6 Impossible Things...

In the words of Alice Kingsley (Alice in Wonderland): "Sometimes I believe in as many as six impossible things before breakfast."

1. "There are drinks that make you shrink."  Red wine.  As one of my sisters said - it makes you lean - lean against the wall, lean against the nearest person to you...
2. "There are foods that make you grow."  Chocolate.
3. "Animals can talk."  My 11 week old King Charles spaniel can make his intentions perfectly clear after only being here for 1 week.
4. "Cats can disappear."  My husband has been gone for a week.
5. "There is a place called Underland."  I think they're talking about Australia.
6. "I can slay the Jabberwocky."  Three whole days have gone by and I haven't thought about having cancer.

Impossible things indeed!

Chemo Day 1 of 2

It's chemo day - the first of two days of infusions.  First up is Caelyx (pegylated liposomal doxorubicin) - a "stealth drug" - it's a slow release product meant to seek, embed and destroy cancer cells over a 28 day period of time.  Caelyx carries some potentially nasty side effects including most of the topics covered on the SunflowerSisters.ca website under Coping with Chemo. 
The procedure for the infusion includes an unpleasant technique whereby they wrap your hands and feet in ice-filled mitts and booties.  I say unpleasant in that it really causes you to freeze - not only your hands and feet. This is supposedly done to prevent the chemo from being overly active in one's peripheries.  One of the common side effects of this chemo is Palmar/Plantar Syndrome - a skin reaction on your hands and feet - blistering, burning, cracking. 
Being a chemo-veteran, I'm ready with my armament of side-effect preventions.  For the first week following treatment, one is prohibited washing dishes - even with rubber gloves on , doing anything with their hands which could cause abrasion - chopping, gardening, rubbing - same for feet - minimum walking - no socks, no loose fitting shoes/slippers.  It may sound like spa-luxury - but you need to elevate your feet - lathered in lotion - for several hours a day; put ice bags around your feet as tolerated; wear spa gloves for retaining hand cream; hold frozen bags as tolerated and drink lots and lots of water, teas and juices. 
Lindi Skincare products are the only ones I have been able to find which were specifically developed to soothe and relieve the effects of chemotherapy and radiation.  Although pricey, the results were clinically proven in a study conducted at Northwestern University, Feinberg School of Medicine.
This morning I started my day with IP6 & Inositol.  It is a chemo-enhancing supplement which must be taken on an empty stomach.  You will find that most major hospitals in the USA have given the the thumbs-up to this protocol.
I'm about to prepare my green juice - it will contain wheatgrass, kale, celery, spinach, apple and most importantly a beet to prevent the constipation which accompanies the steroidal meds needed tonight.
My final and most pleasurable prep this morning is the mind-body-spirit work.  I will practise yoga and then meditate. 
The start of a chemo session is a new beginning - a chance to do it differently - a chance for more understanding - a chance for better awareness and acceptance.  One of my favorite quotes is by the Dalai Lama "Pain is inevitable; suffering is not." I offer up my chemo today for all of my sisters who are suffering - may they realise that it's only pain.

Medicinal Mushrooms

In my recent blog Countdown to Chemo, one of the items on my shopping list was organic full spectrum mushroom powder.  Specifically, I ordered reiki, maitake, shitake and turkey tail mushrooms.  Why?  These mushrooms are categorised as medicinal mushrooms - full of polysaccharides which enhance the effectiveness of chemotherapy and contain indole-3-carbonal - an ingredient found in cruciferous vegetables.  All four mushroom types have demonstrated benefits as being  immune system builders, antioxidants as well as having anti-tumour activity.

The secret to these powerful ingredients is how to use them and how much to consume.  Dr. Richard Beliveau devotes a full chapter in his book "Cooking with Foods that Fight Cancer" to medicinal mushrooms - including detailed explanations per type.

Medicinal quantities of these concentrates are usually up to 1 tablespoon per day each.  That may sound easy, but incorporating them in some beverage to make them "drinkable" is a challenge.
I've been successful in masking their flavour in fruit beverages in limited amounts.  In other words, only putting 1/4 tablespoon each in a glass at a time.

My experiment this morning though, was hilarious.  It started with me putting one tablespoon of each - reiki, maitake, shitake and turkey tail into the blender.  Then I added one cup of plain organic Balkan-style yogurt and tasted it ... YUK!  Then I added about 1/2 cup of almond milk and about 6 huge organic strawberries and tasted it ...No, no, no! Then I added about 2 tablespoons of Blue Agave sweetener and tasted it - hmmmmmm - it started to taste like dark chocolate - and then I added 1 teaspoon of cinnamon and it tasted again - finally - GOOD!
Necessity is the Mother of invention!

To summarize:
1 tablespoon each of reiki, maitake, shitake and turkey tail mushroom powder
1 cup plain organic Balkan-style yogurt
1/2 cup almond milk
6-10 strawberries
2 tablespoons Blue Agave sweetener
1 teaspoon cinnamon


At Live Superfoods Superstore you'll find Medicinal Mushrooms under their Supplements category.


Here is another fascinating book written by the foremost expert in mushrooming in North America:

The volunteer sunflower

For Christmas 2009, my husband and I decided to give each other a very fancy bird feeding station to try to attract our feathered friends to our 10th floor balcony. Needless to say, it was a dismal failure. Even the common house sparrow had more sense than to fly up 10 stories to find food. All that succeeded in happening was a big mess from the wind blowing the seed out of the feeders and onto the patio.

In the summer of 2010, we decided to build a patio garden. Of course, filling up all those containers involves mess and cleanup and somehow or other, seed from the bird feeder must have made it's way into the containers.

And so, amazingly enough, and before the idea of building the SunflowerSisters.ca website was even conceived, a real sunflower sprung up all by itself in one of the containers on our patio. It had several sisters in other containers which also did well.

The SunflowerSisters.ca logo is a genuine photograph which I took of the first and most beautiful volunteer sunflower grown in our patio container.

Deepak Chopra would refer to this chain of events as "synchronicity"...the connection of coincidences, events, themes and images... very appropriate indeed!


Dr. Deepak Chopra's book on the subject of synchronicity is "The Spontaneous Fulfillment of Desire:Harnessing the Infinite Power of Coincidence"