Planning for Battle by: by:
Michael Guthrie, R. Ph.
One of my favorite movies is Braveheart,
starring Mel Gibson. There are many lessons one can learn from watching this
movie, but one in particular applies to the cancer context. It is this: fighting
battles is tough, it takes courage; it takes tenacity, but it is better to die
fighting than to acquiesce to the hopelessness of despair. And, many that choose
to fight win.
Planning for battle requires education. For the cancer
patient, this means learning all you can about every weapon possible, and then
choosing the weapons and strategies that seem right for you. Remember that you
must live with the consequences. It is your life. One of the great failures of
modern Western Medicine is that the paradigm has become 'treating the disease'
rather than 'treating the patient'. I spoke with one lady recently who had been
diagnosed with a metastatic cancer in which she was given no hope for survival.
The story of how she was handled by a particular practitioner was as sad as her
diagnosis. She told me that she received a letter from a specialist advising her
that hers was a 'very interesting case', but unfortunately one in which she had
no chance of survival. This was not 'an interesting case' for the poor patient.
It was her death sentence. Hopefully, most practitioners are more sensitive than
this.
Making informed choices, and accepting responsibility for the
outcome takes courage. This is not meant to imply that patients should make
uneducated or reckless choices. What it does mean is that it is your life, and
that you must be empowered to make the right choice for you. No one else should
have the right to do that whether they are an oncologist, a naturalist, or a
complementary physician. Unfortunately, many choose to give away the future to
'experts' and therefore quit participating in their own healing.
Anne
Frähm, in her book, Cancer Battle Plan, describes what can happen when one turns
their lives over to the experts. Five months before experiencing excruciating
back pain; she was told that lumps in her breast (that she had discovered) were
benign. It turned out that her cancer was not only in her spine, but also in her
head, shoulder, ribs and pelvic bone. Anne realized it was time for her to take
ownership.
In Anne's case, she took advantage of every possible
traditional means available. Radical surgery, chemotherapy, and bone marrow
transplants were all used in her fight. They all failed to stop her cancer. The
cancer was again invading her entire body. Her oncologist believed she was
doomed when she returned from bone marrow transplant with cancer still in her
bone marrow.
Five years later a test done by an oncologist revealed no
sign of cancer in her body. How could this be possible? We'll be exploring that
in the next few articles, hitting the high points of Anne's story, but you are
greatly encouraged to visit our bookstore and
order Cancer Battle Plan.
Anne's plan consists of 6 steps. They are:
Know your enemy.
Cut off enemy supply lines.
Rebuild your natural defense systems.
Bring in reinforcements.
Maintain morale.
Carefully select your professional help.
In the meanwhile, hang in
there. Have a BraveHeart!
