Today’s good choice is Intuition.

I feel I have always had really strong, really good and really really powerful intuition. For the bulk of my life, I remember developing this super early, I remember memories from being very young and knowing about things.

For the bulk of my life, my intuition has been on and spot on at a volume of 2-3. Meaning, I could hear that strong powerful resonate voice in my head, and know what it meant, but it was also pretty easy to take a back seat and be bluntly ignored.

One of the choices I have actively made, as I work to heal my body, to make it stronger, to clean out all the cancer, to sweep the proverbial cobwebs away and be the beautiful person I know I am. …. is to actively turn that intuition up to 11.

At some point after, I believe it was honestly after getting back from my London trip, my intuition and I had this come to Alethia conversation. I recall, discussing things with myself, like an internal meditation, I don’t recall the details of the conversation, so I’m not precisely certain how I turned the intuition up. It was not a fast process, it was like climbing a step ladder that had a thousand steps.

The visual for this process for me, makes me think of one of those temples you find pictures of with so so so so many steps.

From my meditations, I know that I now know how to actively turn up my intuition. I would not say I have mastered this technique, but I would say I understand the fundamentals enough to get myself back to Loud Intuition.

Loud Intuition is so so great. I can’t speak highly enough of this, because bluntly its impossible to ignore. When you are trying to heal yourself, you need your intuition to be screaming at you, like the teacher, like the healer it is…. It knows, you know, what you need, just gotta pay attention and do the work.

I have countless examples of using this loud intuition and having them make my life recently so much better.

Its a pretty new thing for dialing it up, but I have to say that I have yet to find any downside. I am just so much more aware of everything around me, and the easiest, best and most correct path for me to follow. I will say, that it does take the foreknowledge that I’m not responsible for anyone else but myself, and not taking other peoples journeys, but this is a lesson that I had gotten under the belt so to speak long before turning up the intuition.

Intuition is powerful, it is also relaxing and freeing. It feels good, it feels whole, it feels like the best things in life all bundled up in to a warm fuzzy package of love, hope and all the possibilities of the universe.

Highly recommend getting into resonance with intuition. Its a super good choice.

I’m a little torn in writing this blog. I have done Vegetarianism in the past, and dabbled a little bit for short periods of my life in Veganism. – For various reasons at the time, most of which intimately personal and having very little to do with most of the reasons people tend to “go vegan” or go “vegetarian”

With cancer, there is an amino acid – Glutamine, that is helpful for rapid cell growth and proliferation. Unfortunately, its nearly next to impossible to “remove” this super vital nutrient from the body. It is however, possible to significantly reduce its impact, and availability. Thru removing Meat & Dairy.

I did a somewhat/loosely phrased Keto Vegan diet for about 6 months. This was after being diagnosis as having the cancer in my brain. My intuition lead me to remove the meat and the dairy from my diet.

For me this was a drastic change. I can tell you that generally, overall; at the specific time, it was a super good choice. It cased a profound and very intimate thing in my body, and life.

I have always been a dairy girl, I still miss my greek yogurt alot, as well as some of my many favorite cheese friends.

Dairy also produces an inflammatory response in the body, gastro and otherwise. Inflammation is the bread and butter of misery related to cancer. It causes the pain, and the soreness. I do feel that removing the meat and dairy, while very mentally challenging and unpleasant did afford me the extra time to get to the place I am now.

Giving up something to which you have grown comfortable and attached is a healthy thing. It teaches us balance and humanity.

I don’t know that I will always be vegan, infact I suspect that my time with these things is limited. They were very good choices at the time, and they maybe good choices for a time still. But I enjoy dairy, and my body does better with some of the meats – particularly missing fish. I do think I have learned alot along this journey about food.

I do also think that this has taught me how to incorporate a lot more veggies and variety of veggies into my diet in healthy and propitious methods. How to center a meal around veggies and healthy foods, vs just staples of a meat and dairy.

Veganish has this thing with it, that I didn’t subscribe to – with so so much tofu. Tofu is not a good choice for me. Tofu in the USA is GMO, and I will say that GMO does not feel like a good choice for pretty much anyone but I know it is a poor choice for me. I have tried pea protein powder, and one of my biggest struggles with keeping veganism a healthy good choice is NOT being a nutritionist. And recognizing the need for protein, but not feeling competent in insuring I have enough of it.

So maybe its a thing to say that while Veganism maybe a super good choice for alot of people, maybe I’m just not the poster child for it.

Its a good choice for me now, and I’ll continue to follow it – not quite as religiously as others — My indian place has this amazing paneer – not at all vegan, and makes me gastro miserable for like 2-3 days, but tastes so good, and makes my body happy.

I have found myself cheating with little things, not huge amounts, but like “oh that had an egg in it…. or that had a tablespoon of butter”…

I will tell you that once you have been “clean” of meat and dairy for 4 weeks, you will feel EVERY time you eat some of any variety. Whether the sauce had meat stock, or the pancake had butter. Your tummy will tell you, sometimes you can taste – depending upon how good the quality of the product being prepared is – but tummy doesn’t lie.

I will say from the good choice perspective, my stomach much prefers the company of any vegetable over any dairy or meat. its just happier all around. Things go in, and go out in a much more predictable manner, and overall my digestive system works like clockwork, and seamlessly. Its one of the many advantages of Veganism.

I think there is a lot of room in this Vegan headspace for Keto or rather, low carb no sugar to be brought out more, and given more raised awareness.

I feel I did a bit, but not really enough, having to eat to survive.

So in the short – Veganism – Good choice for now, maybe change in 6 months or so.

Okay so I should say, I have had a … issue / fear with needles my entire life. I have never liked them. However, that being said, one of the things I have been aware of is the debilitating ness of fear, and its self disempowerment.

Armed with this knowledge, years ago – maybe 7 or 8 I worked hard to come to more rationale state with my discomfort/fear of needles. To this end, I visited an acupuncturist and got an introduction to it as a healing modality.

Acupuncture is based upon the meridian in the body. It is fundamentally an eastern healing method. It utilizes the energy and strength inherent in the body to fix any stoppages or blocks within that energy that keep things flowing well and fluidly.

Lets talk about this more fundamentally. Our bodies are designed to work perfectly. We often do things that make this perfection work less well. Acupuncture is a specific approach to fixing these bad choices.

I started doing Acupuncture as a part of my self healing protocol around the same time as therapy. I started going weekly.

I have alot ot say about how powerful this experience has been, and the fact that hands down it not only works, it has saved me many times.

Every week I go for a approximately 20-45 minute treatment. Everytime I feel better, stronger and healthier. There have been times I have gotten a cold, gone in gotten a treatment and immediately felt better.

There have been times I have gone in after chemo or after other treatments and felt “bad” the acupuncture treatment has fixed this “bad” and I leave feeling great.

Over one year of treatments, I can say I have never had a mediocre treatment, never had an experience where I didn’t leave feeling more empowered and resonant than before.

I can also controversial speak of the very very few times I have missed a treatment….. going more than 3 weeks without a treatment I didn’t notice, but I did notice that going back it helped fix things I hadn’t noticed were out of wack.

I am honestly enough of a poster child for this treatment, that places I visit on the regular I have a “back up acupuncturist I see”. I always ask for a recommendation for a therapist/office I can see while I travel, but sometimes for one week its just not possible/reasonable to go.

I would highly recommend this good choice for everyone as a small self care thing, that everyone should be doing. It makes doing other smart decisions easier. Making things easier seems like something all of us want.

As to what the actual treatment feels like. …. really it doesn’t feel like much. You laydown, the therapist goes around your body, takes notes, you tell them what you are feeling and needing, they put in needles. You do feel the initial touch from the person, ideally you don’t really feel the needle, and if you do you speak up, the therapist adjusts it and you don’t feel it. They are very very small, and its this crazy thing, they sit in your body, but you don’t really know they are there. They will put them all over your body, to get to the pathways and organ systems. You will feel energy moving, if you are sensitive.

I have a great acupuncturist, that I can’t speak highly enough about, she is AMAZING. Everytime she does a treatment I feel a sense of “complete” when she puts in all the points. If I feel anything missing, anywhere on my body, some spots will itch or sort of burn telling me “hey mention this to her, and ask about what its serving”…. and she will usually put a point in those spots, and I will feel it connect to the other points she has done.

Overtime, I get a sense of when she has finished putting points in, because I feel “set” sort of like doing a perm or a hair color when the hairstylist sits back and goes “time to set”… I don’t’ know if this is from the points themselves or from the feeling from the therapist, I honestly didn’t think too much about it.

I just know, then she leaves me for x amount of time, I lay down and take a nap, because basically I’m just meditating with these things in, and then she comes back and removes them and I leave.

It feels amazing. I usually nap while they are in, sometimes the music keeps me awake, I usually have her use some aromatherapy while she does this, but one of the travel spots doesn’t really do that.

Some Acupuncturist do other things – some are herbalist, some use other healing modalities also. But overall, the acupuncture is the “reason” you are going, and its just incredible.

Most insurances cover some version of this, so I would recommend checking into that first, my particular acupuncturist is a specialist in cancer treatment. Meaning she knows the points to help me deal with side effects and also help my body be strong to kill off the cancer. If you are experiencing a particular physical problem I’d recommend finding one with that speciality. Overall, I would just recommend trying it out for a period of time for yourself, and make notes and reflect how it makes you feel.

I feel this is a super strong good decision, and I also feel if I had any friends or family with Cancer, this and a therapist would be the first on the treatment list.

So these good choices, are apparently going to be so inspiring so as to wake me from a sound speak with the need to be told.

Good choice that I would probably actually call number one, even though its showing up as number 2 which has a lot of ironic things in my world, but I have to say, call it one or two or call it overall “OMG ITS MOST IMPORTANT” one. It woke me, from a sound and restful sleep with a need to be told.

Good choice number 2 is a Therapist. A Psychologist that you pay money, weekly to sit down and listen to you whine, bitch, scream, cry, laugh or just lament about all the good, bad, amazing and life altering things that are going on in your life.

First I would like to point out, that anyone that knows me very much at all, would very easily laugh at me calling this a good choice.

I have been very very self aware for a long time, and I have a very profoundly well developed ego. So in my world, in my life I viewed this as a truly unnecessary thing. Fate tried, thru kind small movies and actions to lead to release the error of my ways. There are alot of really good Youtube and Ted Talks about how important this is, and how it really somewhat relates to having a bandaid on a bleeding wound. Having a therapist is just a no brainer.

It wasn’t until I had a recurrence of my cancer, and found a study in Germany that found that 85% of woman with a recurrent of hormone responsive therapies, being a particular personality type, and that personality type being Type C – which effectively means “people pleasers that are resentful – that please other people at the detriment of their own needs, goals, and aspirations, and recognize these as bad, but keep doing it anyway”

It wasn’t until I read this, and realized that wow, 85% meant it was “probably me” and the type C didn’t seem so far off from me to be a possibility and to recognize that after 46 years if I didn’t have a fix for this, maybe I need to at least consider that I wasn’t as much an expert as I’d thought, and maybe I needed to at least consult with someone who had spent their life work finding truth in life.

For me, Therapy started as me hunting for a therapist that was covered under my insurance, was less than 5 miles from my home, and had a Doctor – a PHD. Because personally, that vanity aspect, if I figured if I was going to talk to someone and share myself with them, they were going to have done enough annoying schooling and jumped thru enough hopes to be “qualified”. I figured a reporte was something that would come later.

In my findings, I happened to have a comical experience at first, because apparently my DR – there are 2 with the same last name, both doctors both covered under my insurance and both 5 minutes away from my house, and my GPS took me to the wrong doctor the first day. She was super kind, and while it was clearly not the right office, it was an office that could also have been the right office.

When I found my doctor, the one I had made the appointment with we laughed about this experience that first day and instantly a reporte was built.

I have been seeing this doctor weekly for over a year. And I can honestly tell you two things. One I have never had a bad therapy experience. There has never been a time, when the hour was up that I did not wish for more time, and that I did not l,eave in a lighter, happier more profoundly fulfilling space than I started. I have walked thru alot of dark places, and shared alot of really intensive information, but it has hands down always felt better to share it.

Second thing, I can honestly say, that this single step is one of the most critical steps for curing cancer, and for helping me as a person. I feel better after these sessions.

Its also worth mentioning for those with no therapy experience, and I can not speak to anyone else, or any other experience, or any other therapist, but I would imagine that my experience is how much “should” probably go. She doesn’t talk much. In the course of our meetings, our discourses, 90% of the talking is all me. Unlike my fears, or expectations she did not have a crystal ball of knowledge that she felt the need to share to “fix” something that was wrong or broken with me. There isn’t anything wrong or broken with me, I’m just fine the way I am. Her job this entire process has been to allow me to have a voice. To be heard. To speak my truth, and to hear it back myself. The few words or times she has spoken, has been to reframe or offer an alternative to how my thought process has evolved. To allow me to see a different perspective about something I am so sure is correct. This different perspective has always been without any agenda or intent, and I have felt quite confident that it would not have made any difference to her if I agreed or disagreed with her opinion and shared information. I am paying her for a service, and that service is to listen to me share my thoughts, privately and selectively and unbiasedly with her. I did not realize how critical this was, I did not realize how life altering this was, and I didn’t realize just like all those ted talks told me years ago, how much my world would improve by just these small baby steps.

Every week I go to her, spend my 35$ copay – at this point free since I have met my out of pocket deductible for the year, and I am so so thankful the universe put this in my path. I feel I will cure my cancer, and I feel I have learned so much about it and myself thru these simple little one hour of my own effort of nothing more than conversation, every week.

Please find a therapist, please go schedule an appointment and please go regularly. Mental health is not a small thing, it controls your entire universe.

Good Choice.

And now I’ve blogged and I can go back to my sound sleep – more good choices to come over more days, I’m super happy to be able to share this one, and the future ones, maybe they will let me get back to my part 3 of the cancer blog again soon <3

I’m trying to write my part 3 of cancer. I realized I had too much to say for one blog post. Part of the issue is that in this part 3 there are so many pieces that really need their own blog.

Many of the things that I have been lead to that are arguable super super good choices. Things I should have been doing my entire 46 years, that have helped me be a better, stronger person, and have allowed me to fight cancer, to learn about cancer and overall have improved my health.

In no particular order, I’m going to blog about each of these things, by defining them first as a good choice. I am not at all saying that the order is the importance for me or for my life. I am also not saying that they are the order I would give to someone else, anyone else.

They are just ordered as they felt important to share.

This is the first of the good choices. I am not going to try and argue for anyone else to make this good choice. I would like to define 2 things that make something a good choice.

One, something I have chosen to define as a good choice. Does not seem to have negatives for me or for anyone that are large enough to prevent a person from making this decision.

Not necessarily calling them a no brainer, because good choices are hard. They require dedication, discipline, and alot of help from outside resources often. However, that being said, the choice, once made and implemented has such wildly positive impacts as to make me, of all people wonder how I could possible have avoided or steered away from this choice for so long. They are things that have literally made my head spin with my own ignorance. I am not one to call myself ignorant lightly. I have spent the entirety of my 46 years trying to snuff out this dragon of ignorance and have found not many things that have made me question my sanity and state of mine.

Good Choice things, are one of those things where in hindsight they are so good that not doing them seems fundamentally lacking in knowledge.

Two, something else about good choices. Every one of the ones I will blog about individually, is that they are overall, relatively simple. They have alot of fundamental parts, and a bit to learn much like reading, was originally. Letters and the concept of these things is a little hard, but once you grasp this, the basics are so easy as to take you to mystical lands thru books and other worlds.

Good choices are simple, and fundamental and are good for all people, whether they are implementable or right for an individual is totally subjective, and I do not claim to know what is best for anyone other than myself.

That is enough preamble about what makes something a good choice. I will refer back to this multiple times, for now, on to what I consider a number one of my “good choice things”. Things I need to document, in order to continue documenting my cancer journey.

Good Choice #1 – Keto.

Lets talk for just a moment about Keto.

its called a diet, and by nature of the fact that everything we put into our mouths is a diet, by that factor alone it is a diet.

I would more call keto a way of thinking about eating.

Our bodies have this miraculous ability to either burn Sugar or to burn Fat, to fuel cells in our body. . The later we burn with so much more efficiency than the former, its actually a significantly healthier state to be fat burning than sugar burning. Cancer cells do NOT share this multi-pronged ability to burn both food sources, they are only efficient at burning Sugar, they are extremely efficient at burning sugar, in fact, they are 10 times more efficient at burning sugar than any other cell in our bodies. So effectively when you supply sugar, or any sugar to our bodies, cancer cells get fed first. They take the bulk of the sugar, and make new roads to feed cancer cells, multiple, grow and spread harm. They do not have a way to utilize ketosis. When you bring your body into a state of ketosis, and allow the rest of our cells to burn using fat, you are effectively helping starve cancer cells.

Keto is about removing sugar and carbs from your diet. This is a hard hard step. Its not really hard physically. the Keto diet feels so good, that its actually extremely long term sustainable. after the initial transition 1-2 weeks into it. You become less hungry, and your body will automatically cannibalize all that extra fat you have storied making it ridiculously fast and easy to lose weight. Its also super formulaic to follow, just don’t eat anything with sugar and limit the amount of carb you are having to lower than the amount of fat you are consuming. The bulk of your food should come from vegetables, and you should not be eating carbs as we traditionally know them. You will be getting plenty of carbs, veggies have carbs. This food plan is not about avoiding carbs, its about avoiding those processed grainy carbs that we all have known for years are not good for us, but we continued to make bad choices and eat them anyway.

Couple of things I will say from personal experience about Keto. The keto “flu” as they call it, the first week or two of transitioning your body into a state of ketosis, where you are not having carbs. It feels precisely like going thru chemo treatments. Exactly like chemo. Having had a lot of different chemo treatments in my life at this point, and having started a very mild chemo the first week I decided to try Keto, I have to tell you that the keto flu for me, was as bad as some of the worst chemo treatments I have had. I felt miserable. There is alot of emotional and psychological attachment to carb in our diet and lifestyle. We feed ourselves carb because it “feels good” or that is what we tell ourselves. We have developed bacteria and fungi in our gut that “enjoy” that feeling of carb, they are not necessarily good bacteria or good fungi. They are just strong at eliciting a brain response that releases chemicals when we eat carbs and other rawer sugars. Thinking of carbs as sugars is how I personally made it alot easier to transition more onto keto. Anything that turned into a raw sugar within a short period of time in my gut, was on the “no list” for what I was eating. This pretty much meant that when I first did Keto, the first few months, I avoided almost every fruit. There are alot of safe keto fruits, and I’m not recommending that everyone do this, its not for everyone. What I will tell you is that anytime you are trying to transition to something that is harder than where you are at, when you are trying to form new brain and body patterns. Doing things the hardest possible way for the first period of time – for me its 4-6 weeks will make it so much easier to adhere later. Basically have to stick to the guns until you have a routine of “no thats wrong” that pops up from your own mind, that you don’t have to think about.

The keto flu – the 1-2 weeks of feeling like you are going thru chemo is a deterent that prevents alot of people from going on this path, from changing over to this keto diet. I will tell you, that if you take my comments about it “being” like chemo, and you realize that basically your body is revolting because much like having cancer, you have been feeding it all incorrectly for too long, and this Dis-ease of feeling like you have been given chemo. Of feeling like you are having the flu, is a last ditch effort of those fungi and bacteria to try and prevent you from doing this good choice. Don’t worry. there will be a point somewhere along the 10 day mark, where you will suddenly be fine. The good bacteria will take over, and suddenly you will wake and have THE BEST day of your life.

When the body transitions into ketosis. When you stop fighting yourself for feeding yourself things that you need, healthy fats, no sugar no carbs. Lots of veggies. Your body will respond with a “thank you” Things will feel great.

Your brain will work better. You will be smarter. You will have rose colored glasses on, because things that seemed impossible will not seem possible. You will have alot more energy than you expected, and suddenly almost too much. You will want to move your body. I’m not necessarily talking about workouts or exercise routines. But suddenly sitting still, all the things we know are “not good choices” become alot more clear, and they just seem alot easier to give up. There isn’t a gold star or a plan needed. Fun movement things just suddenly pop into your head of better ways to take care of your body, that don’t require really much effort at all, because you have energy for this effort.

Alot of people call this diet the “bacon diet”. I laugh at this, because I know where my journey eventually took me, and I will tell you that the coolest most fun part of starting this diet is that “yes, you can pretty much have as much bacon as you want. That isn’t to say that Keto is the bacon diet, just that sometimes when you are moving to something overall more healthy for you, giving yourself something you want is a necessary trade out. So have alot of bacon if that makes you happy. I will say, I didnt’ eat alot of bacon, however I did buy good quality bacon and I used the fat for cooking alot of things. Bacon itself has always been one of those things that smells and tastes so yummy, but my body is like “meh its food” type of things when I eat it. it was Part of my initial Keto diet, but the bacon grease, the fat from cooking the bacon that was part of my world. It was stored in mason jars, and alot of times I’d cook veggies in it. It made a good source of fat, that wasn’t super bad and had a really good taste.

My personal journey took a left turn at albacourkey a long while after starting keto. I will say that there are people that still utilize bacon alot and good for them. The best thing about this diet is, its not about avoiding lean meats, its more about eating a lot of fat. You get to make friends with some oils, olives, avocados. I was morbidly obese, so for me, this fat introduction took a little longer, because I honestly had so much fat on my body that staying in ketosis was more about reducing the carb count than anything else.

There are alot of sources of good macro information about Keto. I can tell you that the fundamentals are more important than the macros.,- at least from my personal experience. I will say understanding the macros is a good idea, and maybe following for those first 4-6 weeks a “plan” where someone has done all the macros for you, so that you ensure that you known what keto feels like, so that you know what to avoid, and what to ensure you get plenty of, would probably be super helpful.

That isn’t and wasn’t me, but that is alot of people. There are alot of people in this world that feel the need for knowing “this data number is right where it is at. This diet – Keto, is known for producing some of the best body builder results hands down in the world. There are alot of very knowledgeable and smart people that follow keto, and they have gold star advice, My goal with this blog is not to at all replace, or even try and replicate that knowledge. My goal is to share only why Keto is a good choice. One of the best choices for me.

Some resources, for people curious that want more information:

There are a few blogs I follow regularly, and people that do videos I find inspiring and engaging. About this topic I’ll give you an army.

My hands down favorite, Thomas Delauer. This guy is living the dream. His blogs are always uplifting, always spot on, and he has very relevant information about Keto from his own personal experience and struggles. He publishes multiple times a week, and his videos always seem timely.

Another great source, that is reliable usually amusing, and chock full of great sugar information, as well as a woman following keto that happens to cook like its going out of style – making alot of replacement things that you “want” but know you shouldn’t have, that now she provides you with “keto” alternatives. Keto Connect with Matt & Megha.

This third one, I don’t really list down for Keto, but he has alot of good information about health in general, and is one I follow. He has spoken about keto and has alot of good information, he covers much ore broad topics, and covers some interesting topics about cancer. Dr. Berg

I will say, in my personal journey I was very very blessed, that the local farmers market “happened” to have a keto bakery, that filled my kitchen with a few “fake things” that helped me during the first few months of transitioning to Keto. The transition is only hard mentally. I wanted those carbs back. I wanted those sugars back. I had made poor choices for 46 years, and those poor choices were defining a lot of my choosing ability at this time. Utilizing some of her quick recipes for fat bombs and using her yummy baked fake out deserts helped me get through my routine, and move on to making my own plan with less replacement things, and more real foods that suddenly tasted alot better. But I will say, having her recipes for chocolate chip cookies, that were keto approved did help make the transition alot less painful.

I will say, this is alot more than I intended, for this first “good choice” Keto is a good choice. Enough said.