* Take care of some end-things -- organize your papers, decide how much high tech medical intervention is compatible with your values, write a will and a living will, and make known your wishes for your last days and burial.
* Use your asymptomatic time to make some sensible, effective and pleasurable life-style changes, do more of what you love, dare some things you’ve never tried, be of use, love your family and friends, remember all those things you wanted to do some day and do some of them soon.
* Summon your spiritual strength: cultivate a good relationship with the universe.
* Assume the responsibility for your health, and for the rest of your life: you did not cause your cancer but may have unwittingly helped it along through poor choices; that means you can also help it depart by making better choices. And regardless of causes -- taking responsibility for your health is empowering, life-affirming, and can be an adventure in itself. And it may well improve your chances of living longer.
* Deal with regrets; practice forgiveness toward yourself and others.
* Be a difficult patient: refuse to accept medical gloom and doom, refuse to allow the doctor play God and tell you what your allotted time is, refuse to settle for just average care. Make a fuss when things are not right by you.
* And above all, choose hope.
* Keep all your medical records and track the results of your tests over time. That way you will see early any divergences from what is normal for you personally.
* Use current treatments very judiciously; always ask to see the data on the odds of success, and choose only therapies that have good odds of being better than doing nothing. Stay away from high-dose high-toxicity protocols unless you are convinced by the evidence that they offer significant advantages over less toxic protocols.
* If treatment is indicated, try the cold monoclonals first if possible; they may help you weather the time until better things come along.
* If you choose radiation, combine it with some form of hyperthermia.
* If you choose chemotherapy, combine it with some form of immunotherapy.
* Avoid doing any treatment, mainstream, experimental or alternative, shown as largely ineffective in the past but still used on (or by) the unwary.
* Avoid salvage regimens that may beat the disease down a bit for a few months, if you are lucky, at the cost of ruining your remaining health and well being, and stealing the time you have left.
* Avoid palliative treatment in the endstage unless strong evidence has shown that it will alleviate symptoms that are making you miserable. Insist on connecting with a hospice while you still have the time and strength to benefit.
* While living with lymphoma as a chronic disease, or when undergoing treatment, support your body also with a good diet, supplements, exercise, relaxation, and lots of pleasurable activities and love from friends and family.
* Use integrative strategies for dealing with fatigue, side effects of treatment, weight loss and any other bothersome symptom. Demand, and get, effective pain medication.
* If you are daring and resourceful, try Coley’s toxins.
* Experiment with at least one alternative therapy and report to other NHLers on your experience.
* If you choose to use herbal immunomodulators, use only those which are not known to stimulate the type of cell that has gone cancerous in your case, and which are also known to be anti-inflammatory and useful against auto-immune diseases. Be aware that you are a pioneer in this area, with all the risks this entails.
* Protect yourself from future cancers by eating a cancer-preventive diet, avoiding tobacco smoke, and practicing other sensible cancer prevention strategies.
* Use strategies promoting lymphatic health:
-- learn to live without using toxic and irritating chemicals
in your home environment
-- eliminate chronic infections
-- counter inflammatory processes
-- practice detoxification
-- rebuild cellular and intestinal health
-- exercise or do strenuous work nearly every day
-- get a massage regularly
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This is merely an outline. More information will be added to flesh it out. Please send your ideas to add to mine!
Written by Vera Bradova © 1998
Updated 10-1-1998
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