The Epidemic of Cancer!

This, I hope is going to be the only time I write a title with Epidemic in it.  I am starting this site as a place to find solutions for curing the disease.  It may be just a place for me to find ways to cure myself.  We are all ego driven, and I will be upfront about that.  I still remember the pain everyday of what I lost.  My body reminds me even though the cancer I hope is gone forever.

I am dealing with other issues that may be related to what I had.  I am writing this journal to explore that possibility and as a way to chronicle what I discover so maybe someone else will find what I write here helpful.

For starters, you should know one in three women and one in two men will experience cancer at some point in their life time.  One in seven women will experience what I had, though when I had the disease it was one in 8.  I want to see the day when that number goes up, not down.  One in a zillion would be nice.

I want to write about my experiences perhaps, though I am writing a script about that, or a fictionalized version of it.  I think what I really want to do is just write things I have found to help me deal with all of it.  I especially want to write things about food and health and exercise that helped.  I think the main reason we Americans are suffering from this plight is that we have traded on quality of life for this false cultural perspective of fitting in.  As a kid I know we all experienced peer pressure.  If one kid sees another kid eating a hot dog or processed food that if you read the ingredients is not really food at all, and that kid is popular and liked, all the other kids follow along.  The peer pressure to fit in and the media driven campaigns of the makers of these processed foods have created a climate where we don't eat right and many of us are not even aware that we are poisoning our bodies.

Don't get me wrong.  I am not a vegan, per se.  I am not some crazed law breaking extremist, though I am an environmentalist.  I think extremists are bad, even if I believe in the cause.  I don't believe in pushing others or forcing change.  I do wish that those who are manufacturing bad stuff for us, would start looking at how many people they know who have had or have cancer.  I've heard say that cancer has existed since the dawn of time.  Well modern technology has made the world a small place.  We can now get medical statistics from all over the world.  I hate to say this, but there are actually hospitals and doctors more advanced than we have in this country.   Or perhaps the way we live explains why we are suffering so much from cancer.  Look at statistics of cancer all over the world and see that we seem to be the ones with the epidemic.  While we have projected this view that we are this great nation with lots of wealth and stability and freedom, our culture has created a health epidemic, and the way the FDA and the health system is set up, we are just feeding the monster.

I confess I am a bit of a moderate liberal.  My own choices side on complete liberalism, but I don't believe in forcing that perspective on others.  Educate and I hope eventually others will see, or at least make some choices for change.  I would love to see profits drop for the manufactures of processed food so they start making choices to make healthier products.  I know that some people are having issues with some of the health food chains for their potential mis-marketing.  By all means make them live up to the standards that they project, but keep in mind some people have to shop at these stores.  I have to live gluten free and lactose free diet now and I can't eat salt water fish, soy or peas.  Well I am trying to cut soy from the diet or consume very little.  Without the stores like Whole Foods and Trader Joe's and my local organic market, I'd starve.  At the same time, I hope that the regular food stores will continue to add healthy items to their selections.  If those who want to make money perceive a demand for a product and that product is healthy, good food, it will be made eventually.  I think that is the one good quality I have found in the sin of greed.  Sometimes it can drive people to do a good thing for others, especially if said good deed makes cash.  And I hate to give this wake up call to some, but I myself see nothing wrong in profiting from helping other people.  It is a win/ win situation all around.  I think we need to start creating the idea that making a profit off of doing something that inspires others or helps others is a good thing indeed. 

OK so now you know.  I plan to put things I find here to help people deal with the cancer.  I plan on talking about things I find that helped me get through the Monster.    I plan on writing things I find that may help others deal as well.  And now I begin.......