A Long, Grey, Cold Winter - but here's hoping . . .

After a slightly difficult January, my situation seemed to have stabelised, although doesn't suggest any major impovements.  The most wonderful thing is that the sense of peace and freedom from pain, all but from discomhort throughout my dear old fatigued body, enables me continue to do quite a lot - though very, very slowly.

Both Liz and I feel very supported by family, friends and our medical our team.  The latter seems to be expanding by the day.  We now have regular close contact with an excellent GP, a cancer support lady in the urology department, a cancer support nurse at the hospice, expertise from the Yeleni support charity and, hovering in the background, my oncologist.  

Here are the blog entries for the first half of February:

3^rd February 2025
So far no weight change – 81 kg. However I'm finding it easier to get my right slipper and shoe on. I'm also sleeping beyond five without having to finish the night on the sofa. My 'poddling' seems to be more stable though my writing is inconsistent. It needs a varying amount of editing and sometimes write 'gobbledygook'. Thank goodness for spellers! 

10th February 2025
On Friday I had an Echocardiogram at the hospital. I felt so relaxed while the technician took the readings I nearly dozed off. After the tests she took my blood pressure and remarked, “Wow!” Surprising coming from somewhat reticent person. My BP was 111/56!

Daughter and grandson cleared out the eves cupboards over the week end while I supervised. Although I was seated, it was hard work for me and I needed to rest, although I wasn't exhausted.

The results were given to my GP the following Monday and showed my heart to be in pretty good condition. Although my daily weight measurements showed little variance (790 Kg to 801 Kg), swelling in my legs, especially my right leg, had significantly reduced and I was finding it easier to put on my socks and shoes. (The new diabetic socks - looser and softer - are briliant - I've been putting  them on unassisted. I am walking more easily and am more stable in my movement - at least in the morning.  I do slow down notcingeably in the afternoons.

My GP has reduced Fuerocimide to one tablit and booked another appointment for 28^th Feb. It's really good to maintain consistency with my GP. I asked about the possibility of setting up regular biometrics, such as for strength, stability and stamina. She thought it a good idea but didn't know of any such services. She suggested talking to the palliative care team member team whom I see on Friday. Perhaps my kinesiologist would help. I'll ask.

12th February 2025

Here's a copy of a letter to my kinesiologist:

I saw my very helpful GP on Friday and asked about having intermittent assessments of stamina, stability and strength. This, I thought, might provide guidance as to the prognoses of the various conditions I have. This in turn should give an early warning system to help me plan ahead rather than react to emergency.  Not having pain is good but it's difficult to be objective with such subtle and intermittent changes. My GP doesn't know of such a service in the NHS!!  So I wondered whether such a assessments might be possible in your field.

I'm pleased to report that I'm getting consistent support from one GP now.  She has changed my medication and as a result I'm finding it easier to get upstairs.  What do you think?

***

I sleep well from 11ish to 2 or 3 a.m. but the pain in my right ankle or simple inability to sleep gets me out of bed to the sofa. I use a torch rather than main lights to keep the room ambience low.  The pain stops immediately. A hot oatmilk drink, two sugar-free biscuits and the read of a few pages of a book and I'm soon asleep.  I then sleep soundly until 6 or 7 a.m. - sometimes nearer 8. 

 15th February 2025

We had a home visit from a nurse who is a member of the Specialist Palliative Care Team. The team consists of nurses, doctors and other healthcare professionals with expertise and training in palliative care. They can offer help when palliative care needs are complex such as:

• Assessment and ongoing review of your symptoms

• The opportunity to talk through distressing feelings

• Help with planning how you would like to be cared for as your condition progresses and at the end of your life.

• Support and advice for the people who are important to you.

• Information, support and advice to the healthcare professionals supporting you.

The hour and half session was very thorough and easy to understand.  We both felt we understood at least the most important aspects of the support which is to be provided. So now we have a good team: our excellent GP, oncology services, such as scans et cetera, provided by the hospital (Macmillan Renton Unit), specialist palliative care team member and our urology cancer contact.

At this time most of my needs are likely to be met by my GP but there are a number of things that the palliative care team will be providing. Notably an assessment of my current physical condition through scans and perhaps physiotherapy, which I have suggested cover strength, stamina and stability. I am hoping that a report following this meeting will be made available to me.

***

Sleep is variable. Last night I woke up at about 1.30 a.m. and tried to stay lying on my back. This did seem to prevent the pain in my right ankle but it didn't help me get to sleep. I got up, made a hot drink containing a little whiskey, settle on the sofa and read a little. Slept about four, went to the loo and went back to sleep until 8.30, when Liz woke me up. My ankles, though still somewhat swollen are not as soon as they were. It's easier to get my socks on, especially with the new soft and stretchy sorts. And easier to get my slippers and shoes on.

I do have to keep searching for words and failing to find them. Is this old aphasia or simple old age – difficult to tell. I now write down words and phrases that I regularly have to search for so that I can look them up in my journal. Strange that I know what I'm looking for in terms of meaning but cannot articulate the words themselves.

In recent weeks I've found myself having to take the stairs one at a time. I can take three stairs and then have a short rest but the last four or so are hard work. This is especially so last thing at time and even carrying water bottles increases my difficulty. My left leg is definitely weaker than my right and slimmer too, although it may be that the right leg is a bit a bit more swollen than the left.

I feel contented in myself. I feel no serious pain, only slight and intermittent discomfort and have no anxiety about what is going on in my body, which remains stable as far as I can tell.  

My Cancer Diary January 2025

The succession of urinary tract infections followed by repeated atrial fibrillation attacks and months of broken nights of sleep left me feeling a decided loss of vitality – I call it 'flatness'. I'd not been contemplating or meditating much and have found myself dozing a lot. My stability declined, especially in the early mornings and evenings. I now have to ascend stairs one at a time, though gravity helps me descend normally, but not too quickly I hope.

However, by the end of January I began to emerge from my hibernation. I seem to have more stability and am still without pain, only minor and intermittent discomfort when I walk ('poddle'). My flatness has slowly lifted and by the end of the January I was feeling a greater sense of vitality again. Maybe the medications my GPs have pouring into me are making are a difference – pharmaceutical man? Liz has been wonderful during this floppy time, cheerfully enabling me to rest when I need to, and that's been quite a lot.

Here are the latest blog entries. Thanks for the encouraging feedback. 

13th January 2025
I took a urine sample to our surgery this morning and got a UTI test done immediately. The nurse was concerned and booked an appointment that afternoon. Brilliant. The GP suggested that the UTI may have to do with a spasm in the bladder, common in people my age (so many things are!). It needs further investigation. Later that day the reception phoned to say that a telephone appointment had been arranged for me the next day.

My life does seem to be filling up with medical appointments and my mind has little space to contemplate much else.  This is noticeable as I make fewer entries in my journal.  I'm also finding it difficulty to fit in important jobs like publishing.  I get very tired.

14th January 2025
Helped direct our gardener/handyman to sort out our disaster of a garage.  After lunch Liz took me to the audiologist where successful adjustments were made.  Liz did some shopping on the way home slept while I slept.  By the end of the evening I was shattered.  In my condition it's surprising how little little is!

15th January 2025
In the telephone interview the GP asked me to obtain a blood sample for anaemia. I looked up the NHS site and discovered I appear to have seven out of ten symptoms. Feeling decidedly fatigued today but I'm doing what I can do to keep keep active.

17th January 2025
Phoned the surgery at midday. The report showed blood test satisfactory. However my excellent GP tried to phone me three times, lucky on the third, to tell me the test was not OK. I have an ecoli infection and although I have slight anaemia, but nothing to worry about. Might an iron supplement help?  The GP checked with the pharmacists and I was prescribed an antibiotic.

19^th January 2025
Today my urine is clear. However the Solifenicine has no apparant effect yet. I still pee small amounts frequently.

20th January 2025
Set my alarm for 7 a.m. and rather wish I hadn't.  I lay for a while to gaim stability but that didn't help. Stability is difficult is difficult first thing in the morning but often I need a pee - rather urgently - and in danger of a leak!     My eyesight was very fuzzy and remained so at 10 a.m. I had to pause on the stairs. Feeling decidedly limp. Great difficulty getting my socks on!  By lunchtime I hegan to feel better.

22nd January 2025
Liz accompanied me to my rescheduled appointment with my oncologist. After a two hour wait I encouraged her to go to her village meeting and for me to take a taxi home. (£37! but worth it).  It was another hour before I saw my oncologist. There had been a catastrophe with a patient and instead of rescheduling, though it seemed a sensible thing to do as a three hour backlog was impossible, doctors were still trying to see patients. As a result the consultation was rushed. I was told that I was being referred to the hospice as their appeared to be nothing more to be done. It wasn't a surprise but I did expect to be told in a more gentle and empathic way. 

As I left the consultation room the full impact of the news hit me. I went to the Macmillan unit and asked to use the quiet room. An member of the Macmillan staff accompanied me as I didn't want to be alone. I explained what happened and was soon in tears. I don't know how long I was there but it was extremely helpful. We were able to share a lot.  My Macmillan companion found it helpful too.

The next day I was shattered and we cancelled our trip to Worcester. I was especially wobbly when I first got up and fell back onto the sofa three times before I was able to gain a modicum of stability. Slept most of the morning but ate a good lunch and felt better by the evening.

24^th January 2025
Today I phoned our children – the first time I've ever got through to all but one in one go. They were upbeat and supportive, as I expected. They will pass on the information to the grandchildren (all over 20 now).

25^th January 2025
Having had time to reflect on that awful consultation I emailed the family to say that I didn't sense the situation was immanent. I think the oncologist maybe had had  misjudged – has always misjudged – how well I am. O.K. I know my illness is terminal but has been for 10 years, but I have an inner vitality and am not in pain, only minor discomfort, and no serious anxiety about my deteriorating condition.

We will continue to prepare for what needs to be put in place so that we can make as smooth a transition to what will be. Writing, especially typing, is difficult. It's about dexterity. A lot of editing is needed and I still get letters and words wrong,

My urine looks clear.

27^th January 2025
Saw a GP about swollen ankles. On 6^th Jan the doctor took me off Furosemide because of side effects (diarrhoea) and doubled my dose of Bisoprolol. Although the increased Bisoprolol stopped the atrial fibrillations he left the ankles untreated! A different GP put me back on Furosemide until Friday to try to drain off the fluid – side effects or not.

I took a posti-antiobitic urine sample sample to surgery.

28^th January 2025
This morning my urine looked a little cloudy. By the afternoon I was peeing more than usual as should be the case with Furosemide but no sign of diarrhoea. I haven't had the test results yet.

This morning I received a pdf of the letter from my oncologist to the hospice – most reassuring. It's much more what I thought the situation was but needs updating. However, soe of informaion was wron.  I was only on Pazopanib for four weeks before my oncologist withdrew withdrew me from it because it was endagering liy liver. I then had three weeks on half a dose when the after effects kicked in again and I withdrew from that treatment. I had been offered chemo in June 2015 but declined it. I had expected to have a few good years but not 10! The details of that part of my journey are to be found in chapter two of 'What my Doctors Didn't Tell me About Cancer'.

The letter mentioned aphasia as being intermitent but not neuropathy which is consistent! I shall hope to get a properly reserched  assessment which may give some idea of possible prognoses.  To date, apart from scans and radiographer's reports, I've only had hypotheses as to what the causal implications are.

30^th January 2025
The UTA returned! I booked an emergency appointment with a senior GP intent on getting a consultation with a specialist. He suggested that, although he could write a request he couldn't force a satisfactory response. Instead he recommended putting me on a week-long course of antibiotics followed by three month's of low-dose, slow release antibiotics. That seemed quicker and more immediate to me. He's also doubled the dose of Furosemide to be taken in the mornig. I observed that my pee volume was still low though the urgency has calmed. If all this doesn't work we may have to resort to a catheter, and that would be OK. At least I wouldn't need to get up at night.

Felt more chipper this morning. Maybe the Furosemide is working. I have a check up on the swollen ankles tomorrow. An appointment has been made for an echocardiogram on 7^th Feb.

We had a telephone call from the garage in Worcester (25 miles away). We've had to postpone the appointment twice, the second time as I was unwell. They are going to collect and deliver the car free of charge! What a relief and what kindness!

31st January 2025

Another GP appointment to check the swollen ankles. I'm to weigh myself naked every morning and record my weight for a week. Also to keep up the double dose of Furosemide.

The strory continues . . .

January 2025 Blog

Welcome to 2025.  May all that you need for wholeness and health be enabled within you and for you.

From now on my blogs get more personal.  In each blog entry I'll be pointing you to entries from the My Cancer Diary link.  I will simply post the details of how to find the starting point for the latest section.  Here's the link: https://brianscancerjourney.blogspot.com/   So please scroll down the My Cancer Diary to 19th December 2024 for the latest entries,

 

Jumping Doctors

 Many doctors are no less prone to jumping to conclusions than we are, and that is understandable. In our current system, with only a few minutes to see a patient, they have to make decisions quickly. Fortunately, most of the time they probably get it right. Even more fortunately it's well known that most patients who present with an illness at their general practitioner would get better in time even without medical attention. If most people realised that their doctor would have more time for patients who are really ill rather than those who want an itch or minor ache to be treated by the 'full Monty' of medical attention available.

Sadly things do go wrong. Sufficient attention is sometimes not given to what could become a serious condition. For this reason we do need to be our own 'self-advocates' at least some of the time. Of course we don't want to become full-blown hypochondriacs but we do need to be sensitive to our own bodies and not leave everything to the doctor.

In my own case, what was presumed (I won't say 'diagnosed') to be a sebaceous cyst was operated on and discovered it wasn't. The wound was stitched up without taking a biopsy, although I had by then had a long history of cancer, and I was referred to a dermatologist. He took one look at my lump, declared it to be a lipoma, and told me that the NHS would not treat it since it was considered cosmetic and not harmful. If it became painful then, I was told, I could refer myself back to my GP. Some months later it did become uncomfortable so I contacted my GP by phone. He confirmed that he would be unable to get the funding to do the operation. The discomfort was not great so I left it, but within a few weeks another GP took a look at it in relation to quite another matter and noticed the lipoma. He asked if a scan have been taken and told him it hadn't, which caused a raised eyebrow. "I don't like the look of that," he said, and referred me to a specialist in Birmingham. I was given an MRI and PET scan which revealed the lipoma had turned into a sarcoma. It was decided that this was not immediately operable and best left to be observed. A few months later and the sarcoma had penetrated the skull and I now have a tumour on the left parietal lobe of my brain. Over the last four or five months this is now inducing neuropathy which affects my walking and is beginning to affect my speech a little.

Fortunately I'm not in pain. My walking difficulty is an inconvenience but as with all my other tumours they do not cause me any anxiety or fear. I find this to be a continuous wonder and realise how few cancer patients are in this state of mind. Bill Bengston, who's been experimenting successfully healing mice for 50 years, I still haven't fathomed what's going on, and have no more than some speculative ideas on what may have helped my current state.

Although throughout my 15 year journey with cancer I have never been in anguish about my condition, there have been times of considerable anxiety. An important turning point came in 2023 after treatment with acupuncture and I began to experience periods of deep peace. What developed from that was the result of work, begun by my acupuncturist and continued with my kinesiologist. Yet the foundations may well have been my some 40 years of meditative and contemplative practices. This may have helped me to look at the situation more open-mindedly than I had done. I have to say that I am not committed to any religious point of view although I have been influenced by religious and spiritual ideas from many sources.

I suspect that my focus on mind, exercise, diet and support (MEDS) has helped maintain a healthy immune system. I'm now on the lowest doses of three medications and taking recommended supplements. I'm not obsessive about any of this and am open to ideas from others. What I find myself experiencing much of the time is what one of my 'wise ones' might call, peace that passes all understanding. And you may make what you will of that. How long this will last I cannot know, but I trust that Life will always seek the best that can be under the circumstances, and I'm happy to rest in that.

New Moon, New Phase?

At this time of year, mid-November, the mediaeval houses of our village glow with gentle moonlight. The ancients believed it was a time of renewal and certainly over the last few months we began to realise that our journey with cancer is entering a new phase. But should we regard a new beginning with trepidation or hope? I think the latter. What about you? That would be an interesting conversation to have.

Since late 2022 I’ve had considerable variability in my stamina. There have been times when I could walk three miles, others when I could only manage one, and yet others when I could only just manage to walk to the village and back. Kinesiology has helped but eventually, when it was suggested (not diagnosed you note) that the tumour in my brain was causing neuropathy, I realised I would need medication to mitigate the effects. This means the brain connections that coordinate physical movement, such as walking and to some extent recognising and expressing myself are being affected. I’ve been asked to hand in my driving licence and have a Blue Badge for parking. I may even consider a mobility scooter although I will walk as much as I can. The reason for the scooter is so that I can go further from the village and still enjoy the peace and solitude of our lovely Herefordshire countryside.

Fortunately, I am not in any serious pain. However at one time I was experiencing cramps in my feet and hands. This has stopped, although I still get cramps in either of my fingers and thumbs. The main problem is it takes me twice as long to do anything. So, although my to-do list looks easy to achieve, by the end of the day I will only have done half of it.

In all this I have to say that I remain positive and content. I seem to have reached a place of peace that passes all understanding. I don’t know how, when or whether this condition will change in the coming months. I am just resting in the moment, not withstanding eventualities.

Having said that, I continue to do all that seems appropriate to maintain life and love, and that largely in terms of my MEDS: Mind, Exercise, Diet and Support. In terms of support I am greatly blessed by my dear Liz, family and friends, especially our village friends for I continued to be well supported. There are so many in need far greater than mine. I don’t do intercessory prayer (nothing wrong with that) but I do send loving kindness to those of the many who need our support. I use a little blessing which some of you might find helpful. It goes like this, “May all that you need, ALL that you need, be enabled within you and for you.” (And for those whose beliefs need evidence, there are over 5000 experiments showing that our good intentions affect this wonderful material world).

One of my favourite poets, John O’Donohue, wrote, “It is strange to be here. The mystery never leaves you.” As life progresses it becomes even more mysterious. To my mind, if we allow it, rather than trying to force it or repress it, it can become yet more wonderful to us still.

I’m reminded that many elderly aboriginal people come to realise that it’s time to move to the next phase of existence. They quietly leave the village and find a place of solitude where they can allow themselves to pass naturally to whatever might be. But no, I’m not going to lie down in the shelter of one of Mike Ware’s fields to be found by the Saturday walkers - but you get the drift of what I mean.

 

Travelling at the Speed of Life

When we lived on the outskirts of Bristol I cycled to work most days along the busy A38. I noticed that when I first started out on my journey I would be travelling at a steady pace. But as the traffic speeded by I soon found myself trying to keep up. From this experience came one of my little aphorisms: "Don't get caught up in other people's rush hours."

 It's very easy to find oneself rushing to get somewhere or do something simply because other people are rushing too. Or it may we're anxious and our autonomic nervous system is using up its nervous energy faster than we need to. Another cause of hurrying is when trying to finish a job I really don't want to be doing. My mind isn't on the performance of the task in hand, but rather it's end. I'm not living in the now, but sometime in the future when I can be doing something more to my liking. The way we live is strongly influenced by the systemised society we live in. It's largely driven by expectations that are not healthy and indeed positively unnatural.

I guess that over thousands of years 'our kind' (as I like to call humanity), has become less and less aware of the natural world and our intimate relationship with it. That's pretty quick in geological time. No time at all in terms of evolution. That we are becoming less aware of our intimate connection with the whole of nature is become more clear by the day. In turn many of us are becoming less sensitive to our own natural connections. This leaves us vulnerable to the dictates of our systems, including medical systems. Without an inner sensitivity we may accept treatments and take medical advice that may or may not be appropriate. I've noticed among the doctors that that I've consulted over the last 15 years a variety of attitudes towards different aspects of treatment. Some are more sensitive than others. Some I trust more than others. Some I need to question more than others. And there are some I found it necessary to ignore altogether.

This is a situation which is partly learned through research and partly sensed. Because we are all so different we really have to discover our own path here, which is not easy. There is always a temptation that we want to analyse and rationalise things. We want to tie things down, making certain, have total confidence in our decisions, but that's not possible. Any honest doctor will admit that, sadly, the pressures of our overstretched and underfunded NHS often don't allow our medical teams enough time to fully consider the implication of the many decisions they are making.

But we can be the arbiters of our own decision-making – our own self-advocates. On several occasions I've put off making a decision until I have an opportunity to research the implications of what treatment is being offered. I know for certain that on one occasion I did rush into chemotherapy because I thought the situation was becoming urgent. That decision was a bad one because within a few weeks by never had been adversely affected and I was taken off the drug. Unfortunately I decided to accept that medication at at a lower dose but that turned out badly as well. Had I done my research and listen to my body I might have taken more time to sense-feel what my inner nature might have been able to tell me. Two years later and my oncologist's prediction of the degree of imminence was unfounded.

Our bodies decision-making doesn't operate in terms of linear space and time. For instance our bodies replace two million cells every second. Surely that must be faster than the speed of light! It's our brains, and in particular our thoughts and fears and anxieties that slow things down. So let's take time to travel at the speed of life and listen to the gentle conversation that we can have with our bodies.

"To know our nature is enlightenment.
To not know our nature is disastrous.
Knowing our nature, one is accepting
If you are accepting then you are merciful.
If you are merciful then you are noble.
If you are noble then you are like Heaven.
If you are like heaven then you follow the [Way of Nature].
If you follow the [the Way of Nature] then you are sustainable."

The Secret Tao: Uncovering the hidden history and meaning of Lao Tzu by D. W. Kreger

Belief is Never Enough

 

This blog is a reiteration of an understanding that has become central in importance to me over the last 15 years; the last nine in particular.  This is my seminal message about accepting and not resisting the situations we're faced with, no matter what they are. I realise how contrary this is to our way of thinking. Our 'warrior culture' wants to be in control and use whatever ever force is necessary to bulldoze obstructions from our path.

We have all developed a lifelong habit of looking at ourselves in a mirror and always seeing our image the wrong way around.  Our news media give us a continuous stream of negativity creating the impression that 'No news is ever good news'  Though our ego-selves would prefer 'business as usual' maybe it's time we stopped being ego-slaves.  Stop for a while long enough to notice nature. As an old Chinese sage said, “Serenity and peace is the norm of the earth.” Wars end, most people recover from illness, most live to an old age, and most people are doing good things to most other people most of the time. Maybe carrying an image of ourselves that's the wrong way round is not so clever after all.

We have each made up a sense of ourselves from images created by other peoples' images of us. It's unavoidable.  However, most such self-images are “good enough for jazz”, as my musician friends say.  But a diagnoses of any serious illness, especially a terminal one, can confront some, maybe most of us, with a level of truth about ourselves we may not be ready for.  At first this will almost certainly appear terrifying.  Yet when we let our barriers down and begin to realise (make real) this new found freedom of acceptance from our old self can bring us, many find themselves living our lives in quite different ways.

It's all about allowing and letting go, which is an amazingly simple thing to do. Just letting go of something we're holding means relaxing and allowing gravity take the object into the waste bin.  Simple yes, but easy, no!   It should be easy on the face of it, but our ego-self is born out of contrariness.  Our beliefs about having and keeping control in order to keep secure (which may merely mean 'familiar'), can bind us to our beliefs both mentally and physically like steel cables.  But belief is the weakest level of understanding.  For many people belief doesn't need evidence or proof.  It just needs a strong feeling.  If that feeling is strong enough, and for billions of people it is, then are capable of absolutely absolutely anything, no matter how ridiculous it may seem.  We only need to listen to statements made by American politicians to prove that!  The trouble is the emotional impacts of our beliefs are not only mental, they affect the body too.

Subtle energies, the job of which are to flow through the body supporting the gross energies of our physical biochemistry, can become trapped in physical organs like whirlpools among currents in a river.  It was whirlpools like these that were found in my body through working with my acupuncturist and kinesiologist.  The enabled the release of these energies. Of such energy a Chinese sage said 2500 years ago, “It blunts all sharp edges, It unties all tangles, It harmonies all sights, it unites the world into one whole.”   I hope this may give you a tiny inkling of the way in which we can work with nature's energies at different levels of our bodies and minds as well as those of the world around us.

In trusting such processes and working with open minded awareness we can find ways to explore such avenues as these. But I must stress those words 'trust', 'open minded' and 'awareness'. At the outset of our exploration being an intense believer is in the processes and therapies is not necessarily helpful.  In such situation we can carry a lot of preconceptions. Neither should we be dyed-in-the-wool sceptics.  Leave a few cracks in your mental roof to let the light get in.  Don't believe or think you know.  Don't expect for an outcome or a failure. Watch and listen with a healthy detachment.  If we can be still enough and silent enough and open enough, something wonderful will happen.

I meet a lot of cancer patients, many of whom have been under treatment for a along time. All the ones I know are positive and hopeful even though, like me, some are aware they are terminal. I suspect most people find their way through the darkness to a place of peace.  I don't know if any have had counselling; somehow I suspect not.  Maybe at such times there is an inner 'counsellor' - a sense in which wisdom arises out of such circumstances.  Belief is never enough.  

May peace, love and joy fill your days and all that you need be enabled within you and for you.
Contact me on the blog if you want a chat.

(Not edited by Liz
 

Sugar is Sweet but You Are Not!

This week I'm sharing a number of thoughts on dietary matters which I hope you'll find helpful. 

*** 

In my book I wrote some information that was not as useful as I thought it was. Let's face it, I was wrong! There, in black and white, I'd asserted, on what I thought was good authority, that cancer took in seven times more sugar than normal cells. I apologise. However, we should nevertheless cut back on sugar, especially refined or 'free sugars', which are absorbed more quickly than natural sugars such as fruits. In fact, it's astonishing how little we need to fuel our bodies - less than a teaspoon full, it seems 'Free sugars' are such as biscuits, chocolate, flavoured yoghurts, breakfast cereals and fizzy drinks, where either manufacturers, chefs or home bakers top up the sweetness to make a 'special treat'. (Some ice creams and cakes can have 30 to 45% of sugar!)

Here's the link to the Cancer Research UK site

When we take in more sugar than we need - and in our world of highly processed foods that is almost inevitable - our bodies convert the excess sugar into fat. In ancient times that was no problem. For millions of years we scavenged, gathered and hunted for food and a good meal, sometimes any meal, was not always available. Therefore when an opportunity arose to gorge on animal fat or honey, we took it without hesitation. In these situations it wouldn't be long before the excess fuel was burnt off. Nowadays we can gorge ourselves on sweet and fatty food throughout the day and obesity is one of the greatest causes of illness in the Western world.

So, whereas we know that sugar doesn't cause cancer, and neither does sugar itself make cancer worse, being fat does. Most importantly an addictive sweet tooth reduces our ability to maintain our fitness levels and therefore reduces our immune system's efficiency.

An alternative to sugar might be sweeteners, but this isn't altogether safe. Some sweeteners known as polyols (such as sorbitol, xylitol and erythritol) can have a laxative effect if consumed in large amounts and some of their E numbers, whilst approved for human consumption, are not the most natural food stuff to be consuming.

Sweeteners approved for use in the UK include:

• acesulfame K (E950)

• aspartame (E951)

• erythritol (E968)

• saccharin (E954)

• sorbitol (E420)

• steviol glycosides (E960)

• sucralose (E955)

• xylitol (E967)

Combinations of some colour additives have been linked to negative effects on children’s behaviour, in particular hyperactivity and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Used in soft drinks, sweets and ice creams, they include:

• Sunset yellow (E110)

• Quinoline yellow (E104)

• Carmoisine (E122)

• Allura red (E129)

• Tartrazine (E102)

• Ponceau 4R (E124)

Maybe the main problem with sweeteners is that they stimulate our desire for sweetness and therefore may leave us with a craving for sugary things like chocolate. When, on my MEDS regimen, I cut back on sugar it wasn't long before my sweet tooth became less of a craving. When Liz served up a delicious pudding at a dinner party I thought I'd make the exception and tucked in with gusto. I was pleased to find I couldn't eat more than a couple of spoonfuls. But I do like a digestive biscuit now and then so I got some sugar free ones. Feeling able to indulge more freely I soon found myself wanting more sweet things so I cut back on sweeteners too.

***

Supplements

For some time I've been taking quite a lot of supplements, mostly after breakfast. It was time I investigated whether it was OK to take so many tablets together. It didn't take me long to find it wasn't. There are certain times of day when it's more betterto take supplements than others. Here's what I found about my personal collection of capsules, recommend by my by doctors, nutritionists, a mycologists and my kinesiologist:

Morning

2 x 500mg capsule Reishi

1 x 500mg capsule Cordyceps

1x Probiotic (9 billion mixed bacteria capsule)

Teaspoon full Prebiotic (wheat bran)

1 x 400 mg capsule Saw Palmetto

1 x 400 mg capsule Sulforaphane : 30 minutes before or 2 hours after a meal

Lunch

1 x Vit D3 25 mg capsule with main meal

1 x Vit B6 30 mg capsule

Evening

1 300 mg capsule Magnesium citrate

1 x 400 mg capsule Saw Palmetto

It was relatively easy to look up the volumes, doses and frequencies for my supplements.

But let's not over obsessed with the 'whys' and 'wherefores'. My sense is we should build up a good understanding of sound information which we retain. This becomes the foundation of good habits which are largely automatic. I don't want to become a boring pedant who talks of nothing but his regimen.

The Silent Healing of Inner Peace

“All of humanity's problems stem from
[our] inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”

Blaise Pascal

I'm sure we've all experienced what I call the 'waiting room syndrome'. The young man is disappointed by the sign 'SWITCH OFF YOUR PHONE'. Since Covid, there are have been no magazines in the rack – not even women's magazines. He doesn't know any of the other patients and no one's giving eye contact – not that he'd welcome it. He's read the noticeboards – twice – and is tapping his foot impatiently waiting for the screen on the wall to show his name. But might it be pleasant to be able sit in quiet contentment rather than in a state of constant agitation?

There is a simple way to find inner peace. Simple, yes, but not easy for most people. However, if we can be open enough and still enough and silent enough for long enough, something wonderful happens. It just takes patience and practice.

We used to teach our management trainees that it take three weeks to learn a new habit. That depends on individuals, but 21 days is probably a good average. Ideally that may mean doing a certain kind of activity deliberately every day, whether that's a physical task or a mental one. Repetition of any kind builds those habits into our autonomic nervous systems so we don't have to think much about the task any more. Our bodies know what to do and get on with it. We find ourselves performing a lot of daily routines in this way: driving a car, unloading a dishwasher, cleaning our teeth or taking tablets. So developing the habit of finding inner peace is no different from any of these activities. It's a matter of regularly bringing our minds and bodies into harmony. At first this will be for only short periods of time, but with practice, we find ourselves becoming more and more comfortable just doing nothing. That alone will boost our immune systems, considerably improving the levels of health they can achieve. If we're dealing with a serious illness, like cancer, the less day-to-day work we give our immune systems the more they can be put into dealing with our sick cells.

If we've never practised inner silence before, we'll need a long lead in. It's may not be helpful to throw ourselves into to a 20 or 30 minute meditation session. That's usually a road to disappointment. I've met a lot of people who say they've tried meditation and it didn't work for them. The reason is simple and it lies in that word 'tried'. Trying to do nothing is a contradiction in terms. We have to stop trying and allow our minds to come to rest. When we can do that, even for a minute or a few seconds, we need to pay attention to what we feel in our bodies as our minds pause from their incessant thinking.

The simplest and easiest way to begin practising inner silence is likely to be mindfulness. This practice has been said by psychiatrists to have made one of the most significant contributions to improved mental health over the last 20 years. It's something we can do at any time of the day, particularly when carrying out some routine task such as washing up or unloading the dishwasher. As I said before, this is a job that we do regularly so has become part of our autoimmune system. We don't have to think much about it. But once we can practice mindfully we can change a chore into a most pleasurable aspect of our day with considerable health benefits.

It is important to pay attention to the way we move our bodies: slowly and gracefully. We should also notice how every item we touch feels: texture, temperature, weight and shape. Take an attitude of loving kindness to everything. The warmth and soapiness of the water, the feel of the shape of the crockery, the hardness of the cutlery, the way we set items on the draining board. As we do this we enter into a different relationship with everything. These are not just objects we are handling. They are entities which consist of interrelated atoms all moving in harmony with each other. By paying attention to how they feel to us ,we can become aware of the harmony of movement that is going on within our bodies..

In that moment of harmonious attention – I call it 'Knowticing' – we will feel, albeit briefly at this stage, a sweet and gentle calm. This is unlikely to stay with us for long, but it is a start, and this sweet and gentle calm is something that we will want to return to, and eventually remain in, for a while. Later there may come a stage where we want to hold the inner silence for longer, but don't be tempted to do this. Allow this state of inner peace to remain for as long as it wants to and then let it go. Peace is not something that we can grasp for and hold on to. It is not our peace. It doesn't belong to us. It's an aspect of life and nature from which arises all that exists – and that includes each one of us. It is an essential source of wholeness and healing. We can eventually reach a stage when we can easily slip to and fro between the liminal boundaries of the noisy and busy temporal world and the silence of inner peace.

 

It's Good to be Here.

“It is a strange and wonderful fact to be here, walking around in a body, to have a whole world within you and a world at your fingertips outside you. It is an immense privilege, and it is incredible that humans manage to forget the miracle of being here. Rilke said, ‘Being here is so much,’ and it is uncanny how social reality can deaden and numb us so that the mystical wonder of our lives goes totally unnoticed. We are here. We are wildly and dangerously free.”

~John O'Donohue

So rich, so joyous, so undeserved, this latter-day life of mine. Each day a bonus. When, in 2019, we celebrated my 80^th birthday I wanted it to be a very special day. After 10 years with cancer I then had little expectation that I would still be among you five years later. (And by now, my 85th birthday today, I'm well past my use-by date!)

So today I'll be having a big celebration, though you won't see much evidence of it. First and foremost among my guests is my precious first lady, Liz, who has been such a tremendous loving support through our life together - espcially over the last 15 years. Then, as well as loved ones, present and past, my wise-ones, too many to mention will be arriving in the coaches of my mind. They'll fill the secret cave of my heart with gifts of remembrance: peace, love and joy.

Thank you all for being with me on this gentle day.

May all that you need, all that you need, be enabled within you and for you.

How to Train Your Crocodile

When in Africa, we once got uncomfortably close to a crocodile hidden under an embankment. The croc hissed and skedaddled in one direction. We skedaddled the opposite way, muttering expletives.

It's the same physiological process that might happen to custormers in a noisy pub when someone smashes a glass. For a second or two 57 people and a couple of dogs become alert and stop talking. They're assessing what the anomaly means. In doing that, the most primitive parts of our brains instantly and automatically (within 1 fifth of a second) prepare everybody's glands, including those of the dogs, to produce hormones ready for action.

Our primitive brains, which neuroscientists refer to as 'reptilian' and 'mammalian', are the first to receive information from our five senses and, before those aspects of our 'New Mammalian' brains begin their own rational and analytical processes, that information starts a chain of reactions.

That's fine if you're a crocodile but not always helpful for creatures of our kind. For instance, if your boss is yelling at you, your inner crocodile may feel it wants to bite her head off, but you stay shtum because you can't afford to lose your job. Outside in the corridor though, you translate your Crocodilian into English rather volubly.

In living with any serious illness such as cancer we're prone to reptilian reactions quite a lot. It happened when tumours were found in my lungs. It's a threatening disease and there are so many unknowns. Unfortunately, in our culture and our education system, we've done little or nothing about learning to cope with our crocodiles. “It's just the way we are,” we say. But no! It's the way we've become. Although psychologists have a fairly good understanding of what they call 'ego', the self, that knowledge has not been disseminated widely. To gain access to it we often have to wait until the problem becomes acute, before we get help from our overstretched mental health services, go privately or, for most of us, muddle through in ignorance.

Half the solution to a problem is to recognise what the problem is, and many, probably most of us, don't understand how to put our croc on a leash. But it will be helpful to do this if we are to live with cancer and our treatment with, at least, a relative level of peace. First, it's important to recognise that we have to deal with the whole person, not just the mind, the emotions or the body. Secondly, we're in danger of seeing things the wrong way around. It's like looking in a mirror, left becomes right and right left, but if you see yourself on a computer screen and try to comb your hair, you won't be able to do it. We're so used to seeing things reversed we're in the habit of getting some things the wrong way round, even when we're not looking in a mirror. For instance, in tackling fear and anxiety we're likely to start with our minds and try to use will-power to repress the feelings of discomfort generated by our minds. That's like playing one-armed bandits against yourself. If you win, you lose. It's no good trying to bring our minds to rest when our bodies are telling us they're feeling anxious and fearful. When we try to resist our feelings through the power of the will our feelings resist back. We end up by doubling the power, not reducing it, and becoming more tense not less.

When we have a shock, our first reaction is likely to come from our inner crocodile. It's prompting us to flee so we breathe short and shallow. That may be okay for the croc but inappropriate for us. In that situation someone may say, “Breathe deeply,” even though that seems to be the opposite of what the body wants to do at the time. Our minds are intimately connected to our breath and although the mind wants our bodies to breathe short and shallow, we can take control and make them breathe long and deep. That says to our crocodile, “Basket!” After a while it will usually do as it's told, though with a few resentful hisses.

But don't wait for crises before you train your crocodile. There are many occasions during the day when we can find a few moments to breath deeply and bring minds to rest, perhaps when waiting for a bus, washing up, gardening or doing some photocopying. By developing the habit of mindfulness every day we can build serenity and peace into our autonomic nervous systems. Even more so if we take time each day, preferably in the morning, to spend 15 or 20 minutes in solitude and calm. After a while it's not too difficult to find that inner peace whenever we notice our minds triggering tension in our bodies. Don't resist that tension with will-power though. Just relax. Our own inner peace will soothe our inner croc whenever it feels restive.

What's your inner crocodile called? Mine's Granville.  😁

Enough's Enough!

 

One of the first things I do in the day is to wash my face in cold water. Then I look in the mirror and smile. It's not a habit, neither is it a response to my tousled appearance, though that might be appropriate. The smile is spontaneous. It's simply good to be alive. Right from the outset of my day there is an inner joy that is inexplicable. I could easily dwell on the multiple diseased elements in my body and other problems queuing up in my day but I don't. For some inexplicable reason this is not something that I've had to work at – not consciously or directly, at least. So far I have been extremely fortunate in not having to experience much in the way of side effects as a result of my tumours – of old age, yes, but only one of my 'visitors' produces mild and intermittent discomfort. Maybe my condition puts normal day-to-day stuff into perspective, I don't know. But I don't have to hype myself up. The joy rises without the need for an external reason.

Lao Tzu* says, “The norm of the world is serenity and peace.” In considering this I recognise that although we become ill from time, most of us recover. As Grandpa Tweedy says in Olive Burns' wonderful novel 'The Cold Sassy Tree', “We gits well all the time but we don't die but once't.” Turmoil arises and subsides, wars are always followed by peace – it's a principle of life; dysfunction is an anomaly; everything returns to the norm.

Of course, that doesn't mean that we recover from illness all the time, because there are other principles of life that are at play here. One of them is that life always seeks the best that can be. If that had not been true then life would not have been able to survive and evolve for the last 4.5 billion years. But, in seeking the best that can be there is another principle here: Life does not impose itself by force. Lao Tzu explains, “It is heaven's way to conquer without striving, to get responses without speaking, to induce the people by not summoning . . .” It seems that life doesn't make things happen but enables things to happen by wisdom and allurement. It is no respecter of persons. The principle of 'the best that can be' applies to everyone. Yet we can influence the outcomes of that principle.

This is my trust and my hope, based on the assurance of what we can observe of how life manifests in the living. Another is that it is in the nature of nature to nurture. Every living thing is nurtured for survival and, in turn, nurtures other living things. Life lives off of life. For us to live today other living things have to die and be consumed. Yet life always provides sufficient abundance, though not a superabundance. It is our kind that seek a superabundance which, as a result, has sown dysfunction and anomaly among all other life forms. One of the main sources of dysfunctional superabundance is obviously our excessive consumption and our excessive fear of death. Whereas we are naturally endowed by life to survive through the principles of nurture and 'the best that can be', we have perverted these natural endowments through failing to recognise the greatest wisdom, that of having enough. As the writer of Ecclesiastes says, “There is . . . a time to be born and a time to die . . .” Yet our fear of death often forces us to extend our lives long beyond our 'use by' date.

Life seems to operate on the basis of principle rather than law alone. Quantum scientists speak of 'uncertainty' and 'probability'. It is as if, in holding to the principle of 'the best that can be', we can help maintain the balance between uncertainty and probability. In recognising the principles of life and actualising them through implementing healthy lifestyles (my MEDS) we can have a major influence in the outcomes of our illnesses and treatments.

My love and best wishes to you all.

Brian

* The legendary Chinese author of the 2500 year old Tao Te Ching

Love Yourself Better

 In my 15 year journey with cancer my primary concern has been to do with dealing with fear and anxiety. I can't speak about long-term pain, for I've been extremely fortunate in that there has been little of that.  Had that not been the case I'd have been less able to contemplate aspects of my experience as deeply as I have done or perhaps write the book. Certainly, much has been taught me and surprisingly much of that has resulted from reflecting on the generous feedback .

 Most recently has been openings about our warrior culture and how this affects our attitudes and experience of cancer and other serious illnesses. When, in our 'cancer vocabulary', we use such terms as 'battle', 'fight', 'resist', 'enemy', this is the language of our warrior culture, which has been predominant world-wide for 6000 years and more. It is the language of fear, for although we may also speak of courage and bravery, behind these concepts are those of confrontation and insecurity.

Negative language is dangerous, primarily because it invariably provokes anxiety and fear. Such feelings cause the body's defence system to generate hormones evolved to enable us to take action by fleeing or fighting. Since we can probably do neither of these the hormones aren't burned off by physical activity but remain in the body and become toxic. In this situation not only has the immune system to deal with the tumours and their effects but with the overload of unused hormones. We may be able to distract our thoughts or suppress the feelings this language and its surplus of chemicals provokes in us, but it's nevertheless difficult to control the mind with the mind. That's like having a one-armed wrestling match against you. If you win you lose. So, to a very large extent language controls our attitudes and to change our feelings we need to change our language so that we can change our attitudes.

The opposite of the warrior culture is the culture of loving kindness. Scientists at the Heartmath Institute discovered that loving kindness can actually change the conformation of DNA. We think of loving kindness as something we do to others, but it is just as effective when we apply loving kindness to ourselves. “Love your neighbour as yourself,” says one of my wise ones. Another wrote, “One must learn to love oneself – thus do I teach – with a wholesome and healthy love . . .” It is also said that we should love our enemies - even our cancer. What opened to me was that my tumours are my cells, my offspring. If a child becomes criminal, do I reject them because of their criminality or love them because they are my child, my offspring?

I don't know how much my positive attitude of loving kindness has affected my cells. I've certainly reached a place where, currently at least, I have no fear or anxiety about the tumours currently in eight locations. What I do know is that doctors report that the greatest chances of recovery from illness come from patients with the most positivity. So we should replace our negative vocabulary, which is damaging to both body and mind, and begin to use the language of loving kindness. My body knows how to deal with my cancer better than my mind. Of course, sometimes my body needs help, but the most powerful medicine, that which will influence my immune system and support my treatment, is love.

The Best That Can Be

For me, the most uplifiting events of the last couple of weeks have not been the Olympic Games. Spectacular as they were what reached my heart was the people of Stockport's spontaneous clean up after the riots, and the peaceful marches nationwide which stopped the bullies in their tracks.  

 

Such events as these become newsworthy because of their scale but little miracles of kindness happen every day - by the millions.

If we follow the news media we will be fooled into thinking we live in a world that is a continual playing of 'East Enders'.  The world's not like that – observably it's not. Most people are doing good to most other people most of the time. We should constantly remind ourselves of this.  2500 years ago Lau Tzu observed that 'Serenity and peace is the norm of the world.'  That's quite a contrast to Tennyson's world, 'Bloody in tooth and claw'.  As the ancient sage pointed out, wars cease, most sicknesses heal and, in our time, though there is much to be done, billions of people's lives have been improved.

It is also observable that life always seeks the best that can be. 4.5 billion years of evolution surely proves this. And this principle is demonstrated by the observable fact that it is the nature of nature to nurture. Every living thing is nurtured towards the best it can be, sometime despite dire limitations. For life does not impose itself by force of will but enables the best that can be by allurement.  The root of the word nurture comes Sanskrit and is related to breastfeeding. Nurture is love. I therefore conclude that the principle of life is love.

These are my observations especially over the last 15 years of living with cancer. My body has continuously sought the best that can be. That is the nature of every quantum particle, every atom, every molecule of every cell in my body. In doing what I can to provide my body with what it needs to enable the nurture of nature to do its work, I'm keeping out of the way rather than trying to impose my will to obtain a specific result.  My body knows what to do and I trust it to do what it can, in the best way it can. 

My mind is at rest. I have no idea as to whether I will die with my disease or of my disease. I would like it to be the former but I'm prepared to suffer what I must. Nurture is not just of my body but of life itself and I am surrounded by many sources of nurture, all there to support me.

So may we be aware that we are surrounded by love and that the nurture of life that will always seek the best that can be. May we give our full trust and cooperation to life.

The Book Launch Talk

 

Here's the recording of my short talk at the launch of 'What my Doctors Didn't Tell me About Cancer' which took place on 25th July at Waterstones in Hereford.

Click here to view the video on YouTube

The Big Book Launch

 It was difficult, that couple of weeks leading up to the launch of What my Doctors Didn't Tell me About Cancer at Waterstones on 25th July.  Should I postpone?  We decided to wait.  I didn't feel bad but the Covid tests kept coming back positive and the information from the NHS, about when it would be safe to be seen in public again, seemed ambivalent.  A body of advice said we should go for it and on Wedesday  24th I tested negative. 😅

Over thirty people turned up and I signed nearly enough books to require embrocation.  The interaction between people was wonderful.    Billy, the Waterstones manager said, "It was such a wonderful event and very well received.I'm glad we had, just enough, chairs to accommodate everyone. Everyone left with a smile, which, for me, is indicative of how much they took for the night."

 

A video of the 18 minute talk (thanks to daughter Jinny) will be    available on YouTube shortly, along with podcasts and videos from the interview programme that a is taking place thoughout July, August and September - eight in all.

Now I have to work on building my stamina up after July's health issues.  I'm a bid 'Bidenesque' on my feet at the moment and run out of energy fairly quickly.  Fortunately summer seems to have come so I can walk and garden daily. Liz and I visited Llangorse Lake yesterday and I had one of the best night's sleep in a long time.

 

I Hope I've Been Missed!

5th July: I lay all afternoon alternately shivering and getting hot. Eventually I rang 111 and they advised an ambulance.  It was gone midnight before a doctor decided to give me a urine test and the problem became immediately apparant. My pee was as cloudy as the rough cider of my mispent youth!
     I was provided with an upholstered chair in a 'holding pen' with a load of other people and dozed fitfully until breakfast at 7.  Then they took me to a ward and kept under obsrvation for the day, while they puumped me full of antibiotics.
     10th July: Had been coughing for a couple of days and thought I'd better take a Covid test. Having not had it before - ever - it showed positive!!  Right in the middle of preparations for the Book Launch on 25th July!  (It'll be alright on the night.)
     One advantage has been that it's enabled me to catch up on my reading.  In the current edition of The Week I read a short piece about the inefficiency of taking multivitamins. Taken from three studies involving almost 400,000 healthy adults in the US, participants were tracked for more than 20 years. Having taken many factors into account, researchers found "no evidence that taking multivitamin supplements prolonged life; instead the bills were linked to a 4% higher risk of death in the initial years of follow-up." A nutritional researcher said that supplements can be beneficial in specific cases - just not multi-vits I presume.  However, I note that it was not said they didn't do any good at all.
     I'd seen such reports before but never on such up a scale. So I thought it was time that I reviewed what supplements I was taking and why I was taking them. This has changed over time and I've experimented with different ways of taking them: leaving them out and keeping them in, taking them in small groups up at different times of day.
      I seem to have settled into a routine that works. However, it's important not to follow my path blindly. We have to find our own way here. Each of our bodies is unique. Each of our bodies has different requirements: different supplements, different quantities, different reasons for taking them. 

Here's what I'm taking currently with brief information taken from the excellent the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre: https://www.mskcc.org/cancer-care/integrative-medicine/herbs.  You can find much more information on most of these supplements on the website.

Reishi mushroom:

• Boost the immune system
• Increase strength and stamina
• Lower cholesterol

Treat lower urinary tract symptoms They contain Betaglucons,which are of interest to scientists in the treatment of cancer.

Cordyceps Mushroom:

• Boost the immune system
• Help the kidneys work better (Important for me with only one.)
  
• Boost strength and stamina

Sulforaphone (Extract of Broccoli sprouts)

• Cancer prevention (Breast and Urinary tract)
• Helicobacter pylori infection (An infectrion of the stomach).
  
• Stomach ulcers

Vitamin D3

• Osteoporosis  (Important since a tumour was found in my humerus)
  
• Seasonal affective disorder
• To prevent cancer

Various studies show that nutrients including B6 obtained through diet have cancer-preventive effects, but this does not mean these same effects occur with supplements.

Magnesium

• To reduce cancer risk
• To prevent heart disease.
  

Studies on whether magnesium intake reduces cancer risk are mixed. However adequate magnesium intake, especially through diet when possible, is important.

 Saw Palmeto

• To reduce an enlarged prostate.

Pre-biotic

• Organic wheat bran
• Feeds the existing gut flora to support the immune system.

Pro-biotic

• For use while taking antibiotics to replenish live cultures in the stomach flora.
  

PLEASE REMEMBER: Do your own research so you know what will help, in what quantities and what frequency.  Also take advice from your doctor about any supplements you propose taking in relation to any medicaton your doctors prescribe.  Your dotor may want to play safe and keep you away from anything they don't know about. You may need to get help from other sources.  With supplements you can stop at any time if you think they're advrsely affecting you.  Research, listen, sense-feel.