“Given half a chance, the body will heal itself by itself” ~ Joshua Rosenthal
This quote stuck with me from my early days of training in Holistic Health and ignited my passion for self-empowerment in health care.
It was challenged when I was first diagnosed with a bump in my breast in June 2019… but only for a few days.
If you’re new to my journey “bump” is the term I use. Words carry energy and I never wanted to bring the energy of the C-word into my field.
I say that’s the date of diagnosis, but the bump first appeared in a self-exam around Jan 2014. The first OBGYN that palpated it said “It doesn’t feel like cancer” and the Oncologist/Surgeon agreed, yet recommended a needle biopsy for good measure for something quoted as having a 5% or less chance of being anything.
I’d recently been a guest on the Women’s International Summit for Health (WISH) and I’d been introduced to Gayle Sulik and her book “Pink Ribbon Blues” and the Breast Cancer Consortium she’d founded in 2012. So I knew the risk of spread from needle biopsy and the stats at that time which cited 500K breasts were unnecessarily removed each year in the US.
I canceled the biopsy and began using thermal imaging to keep an eye on things.
Fast forward five years, it was the start of retreat season for me. A few days before the first event, I had everything I needed (outline, exercises, workbook) on a flash-drive to take to the printer. No back up.
I was sitting at my desk with the flash drive inserted in my laptop and a book fell off a shelf, cracking the flash-drive in half. I went into sheer panic mode for a few minutes and then I heard it…guidance in the form of an audible voice.
I’d been hearing guidance for some time, but in the form of claircognizance, empathic sensations, psychography and incorporated embodiment…where I’m literally in motion before the mind catches up.
But this was the first (and to date only) audible male voice that said…”It’s not about you.”
At the time, I took that message to mean the retreats and I went on to lead the most intuitively guided retreats I’d ever led. I literally had no outline and felt my way into each activity without knowing in advance what was next. It was the most amazing trust exercise and the women loved it.
The morning after the second event, I went for an ultrasound to check on the bump because I could tell it was larger and that’s when the diagnosis was delivered. I was a few years removed from the research on biopsies and the radiologist saw my history and was hell bent on not letting me leave her office without one.
This perfect storm led me to fall victim to the fear factory and within a few hours I was biopsied, diagnosed and scheduled for surgery followed by 25 rounds of radiation. I was highly urged to test for BRCA and a positive outcome would mean mastectomy instead.
I said yes to it all just to get out of that office and to a place where I could breathe.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t fearful, but I had the presence of mind to take a few days and refresh my research and options. I only shared the diagnosis with a handful of people…those I knew would keep fear out of it. I didn’t even tell my parents as my Mom had been through this diagnosis twice. I waited until I had good news after my initial treatment.
As I expected, when I finally shared publicly, I received both messages of support and warnings of fear, but by then I was so solid in my choice that the fear of others didn’t faze me.
A good friend told me about Hope 4 Cancer centers and within 5 days, I’d had an initial consult with them and made the decision to cancel the surgery and radiation. I’d never felt more certain of a decision in my life.
A few weeks later (even the surgeon agreed this bump was slow moving), I went to Cancun for the initial 3-week integrative treatment and I’ve been following the treatment plan and doing my follow ups in the Cancun and Tijuana centers ever since.
By May of 2022, the recommended treatments had helped my body shrink the bump by 90% volume. And it was getting more and more difficult to tell if the 10% left was active cancer or dead scar tissue.
One thing I’ve learned is that cancer is smart and it just wants to live too, so when we block one pathway that sustains it (like hormones) it will do everything it can to find another source of sustenance.
Three years into the journey, my H4C team said…its time to take it out. It’s small enough and inactive enough that its safe to do so and we’ve been starving this thing for so long and it could eventually adapt. (My words, not theirs)
It took me a bit to wrap my head around having a lumpectomy. Longer than it did to cancel it originally. I found myself wondering if I’d disappoint the holistic camp and if some would think I’d sold out. But these were fleeting thoughts.
As I cautiously began sharing my decision, I was met with some of the same opposition-warnings that I was making a mistake. Stories of surgeries gone wrong. But it didn’t faze me.
Ultimately, I made the decision to move forward because the truth was…from the very start of this journey…the healing had already occurred in the field. All along, I’d simply been calling in that result to the physical realm.
So on Oct 24, 2022 (3 years and 5 months after diagnosis), I had a lumpectomy. Hands down…creepiest experience of life so far. Lol! That’s just the Ego talking.
I’d taken my time and done my due diligence to find a surgeon I felt good about. I did my best to remain curious about the whole procedure. Of course, she recommended radiation after the procedure, but I passed on that.
The pathology report was filled with terms like “ill-defined,” “scar,” and “difficult to identify.”
My interpretation: ding dong the bump is dead!
In the integrative world, we replace the term “cancer-free” with NED – “No evidence of disease.” To me, its more honest because each and every one of us make cancer cells every day and while the working stat has been that 1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women will experience cancer in their lifetime, more recent research indicates by 2030 EVERY person in the US will have an experience with cancer.
Cancer is becoming…expected? AND also 90% of cases are believed to be curable…so this next part is really important to understand.
What I’ve learned is that any dis-ease is a result of 2 things:
- The terrain in the body and
- The emotional root causes.
Cleaning up the terrain was the easy part. To date, I’ve identified 2 dozen emotional patterns that I got to process and release. This from a person who thought I’d already done all the emotional work!
This journey hasn’t ever been about a bump. It’s been about my cultivating a deeper connection with my own self-authority. I was never going to die from the bump. I know that in my soul. I literally could have chosen to do the lumpectomy or not and either way, I would have survived.
But when I checked in with the guidance, I heard…”it’s time to release all that does not serve” and was never who I am in the first place.
And…it’s not about me.
The message sent in 2019 finally landed. The entire journey has been about letting go of identification with small-self form and BEING the energy I’m created as.
I’m more clear than ever that I choose not to play in the 4% of our solid matter, but rather the 96% of the energy that we are.
The journey’s been about letting go of Ego and allowing God to create AS ME.I AM a servant of the Light many call God. That is my one and only purpose here.
A few days after the great release (sounds more fun than lumpectomy, doesn’t it?), 2023 intentions dropped in as effortlessly as I receive the breath.
Crystal clear.
5 min or less.
And so it is.
Last thing, I know as I write this some have lost a loved one to cancer. In fact, we just lost our neighbor. My father is on his own journey as we speak. I’ve lost a couple friends to it this year and another just received word of a spread.
Nothing I say here is intended to be insensitive or to minimize how heart-breaking that is. My only intent is to share my perspective and, if anything, open eyes to possibilities beyond what may be presented from a medical office or fear filled heart.
YOU are the miracle.
Trust that and yourself as best as you can.
Don’t believe it when someone tells you it can’t be done.
In Loving Oneness,
Leah