My Cancer Diagnosis hits me by surprise
It was January 15th, 2017 the lump on the side of my neck that I was watching for the last 4 months had grown ½ again larger and I felt a small pea size lump in the middle of my neck. Opps, this does not seem too good I thought to myself. A biopsy later and a PET Scan showed that I have a 5 cm Squeamish Cell Carcinoma on my tongue that metastases to my lymph nodes which classified my cancer as stage 4 neck and head cancer. Hmm looks like life will be different from here on out I said to myself.
Being an eternal optimist I knew in the back of my mind that it would be a tough ride but always kept the thought that I would come out better because of it no matter what happened. So I plowed ahead and listened to my Doctors and accepted the treatment plan with some of my own holistic medicine added in.
Treatment:
The treatment plan includes 7 weeks of radiation daily directly on my neck. This involved being secured to the table with a mask over my face and upper body to hold me in the same position every day so they could direct the radiation where it needed to go for the treatment. Along with three (3) rounds of Chemo treatment therapy. There was a month preceding my treatment where I underwent more tests and prep before starting treatment. So being proactive I started a regiment of RSO cannabis treatment to help fight the cancer prior to my medical treatment of radiation and chemo.
What is RSO?
This is a highly concentrated form of Cannabis that was first produced by Rick Simpson to cure his skin cancer in 2003, so RSO is Rick Simpson Oil. The brand and strain that I preferred to purchase was Ethos Brand and the Indica based strain. It is recommended as a natural path treatment for cancer and many recommend to ingest 60 grams of RSO at about 1 gram per day as a form of treatment. Now if you know anything about cannabis and concentrates that is a heck of a lot of cannabis to take. I worked my way up to about ¾ a gram per day after a week but to tell you the truth it is hard to enjoy taking the much product.
My medical treatment began a month after my initial diagnosis. With the Chemo they gave me medicine in my IV and 3 types of anti-nausea pills to help with throwing up and all was fine the first 12 hours, but then I sneezed for no reason and then all hell let loose. NO matter what pills I took I could not stop throwing up for the next I would sneeze and soon after I would vomit. This put me in the hospital many times to get IV fluids pumped back in to prevent dehydration and death. I soon discovered that using my PAX vape pen with leaf cannabis product would help alleviate the need to vomit so much. It would not stop it completely but I could control the vomiting a little better when if I would vape right when I felt a trigger coming on. Learning this lesson I think saved my life and helped me stay out of the hospital as much preventing my dehydration.
The radiation treatments were every day 5 days per week for 7 weeks for a total of 35 treatments. The first ones were not too bad actually, the hardest part was being strapped down to the table with my mask and getting over the fear and claustrophobia of having an uncontrolled bout of sickness while in the middle of a session. This fear mostly gripped me at night thinking about it would give me a panic attack. But when I actually went in for treatment I seemed to find a place of relaxation and could sit still for the 15 minutes each treatment and be calm.
Some days were better than others but most of them sucked and I just wished I could sit in the sun and sleep without discomfort from nausea.
Having Cancer was not as hard as recovering after the treatments were complete. I wished so hard to be better but I was still not able to eat anything by mouth so that means I was pushing soy shakes into a tube that was sticking out of my tummy. 2000 Calories a day may not seem like a lot to eat when you are healthy but when you are sick it is a hell of a lot of stuff to push through a tube directly into your stomach, especially when everything that hits it wants to come right back out your mouth.
A few weeks after my last treatment things were getting better and by mid June 2017 I was able to eat enough to stop losing weight and was able to convince my ENT Doctor to remove the tube. That came with a stern warning that I must eat all foods by mouth and not lose weight. I happily accepted the challenge we soon started to do some traveling on the weekends to help with my recovery. In Mid July I had a follow up PET scan and it was determined that my treatment was a success and all cancer was gone.
My New Life:
So how did having cancer save my life? During treatment and recovery my wife and I made a commitment to change our lifestyle and thought process about life work balance.
*I do not need to work for a living but only work when I am needed. I soon found out that I was not needed nearly as much as I thought. *
This is one benefit of being an entrepreneur and having a couple businesses with compassionate and competent business partners and employees. While I was in treatment and recovering business still went on without me and I was still able to make a income from the businesses even though I did not participate during this time.
I now concentrate on traveling and enjoying time with my better half first and make it a priority to put our health and enjoyment in front of the need to be a part of any business, project or job.
I want to share with those interested, my story about what I have learned on this journey to turn what could have been a life tragedy into a milestone of change for the better.
I now look at life's difficult moments and turn them into opportunities for the better. I don't think there is any other way I could look at a challenge in my life now.
Last thought:
I do realize that cancer is a serious disease and I do not for one second take what happened to me for granted in knowing how lucky I am. My father and uncle were not so lucky and I know firsthand the consequence that could have happened should I not have caught it early and with received some of the best care in the world.
As with anything you should do your own research and look at both sides of a story to get at your own truth.
Rick Simpson Oil Pros.
Rick Simpson Oil Skeptic review
That is how cancer saved my life!
Please ask me questions and I am open to any suggestions and critiques.
Scott