Finding the Good Out of Bad Circumstances
by Jacqueline Irish
Shocked
The diagnosis came as a huge surprise. “I don’t have cancer in my family. I’m rarely sick with a cold or flu, and I don’t even have the common risk factors for disease. How on earth did I get cancer?” I asked myself.
Those very thoughts were luring me on a mission with the goal of finding answers. The next time I saw the oncologist, I directly asked: “How long has this [small] tumor been there?”
“Probably five to eight years,” he said.
Immediately, my mind began running through all the events that were going on during those years—getting married; quitting a full-time job in marketing communications to pursue a new career; pulling all-nighters in design school; moving to a new community; remodeling a home; dealing with the ups and downs of multiple failed infant adoptions, infertility treatments; and now halting our certification to become foster parents with news of the big “C” word.
Stuck in Failure
The list of stressors during those years certainly made me think I had a stamp of failure on my life. “Design school. All for nothing,” I’d think. I was neither here nor there with any current required skills to move back into a now highly social media-driven marketing position or move forward in a competitive interior design field. Every year seemed to pile on more unexpected news that I could not find answers to. I was grieving the loss of any career goals, and a cancer diagnosis seemed to top the list as an answer to inner sarcasm: “What else could happen?”
The Wakeup Call
Before drowning in breast cancer terminology, treatment options, and doctors’ appointments, I chose to stop mentally adding to the list of failures. My faith and church family were the only constants getting me through any of this, and I just had to learn to let go—of everything. “If there is purpose for my life,” I kept reminding myself, “there is a greater plan in all these challenges. I just have to trust and be patient to see how it is going to be used.”
Cancer—My Insights & Catalyst for Change
Soon, a string of events began to fuel a new desire that I hoped could help others. Here are five insights I learned with the goal of being proactive about the health of the mind and body.
#1: Cancer and Disease Do Not Start Overnight.
As former health sciences student and designer/editor for a national health and wellness company, it was like a light bulb had gone off. I remembered: “It takes many years for systems in the body to become imbalanced or weakened, ultimately creating an environment for disease and cancer to grow. Cancer is a problem of the immune system.” Prior to this thought, I simply did not see how my own habits created need for change.
#2: Chronic Conditions Weaken the Immune System.
Then, I stumbled across surprising information found in several anti-inflammatory books I had accumulated when my husband and I were learning about the Paleo diet. (I guess you could say I didn’t dig too deep in the information, given I hadn’t read each book cover to cover.) Suddenly, my eyes were opened to the problem of inflammation, which is the common denominator between most diseases and cancer.
And, there they were... Endometriosis, a condition I had suffered pain from for years, was listed as a chronic inflammatory condition, as was anxiety, infertility, allergies, and lactose intolerance. I never considered these conditions could be taxing my immune system!
Unfortunately, the list of inflammatory diseases is quite long. Autoimmune disorders and chronic inflammatory conditions all fall under the term inflammatory disease. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if every person reading this post has [at] least two or three inflammatory conditions. Two primary points to note of these conditions are: one, inflammation in the body is at their core; and two, many of the conditions can be linked to poor digestive function. Ever heard of the gut-brain connection, the gut microbiome, or leaky gut? That’s what I’m talking about here.
Today, there’s a large body of evidence that points to the integration of a low-carb, sugar- and grain-free lifestyle as beneficial to reducing inflammation. Look at the popularly published books by functional medicine, neuroscience, and nutrition experts, including Grain Brain and Brain Maker by Dr. David Perlmutter (neurologist); Eat Dirt and The Keto Diet by Dr. Josh Axe (functional medicine doctor); The Autoimmune Solution: Prevent and Reverse the Full Spectrum of Inflammatory Symptoms and Diseases by Dr. Amy Myers (functional medicine doctor); Practical Paleo: a Customized Approach to Health and a Whole-Foods Lifestyle by Diane Sanfilippo (certified nutrition consultant); and others.
#3: Toxic Mental Health Can Contribute to Chronic Health Conditions.
What became an even bigger “ah-ha” moment was finding articles that cases of endometriosis and fibromyalgia have been linked to undealt with negative emotions, childhood trauma, and even PTSD. For as long as I can remember, I have struggled with some form of anxiety, which was compounded with perfectionism, people pleasing, and limiting beliefs about myself.
Soon, I began to ask: “Could endometriosis, years of heartache dealing with multiple failed fertility treatments and adoptions, grieving the loss of career plans, and even cancer all have been prevented?”
#4: Developing Disease or Cancer Is Complex.
While it would be easy to deduce the origin of disease to one or more existing inflammatory conditions that weakened the immune system, that simply isn’t the whole picture. We live in a toxic world, and well-established practitioners publish books from A to Z, focusing on the impact of:
Toxic mental stress on the brain that changes neurochemistry, turning genes on or off;
Chemical toxins found in our food, cookware, cosmetics, everyday body care and cleaning products that alter our hormones, create reproductive harm, damage organs; and even contribute to cancer;
Untreated mold exposures and infection from viruses that further tax the immune system;
Gluten-containing foods that cause tight junctions in our gut lining to loosen, allowing partially digested food particles to escape the digestive tract and cause inflammation (aka, “leaky gut”)
Electromagnetic fields (EMFs) that damage DNA and produce other health symptoms from nearby cell towers, use of the microwave oven, Bluetooth technology, and all the other wireless devices (yes, my friends, we might consider limiting use of our wireless devices); and
Bioaccumulation of heavy metals and other pollutants we cannot as easily control in our water and air supplies, which can contribute to other imbalances within the body.
#5: Recognize the Responsibility and Role Our Choices Play in Achieving Wellness.
Although it would be difficult to control every aspect of the toxins coming in from our environment, we can make wise decisions in those areas of our lives we can control, such as what we put into and do to our bodies, such as utilizing healthy mind management skills; eating nutrient-dense “real” foods; using clean products; and incorporating and maintaining good self-care routines (i.e., getting seven to nine hours of sleep per night).
Here are several quotes from practitioners in the field of medicine and neuroscience that give validity to the proactive approach needed to achieve a healthy mind and body.
Functional medicine practitioner Dr. Will Cole writes in his book The Inflammation Spectrum: Find Your Food Triggers and Reset Your System: “. . . a startling 80 percent of the most common chronic diseases (heart disease, cancer, autoimmunity, diabetes) are almost always preventable and reversible with lifestyle choices.”
And, in the book Think Learn Succeed: Understanding and Using Your Mind to Thrive at School, the Workplace, and Life, author Dr. Caroline Leaf, a cognitive neuroscientist and expert in the field of communication pathology, acknowledges how epigenetics plays a part in our lives. (Epigenetics is the science that our behaviors and environment can change the way our genes work.) In page 42 of her book, she writes: “You switch genes on and off with every thought you have, and every thought you have is a response to the way you see and perceive your life experiences. Research actually shows that only five percent of genetic mutations directly cause health issues. Roughly 95 percent of genes are influenced by life factors and lifestyle choices.”
I’d say these are pretty startling figures on how we can gain control over our health. This sums up what my own gene counselor said after relieving me of the news I don’t have either of the two BRCA genes. I distinctly remember her saying: “Even if you had one of the BRCA genes, it doesn’t mean you’ll get breast cancer. Lifestyle habits and environmental factors are more of a determinant of disease than your genes.”
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Today, you can find Irish with a completely different career direction and lifestyle focus. She is owner of Ketolicious Eats, a home-based ketogenic and diabetic-friendly bakery in San Diego, California, and a clean, grain-free recipe food blog with the same name. She also provides recipes and health tips on how to reduce inflammation and increase immune health in the body via her Instagram account @ketoliciouseats. Her biggest hope is to encourage and soon coach others to live and eat clean as a preventative measure against disease, potentially sidelining many of the difficult years her own family went through.
If you would like to know more information about Irish or her business, Ketolicious Eats, you can reach her at jirish@ketolicouseats.com.
