Falling into poetry - finding a new world

I have recently discovered Caroline Kaufman's new poetry book entitled when the world didn't end, and I can really relate to this girl who has suffered from depression. I feel that I truly fell into her words, like Alice falling down the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland to find a strange new world. And through poetry, hers and my own included, I am finding a new world, where I can be happy and whole. 

On page 78 of Caroline's book I quote: I am surprised I am still alive, but I am grateful for it. That sums up my feelings exactly.

And I love this verse from Caroline's book on page 172:

every minute I have on this earth

is borrowed time.

I fought for it,

almost died for it,

and won it back

That describes my cancer experience exactly. I fought to stay alive in December 2015 when I was operated on, and it is true that I almost died but I did win my life back. Now going on 4 1/2 years later I am still living on borrowed time. But the cancer is in remission and with my bladder problems looked after, my pain is truly under control.

I want to emphasize that my recovery follows the path of Radical Remission as Kelly A Turner's book describes. Now, what is left to do is shrink the three tumors on my spine. And through Bruce Lipton's The Biology of Belief whereby through belief I can do healing wonders in my body, including shrinking of tumors. Lipton quotes Henry Ford's famous line on page 112 of his book: If you believe you can, or if you believe you can't -- you're right.

I recently purchased a neat book entitled Naturopathic Oncology: An Encyclopedic Guide for Patients & Physicians. In this book I find plenty of support for what I am doing to heal, particularly with regard to mistletoe subcutaneous injections which prime the immune system to work against cancer cells, and with regard to curcumin which reduces inflammation, and hence works against the impact of inflammation in encouraging cancer cells to thrive and grow. The book has two pages, 410 - 411, devoted to RCC, Renal clear Cell Carcinoma. It mentions that only 62% survive kidney cancer for five years. So it looks like I am in the 38% that go on living!

By the way, I should have said in my last post that one reason for my trip to Yellowknife last week was to take a CT scan of my sacrum area. That was done and the CT showed no growth of the sacrum tumor. So I am definitely still in remission, and looking forward to my new world of thriving in recovery by shrinking the tumors and getting on with life. I can then be considered as "cancer free"!!

The winter of my discontent

"The winter of our discontent" was made noteworthy and kind of famous, first by William Shakespeare and then by John Steinback. This is the winter of my discontent too. As I write I am down from Inuvik to Yellowknife for my monthly Nivo immunotherapy.

Today, April 09, it is snowing in Yellowknife, and I am wearing a urine bag and a catheter. So, in fact, I would call this the winter of my soul. Life has become cold and listless. Perhaps by writing here I can get my mind and emotions back on track. The catheterization came about because I guess for years I have not been able to empty my bladder and the pressure of the full bladder all the time was in fact causing the severe pain in the tumor on my sacrum. Now I only have to take a pain pill once or twice a day. Sandra is hoping, by us switching to a totally non-inflammatory diet, essentially a vegan diet, I can shrink the three tumors on my spine. So, fewer hydromorthine pain pills and I bet my brain will clear and I will be more like my old self.

Well, now the next day April 10, the sun is shining in a bright blue sky here in Yellowknife, and my optimism is certainly coming back. And it was so good to get a good night's sleep now that the bladder problems have disappeared.

I hope I am not repeating myself here. I am in a highest risk category for COVID 19, being Stage 4 cancer with a compromised immune system and 79+ years of age, and so Sandra and I stay completely at home these days. Our friend Chris in Inuvik gets our groceries, mail, and drug store stuff. One scary thing is that there are only 3 ventilators at Inuvik hospital and I am not top priority to receive one because of my Stage 4 cancer and age. So I have to really take personal care to stay alive.

Back to Inuvik tomorrow. I will send my next post from home.

The COVID 19 epidemic continues to rise - FAST

Happy Thursday. Our self isolation ended last Sunday. We tried to take a drive to Tuk on Sunday, but the road was closed to normal traffic when we wanted to go.

Well, we now have one COVID 19 case in Inuvik, but that person is self-isolating so no spread here. However, I am taking much more precautions. I am not going to go out, except in car. At 79 and counting, with a compromised immune system due to cancer, chemo, and pain drugs, I am a prime candidate for testing positive to the virus and dying of pneumonia.

Country-wide, according to today's New York Times, Canada has only 109 deaths, doubling every 4 days. the US on the other hand has 5,708 deaths, doubling every 3 days. We intend to tell our Illinois friends to be more careful because the state of Illinois already has 152 deaths, doubling every 2 days! Note that Illinois has almost 50% more deaths than the country of Canada. People in the US really don't want to stay home. I think it was California that hasn't even closed it's public beaches. The NY Times showed a beach really quite well populated.

I have great news! Great for me anyway. I have been on the board of a high tech company in the nuclear industry for the past about 15 years. The day before yesterday my phone rang late morning and it was the board Chair of that company. He offered me a contract (accepted of course) to tackle an engineering problem related to his company's power plant design. Why me? Because we have developed considerable trust over the years. And he hired me knowing that my short-term memory and some cognitive ability has suffered because of chemo and pain drugs. So I am quite delighted.

My required engineering texts are in a rented storage unit in Yellowknife, and they are all 40 or more years out of date. So I bought 2 books through Indigo-Chapters on line. One of them has already shipped, on Engineering Mathematics, but it is not the one I need the most, on Thermodynamics and Fluid Flow Dynamics as applied to power systems. My specialties in engineering have always been thermodynamics (the study of thermal energy in all its forms) and fluid mechanics (looking at how fluids, liquids or gases, flow in systems we use every day or in power plants).

I would like to think that this pandemic will bring people together in a helpful community-oriented way in the western world. However I was disappointed to learn, again from today's NY Times online that last month, March 2020, resulted in the second-highest month every for personal gun sales in the US. That doesn't bode for being helpful and community-oriented! Also, Dr Anthony Fauci, President Trump's medical adviser is getting death-threats. It is amazing that there are folks in the US, the fastest growing country for COVID 19 cases, who simply want everyone back to work to kick-start the economic engine, regardless of the threat to human health.

A good friend of mine is of the opinion that this pandemic will bring about a reset to society in the western world. It seems to me that it is really a boon for communication industries, since whole conferences are now planned using Zoom-related technology.

COVID 19 on the Rise

It has finally hit the NWT. There was a confirmed case in Yellowknife the second week of March - someone who had flown in from the south! Well guess what, that week of March 9 is when we were in Yellowknife for my treatment! So as soon as we were told about it yesterday we had to go into voluntary isolation for up to two weeks from the time we could have caught the COVID 19 in Yellowknife. So until next Friday the 27th, we have to remain in isolation. 

But no worries. Our friends here in Inuvik have already volunteered to do the delivery of groceries, bottled water, etc. Sandra and I are completely free of illness symptoms. In fact I have not even had one single cold since my cancer operation on December 6, 2015. So that is almost 4 1/2 years ago.

It feels strange to be in a high-risk segment of society, being in my 80th year, and suffering no coronavirus symptoms. I talked to my dear cousin Lillian who is just two years younger than me, living in the Vancouver area, and there have been five deaths to the virus so far. So she is quite concerned about staying at home, not going out and about any more than absolutely necessary. I am going to have to travel to Yellowknife every month for Nivo treatment as an absolutely essential travel. My next trip is scheduled for April 8 - 9, including a CT scan to make sure the tumors remain in remission.

Sandra is shifting us a bit further nutrition wise to a vegan diet. And it is not as hard or far out as I thought it would be. For example, I love pancakes, and yesterday I made wheat, oats and ground flax pancakes with avocado oil. Super delicious.

Sandra and all of her staff are now working from home. The work still has to be done. All of the counselling that her staff do will now be done by telephone. And no one knows how long this epidemic is going to last. It is not a good time to need counselling because nothing beats meeting face to face.
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This being isolated at home doesn't really bother me, since I love writing, and I have a library of books to read, with more on order. I give away as many as I order now, so our library remains pretty well  static with the size it is now. And we have a store of good DVD movies. Tonight before bed we are going to make our own popcorn and watch Casablanca, one of the best movies of all time I am told.

Hay House and Radical Remission

Hello again folks,

I love being in remission and I have been an avid listener/observer to the Hay House Publishing docuseries Radical Remission, which you too can view at https://www.discover.hayhouse.com/radicalremission/ but only until March 26 in this 2020 year.

Also, as you know, after taking responsibility for your own health, nutrition is a very important part of fighting cancer and getting it into remission. So I love a quote from Danielle DuBoise of Sakara Life which says: "JOY is a nutrient." As I look at the Radical Remission landscape and cancer recovery I so appreciate the aspect of JOY. A prophet of the Old Testament in the Bible named Joel had this to say about the importance of joy: "the vine is dried up, and the fig tree languishes; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: for joy is withered away from the sons of men."

Wow, that is so powerful. If there is no joy there can be no spiritual fruit. Joy must come first. Now, as I look at my life now, when I have gratitude, when I sit down and make a gratitude list, I find joy rising up inside my spirit. I become joyful. And that makes life so much more worthwhile.

Also, my cancer recovery has become a course of action. Knowing what to do to follow-up on the wonderful effective Nivolumab immunotherapy is one thing, but to do it with tenacity is another! And so I came across an action strategy called John Boyd's "OODA loop":

Observe, Orient (set yourself in place for action), Decide, Act! This flow chart is a picture of United States Airforce Colonel John Boyd's "viral strategy" for out gunning the enemy in the Korean war of the early 1950s. Using that strategy he and his pilots flying F86 Sabre Jets were able to outmaneuver much more powerful and faster Mig 15 fighter jets flown by the enemy. Note that at any point in the decision making loop your critical information provides feedback so that you can go back and repeat if necessary. 

I'm not sure how this centered typing thing got going so I don't know how to change it. Other than I will go for a new blog tomorrow. 

Bye for now.

Keep Calm and Carry On

I sit here with the soft snowflakes drifting down this cozy winter evening. A tremendous amount of snow this winter and my shoveling capacity physically is close to zero, so we have hired that work out a couple of times, and more to go, to keep our walk and driveway navigable.

I have always admired the British government for their attitude all through World War 2. Hence the title of my post as it relates both to the COVID 19 pandemic and my personal war to win the fight against cancer.

Thanks to all my dear friends for their comments at the end of my blog posts. you all mean a huge lot to me. Writing this blog certainly helps keep up my spirits for the health battle ahead. Although I am so fortunate to find myself very healthy in all other non-cancerous respects, and although I am in remission, the specter of Cancer, the big C, continues to dog me day and night. The drugs still make me very tired, but that is mitigated to some extent on days that I can get 10 hours of sleep or more. So I am not allowed to forget that although I have won a major battle, the cancer war is still on!

The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in all professional things I had hoped to be involved in as related to permafrost engineering and talks at conferences, etc have been cancelled. Fortunately I only had one air travel booked and paid for, Air North return flight to Whitehorse in mid April. Air North would not give me a refund but rather simply put me payment amount into an account that I can use next time I book.

What do you think about this idea? The world is full of anger and misunderstanding and cultural battles, etc etc. This COVID 19 pandemic might just bring people together to fight a common enemy, an enemy that threatens to destroy the health of thousands all over the world. It will hopefully make us all more caring, more sharing, more neighborly.

At my ripe old age of 79 1/2 I am in one high risk segment, so I am being encouraged to stay home, and not to wander around town unless it is absolutely necessary. Sandra's boss Cynthia saw me in the hospital cafeteria yesterday and mentioned to Sandra that I should not come to the hospital unless absolutely necessary. Which is good advice especially considering that to some extent the hospital is a disease collecting facility as well as a disease treatment facility.

It is strange, waiting for the corornavirus storm to hit. It makes me feel like it did at home on the farm with a hailstorm and dark clouds on the horizon. Waiting and wondering when and where it would hit. Not if but when. 

That's all for now folks. I hope you all stay healthy. I guess we can't all stay one metre away from each other, or we will get pretty lonely at times!!

Partners in recovery

Cancer recovery is a lonely process. Most of family and friends want to help, but don't really understand. I am happy that right here at home I have a recovery buddy, our not so little (14 lb in weight) five-year old shih tzu named Hagar, named after a Viking warrior cartoon character of 20 years ago. Here he is in living color:

Although he is a small dog he has a bark that would frighten any intruder, so he makes a good guard dog. We don't have a door bell, and with Hagar we don't need one. He gives me an immediate alert when anyone comes to the door.

It is income tax season and my writing time has been shut down until I get all of 2019 financial stuff straightened away. I have some consulting work each year to account for besides my pension and Sandra's employment income.

I have probably said that I am doing some permafrost engineering for a wind turbine project about 10 km north of the Inuvik Airport. I am also planning to submit an Abstract and presentation to the Canadian Nuclear Society annual meeting and conference in May 2020 concerning the challenges of installing Small Nuclear Reactors, SMRs or nuclear batteries, in remote communities in permafrost areas. It is always necessary to keep the permafrost frozen when constructing buildings and other infrastructure in or on permafrost (permanently frozen soils with significant ice content). When permafrost melts it becomes very unstable and foundations collapse, so warm building foundations on permafrost must be avoided.

I was delighted several times over the past couple of weeks when close friends tell me that they enjoying reading this blog. I will keep it up.

You may remember how Winnie the Pooh was so concerned about his appetite and the size of his tummy because he didn't want to get stuck in Rabbit's hole - he talked about being concerned pound-wise which encouraged him to do his well-rhyming exercise. Well cancer-wise I don't need to worry about Pooh's problem, because my appetite is fairly low and steady and the fat problem has gone away (definitely not recommended as a weight-loss program). I am staying at 165 lb weight, constant now for the past two full months. That is the weight I was in high school!! 

And I am off the hook as far as exercise is concerned. I am still quite unsteady and in danger of falling when I am walking outside on snow and ice - problem is if I fall in the snow I may not be able to get up again, which is an uncomfortable problem today March 05 2020 when the temperatures are hovering around -30C! I look forward to summer when I can walk better and strengthen my legs, and increase my stamina. I get tired very easily these days and must have at least 10 hours of sleep each night to keep going.

My cancer is in permanent remission now it appears. I must go to Yellowknife or Edmonton every month for Nivo immunotherapy for the rest of my life to make sure that my spine tumors do not every grow again. I have a CT scan at the end of March as a check on recovery.