Nutrition

Cancer-fighting diet nutrition basics

A beginner's guide by a "terminal" cancer victor

Introduction

This page is devoted to what your diet can do to help you. Do not expect diet alone to cure. It almost certainly will not. Never say never, but... So what is needed? What is the effect of external influences on my body? Do I have to do this forever? There could be hundreds of questions racing though your mind about these and related subjects. We will try to answer some of them here.

What is offered up are suggestions for you to consider. Not everything will work for everyone the same way. All of these things are factors in getting rid of cancer in general. We all have cancer in common. We need to look at what we can do on a daily basis to begin the healing process. Remember, what is being offered here will not hurt you in any way, regardless of what forms of treatment you seek for your cancer. Regular allopathic (conventional) medical protocols or natural regimens all will be enhanced by your actions here.

Changing your diet is one of the most intense and effective ways you can wage war against the disease ravaging your body. If you starve your body of the nutrients that it needs to stay healthy, you'll feel weak, depressed, lethargic, and could even die. Cancer is the same way. If you starve it, it will eventually wither away, at least to a state where it's not winning.

Scientific research has yielded some amazing data in this area. Unfortunately, most doctors never receive more than a few hours of instructional material over their entire course of study on proper nutrition. While barely receiving the Cliffs Notes© version of nutrition, medical students are indoctrinated in the "science" of prescribing medicines.

Learning how to balance your body's pH and utilizing natural vitamins and minerals is crucial to your success.

When I was first diagnosed with terminal cancer, I started looking at diet because of interviewing a number of cancer survivors as well as their families and friends. All of those that pursued natural healing methods had altered their diets, some quite significantly. I ultimately became on of those who changed a lot. I did not have a lot of time when I first began the quest for health as terminal cancer seems to put a finite time limitation on time you can throw at a subject and the learning had to come on a number of fronts.

I purchased a large number of books and started reading. There are hundreds upon hundreds of books out there that deal with diet for every conceivable reason up to and including cancer control. The more I initially looked, the more confused I became. Among the tomes I purchased were books published by some of the most prestigious cancer clinics and hospitals in the world. Even those had so many glaringly obvious contradictions to common sense, I was even more confused than when I started.

I then researched both individual foodstuffs, allergy testing of foods, and a number of general concepts about how phytonutrients (the stuff that hides in plants your body uses to maintain its health) boost the body's immune system and generally support your wellbeing. I came across the works of Dr. D'Adamo on blood type diets. I attempted to follow that path, but in the process of testing myself for food allergies as well as just the basics of what would be most beneficial to my body, I came to the conclusion that this was not right either. It really became a frustrating, exhausting exercise in futility.

When the dust finally settled, the short course on eating right for cancer is a diet that consists primarily of vegetables. I will personally never become a vegetarian as far as I can determine at this point, but the amount of meat eaten and the frequency at which I eat meat has been very dramatically altered. From a cancer-fighting standpoint, you are probably best off as close to vegetarian as possible. If you are to eat meat, limit it to a few times per week and not more than 4 to 6 ounces at a time. Organically raised meats are best. Fish is better than beef is better than chicken (poultry), but even that is debatable by many people.

There is much to learn in this area as most people, myself included, had an abysmal diet up to the point that cancer was detected. How fast you change, and maybe more importantly, if you change both what and the way you eat will make a profound difference in your chance for survival.

The average American consumes 1 1/2 cups of fruit and vegetables a day when you should be upwards of 10, 12 or more cups per day. Herein is the simplest of all things you can do for yourself. Just eat the right stuff. It will, in many cases, turn out to be one of the toughest challenges many people face. Your palate rules your actions. How, and realistically if, you can control it, it will go a long way towards putting your cancer in remission.

If you cannot eat right to help your body; if you will not eat right to help your body, then don't waste your time reading the rest of this page. You and you alone are responsible for your actions. You need to be in charge of helping your body to control the cancer inside you. You cannot wish it away. You cannot ignore it. You must fight and fight hard to control it no matter what course of medical action you take.

Here is a little factoid worth remembering the next time you chat with your doctor about nutrition and he looks at you like you are nuts: Seventy percent of all diseases, not just cancer, have nutrition linked to them; yet only 31 of the 125 medical schools in the U.S. require future doctors to have at least one course in nutrition. The average curriculum time for all doctors from all schools is a whopping 2.5 credit hours of study. You can do more than that in one month just on the internet in general reading for your own situation.

As of this writing, there are now more than 5,000 scientifically conducted medical studies completed that in fact link cancer to patient nutrition. Up to 1/3 of all cancers, according to the National Cancer Institute are directly related to nutritional imbalance. Yet according to the National Cancer Institute, over 83% of all doctors in the U.S. still make no connection to nutrition and your potential for cancer survival.

Juicing

In retrospect to where I am at today, the single greatest advances in the curbing of my cancer came when I started juicing vegetables and then when I added juicing beets to the regimen. The vitamins, minerals, and supplements were beneficial. The Rife equipment was beneficial. The single biggest bang for the buck, so to speak, came with the juicing regimens I established for myself and continue to do to this day.

Late in my program, I came across a book entitled The Breuss Cancer Cure which details the work of Rudolph Breuss, an Austrian healer who devoted over 50 years of his life to treating people with cancer and other "incurable" diseases with juice and tea regimens.

Had I found his book when I was first starting out, I would have followed it, especially after the dramatic results I saw with just the green juices I created. His total reliance upon juices to cure cancer amazes me. I have read enough other reports on his work to be more than a little impressed. I have even recommended this to a number of terminal people I am now consulting with on their conditions and with some additional supplementation have seen some interesting possibilities.

Regardless of what stage your cancer is, this protocol can be of significant benefit. You will still need to alter your lifestyle and maintain a healthy diet regimen from here on out. You still need to strongly consider vitamins, minerals, and supplements to bring your body to a normal condition in as short a time as possible. You still need to be in charge of your life and controlling the factors that determine health and safety for you. But this is a really great place to jumpstart the process. More at Juicing against cancer: advice and experiences of a terminal cancer victor.

A word on the all-important immune system and free radicals

Your immune system is your first-line defense mechanism for keeping you healthy. It is just that simple. It is not (directly) the food you eat or the environment or your good or bad habits. It is your own body's immune system. Now, what you eat, the environment, and what other things you do that tax your body's ability to fight diseases including cancer is what we have to work on to get your body to heal you.

Common sense says that you should do the things that help your body fight cancer. Again we have the basic problem of knowledge and its application. Do not fall into the pit of knowing but not utilizing that knowledge.

Let's talk a moment about free radicals. The basic definition in our very limited medical dictionary states, "In very simple terms, they are a highly reactive chemical particles in your body that oxidize (burn) just about anything they come in contact with. Extremely damaging to body cells and DNA." Every time we take a bite of food, a breath of air, a drink, we produce free radicals. Every time we are exposed to tobacco smoke, rancid oils and fats, smog, pesticides, radiation, chemotherapy, sunshine, and even malnourishment, our bodies can and will produce extra free radicals. Free radicals are unstable oxygen atoms.

Under normal circumstances, our immune systems utilize some free radicals to kill invaders (bacteria and viral infections). This is why oncologists get upset at the thought of you taking antioxidant supplements. The issue with that is however, that not only do the chemotherapy drugs generate some free radicals, they generate hundreds of times more than your body can tolerate and they attack everything, not just the cancer. The older we get, the fewer enzymes and hormones our bodies produce to keep naturally occurring free radicals in check. If our immune systems become too weak for any number of reasons including the natural aging process, free radical production runs amok and now instead of fighting diseases, free radicals destroy DNA and cell membranes as well as turn a number of body substances into carcinogens (cancer-causing agents).

Let's get to the diet

Factoid time: Over one half million cases of cancer could be prevented each year simply by observing proper diet, exercising regularly, maintaining proper body weight, and not smoking. How do you stack up against this description?

As long as we are asking questions, let's try a couple more... Do you frequently eat snack foods such as chips, dips, ice cream, pop corn, candy, soda pop (sugar or artificially sweetened)? Do you regularly eat french fries, onion rings, deep-fried chicken or other meats (including fish), barbecued beef/pork/chicken, "wholesome desserts" such as cakes, homemade cookies, and pies? Do you consume 2 ounces or more of any form of alcohol daily whether it is beer, wine, or hard liquor? Do you consume more than one 8 ounce glass of milk of any fat content or one cup of coffee on a daily basis? Congratulations! You lose the health lottery.

Just like me and 60+% of the American population today probably do 2/3 or more of these acts every single day. All of these things consumed on a regular basis increase the risk of getting cancer by 5 fold. Continuing to do them after cancer is discovered will reduce your chances of survival by 70%. Might be time to consider a lifestyle change. Again, doing them does not guarantee getting cancer or any other terminal illness. Doing them once you have cancer does not guarantee to worsen your condition; but the odds of things are stacked pretty heavily against having a long, disease-free life. The choice is yours.

Good fats, bad fats

Fat is fat is fat; right? WRONG! Your body needs fat for a number of functions, but all fats are not created equal. Let's look at the bad one first: omega-6. It is important to stress here that the body does utilize omega-6 fats for more than a dozen different essential functions. Omega-6 fats occur naturally in all grains and most vegetables. Consumption of these oils from natural substances in the amounts contained in the natural substances is both good and appropriate for your body. No one has any argument with this statement. As a matter of fact, these commercially processed oils are touted as "being good for you" by no less than the American Heart Association; safflower oil, corn oil, peanut oil, soybean oil, sunflower oil, and canola oil. OOPS! The problem is with the extreme quantities of these oils we are consuming, not just their consumption. A good thing in excess is frequently not quite so good for you.

The primary reason for this journey into a discussion on fat is that most people, myself included, actually need to understand why and how our favorite foods are literally killing us. One or more of these common oils are found in virtually every single piece of processed food in the grocery store today. Every time you pick up a frozen dinner, a piece of lunch meat, nearly every type of cheese, many frozen deserts, canned goods, baked goods, etc..., you are eating some form of omega-6 fat. So what?

Let's look at just 4 of the more than 1700 studies done in the last 20 years on these oils. Diets high in omega-6 fats are known to suppress your immune functions by producing a very powerful substance known as prostaglandin E2 (PGE2). Suppression of immune functions can activate latent (dormant or sleeping) forms of cancer. {Journal of Molecular Medicine, 1996} Omega-6 fats can bring on severe inflammation which is a proven tumor growth factor. {Mutagenesis, 1999} In testing omega-6 fats on animals, the test results of 97 studies were combined looking for commonalities. It was found in every case that in the presence of omega-6 oils there was a significant increase in tumor growth. {American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 1995} A study of 217 men already diagnosed with prostate cancer found them to have high intake levels of omega-6 oils. {Journal of American College of Nutrition, 1999} This should be enough of a start to get your attention. Breast cancers have literally dozens of studies that link them with high intakes of omega-6 fats, and on and on the list goes.

One final specific comment on omega-6 oils. If you have cancer and you consume higher than naturally occurring levels of omega-6 oils in your diet, then the omega-6 will be broken down as a by-product of the tumor development and growth. The resulting action is the development of arachidonic acid in your body cells. This substance then converts through metabolism into inflammatory eicosanoids. Guess what? This metabolic action has been tracked in a large number of studies to an increase in both primary tumor growth and metastases.

Again, it is important to realize that just omega-6 fats in and of themselves probably did not cause the cancer to begin. You can never say never, but... There were a number of other nutritional factors that also played a part in all of these tumor studies. There were also a number of other factors within the subjects of these studies that also needed to be quantified. However, noting just the contributory effects of omega-6 oils to an increase in cancer activity, there is genuine cause for concern. Omega-6 oils are contributors to the internal body environment that allows cancer to propagate. And if you are trying to fight cancer already present or are trying to reduce the things that contribute to its being able to get a foothold in your life, then the severe restriction of omega-6 oils in your diet is certainly worth the effort.

Can I ever eat any and survive? Yes, of course. Allow me to restate my position about this group of fats as noted a short while ago. Omega-6 oils are contained naturally in many things we consume. What we are concerned with here is with the inordinate amount of extra oil intake such as found with deep fried foods and all the excessive exposure to unneeded amounts in pre-processed/pre-packaged items on grocery store shelves today. Just how insidious is the problem? Walk into any hospital in the U.S. and guess what you will find being used in food preparation for every single patient, visitor and staff member.

Good fats: Omega-3 is our friend, as far as fats go. But because of its very fragility, virtually all of them are stripped from processed foods. Why? They easily turn rancid and can cause bad taste as well as be harmful to your body. This is why, for instance, flaxseed oil should be kept refrigerated and have a shelf life labeled right on the container to protect the quality of the omega-3 found in it.

Back when cattle were still free-range fed on pastures, omega-3 oils were found in the meats we consumed. But with today's feeder lot production of meats that derive their weight gains primarily from grains, this no longer happens.

A common knee-jerk reaction to discovering the bad news/good news about omega-6 and -3 oils is that people run out and purchase fish oil gel cap supplements or flax seed oils but never reduce the intake of omega-6 from their diets. Failure to reduce the omega-6 intake will greatly suppress the body's ability to assimilate omega-3 oils and the effort becomes an exercise in futility.

Two years is the timeframe generally considered necessary to remove excess omega-6 fats from your body's cells. Yet within as little as 2 to 3 months if intake of omega-6 oils is severely restricted, omega-3 oils can begin to enter the body cell structure and help repair the damage already done. HINT: the quicker you quit using omega-6 oils, the quicker omega-3 oils can help.

Omega-3 oils have many cancer-fighting aspects. I will list just a couple of examples, although there are more than 60 studies to draw information from. Omega-3 oils help to build up the immune system by strengthening cellular immunity. {British Lancet Pharmacol, 1999}

There is a condition called angiogenesis, or the ability of a tumor to grow its own blood supply system. DHA, a component of omega-3 oils, is a key player in the destruction of those jellyfish-like tentacles that feed a tumor.

The only oils I cook with today are cold pressed olive oil or virgin coconut oil. They do stand up to the heat of a frying pan without breaking down and do not have omega-6 properties. Olive oil is also a source for squaline which fights the process known as angiogenesis. I also use olive oil as a salad dressing.

The "big 4" phytochemicals

Let's give you a rundown on the "big 4" of phytochemicals you can draw on from fruits and vegetables readily available in your local store. Note: organic is best if you can find and afford it. [For easy ways to incorporate organic food into your diet on a budget, see How to eat organic "on the cheap".]

Carotenoids (beta-carotene, lutein, lycopene) are found in apricots, broccoli, cantaloupe, spinach, sweet potatoes, carrots, and tomatoes. These are antioxidants that attack free radicals.

Flavonoids (more than 5000 known) are found in berries, broccoli, carrots, citrus fruits, onions, peppers, soybeans, tea, tomatoes, and yams, plus all other fruits vegetables you can name. They are the compounds that give each of these foods their color and taste. They are very powerful antioxidants. Juicing is what most effectively releases their properties for assimilation into your body.

Glucosinolates have 2 very important phytochemicals, isothiocyanates and indoles in their corner. These are found in the cruciferous vegetables such as Brussels sprouts, broccoli, cabbage, and cauliflower. They trigger production of protective enzymes, stimulate the immune system, destroy estrogen, and attack pre-cancerous cell mutations.

Polyphenols are found in blackberries, blueberries, grapes, green tea, raspberries, soybeans, and strawberries. They help prevent the alteration of foodstuffs into carcinogens. They also hlep prevent cancerous mutations.

While there is more to know about individual fruits and vegetables and what they specifically offer you in the way of cancer-fighting properties, you have enough information here to begin a very successful, natural fight against your cancer. Use the knowledge wisely. Get additional information anywhere you can. Consult with your health practitioner, friends, family. Learn all you can, its your life at stake. Once again, whether you choose allopathic, naturopathic or a combination of medical disciplines, your diet will work with them to build up your body. Everybody needs to do this. Everybody can do this, if they choose to.

Fiber

Let's shift gears and head to another subject--fiber. The average American consumes less than 15 grams of fiber per day. Your body requires on average a minimum of 40 grams of fiber per day. This is not a commercial for Metamucil but only because many people are allergic to psyllium husks. Fiber is what old people take to keep regular, right? WRONG! Fiber, if it is not now, will become your friend for a number of reasons.

High fiber diets or diets supplemented with additional fiber protect against the following non-cancer health issues: heart disease, diverticulosis (inverted polyps in the intestines), and obesity. Fiber reduces cholesterol in the blood, acts as a modifier to blood pressure to keep it uniform, levels out bloods sugar levels, and reduces the risks of ulcers.

As to cancer, fiber is a positive factor in lowering estrogen levels to fight breast and prostate cancers. It reduces the risk of intestinal, mouth, rectal, stomach, and thyroid cancers. In all cases, all types of cancer it helps detoxify the body by pushing fats and toxins through the colon before they are allowed to be re-absorbed into the body. If food stays too long in the intestines, toxins begin to leach back into the body. It is crucial to evacuate the intestines as soon as possible once digestion is complete.

There are two kinds of fiber, soluble and insoluble. As noted above, insoluble fiber acts like a scrub brush inside the colon to clean out bacteria and toxins before they can be re-absorbed into your system. You should realistically have at least 3 bowel movements a day. If you have one or less, you are allowing toxicity to build that will ultimately harm your body in potentially many ways.

Insoluble fiber has other functions as well. As the body breaks it down during the digestive process, insoluble fiber becomes one of several short-chain fatty acids. The most critical of these is N-butyrate. This particular fatty acid is the single most important sustenance for the cells lining the digestive tract. When the substance is low, there tends to be a number of diseases that gain a foothold, one of which is colon cancer. N-butyrate is a very, very powerful anti-cancer substance. It works synergistically with vitamin E and a number of flavonoids.

Soluble fibers have a different purpose, but every bit as important. As it is fermented in the colon, the beneficial bacteria ***Lactobacillus and bifidobacterium are able to grow. These bacteria are the cornerstone of good digestive health. They also suppress the growth of pathogenic (the bad stuff) bacteria and yeasts. As a side light, these 2 bacteria also work to support the immune system.

Isn't it amazing the complexity God built into our bodies? How anyone can stand back and look at the incalculable interactions going on every second we are alive [compare Nothing compares in complexity and intelligence to nature] and come up with the conclusion that this is a random chance of nature, is beyond me. The evidence of design (creation) absolutely dictates that accidental happenchance (evolution) could not possibly take place in this fashion.

Raw vs cooked

A couple of more words here about vegetables. There is also a great raging debate over raw only vegetable eaters and the rest of the world. Many things are better for you raw. Some are not. Tomatoes and spinach, for instance, have many properties that are enhanced by cooking. Most vegetables do not and are in fact damaged by the typical pressure cooking or boiling that most people do.

I prefer to steam vegetables I do not cook simply because I prefer cooked and steaming does not damage things (anywhere near as much as just boiling the life out of them) comparatively speaking. So raw probably is better for most things, but not all. Steaming is definitely better than boiling them to death and what you choose to do is up to you, but eat lots of bright vegetables and fruits and you are on the winning side of the diet issue.

Water

Next stop is a very brief discussion about water. Right from the tap? Right out of a bottle? "No" to the first and "Probably not" on the second. There are a number of books written on the subject, so I am not going to spend more than a few sentences on this topic right now.

The water you drink does two critical functions. It re-hydrates you and it flushes toxins from your body. As to re-hydration, you use water to breathe, sweat, and evacuate your system. All three of these functions draw fluids out of your body where they are stored in various cells. In order to keep cells elastic and alive, for that matter, they need water on a continual and regular basis. As to evacuation, if your kidneys are functioning correctly and you are taking in enough water to sustain you, you should be passing somewhere between 70-76% as urine during the course of a day. You should drink close to a gallon of water a day, as a rule.

A good basic formula for the absolute minimum consumption level is to take your body weight in pounds and divide by 2 and use that number as the minimum ounces of water to consume. If you weigh 140 pounds for instance, divide that by 2 = 70 pounds. Then the minimum you should drink daily is 70 ounces of water. However, minimums do nothing more than provide proper cell hydration and minimal evacuation. When fighting cancer, the volume needs to be greater because we need to concentrate on getting toxins, including dead cancer cells, flushed out of your body. That is the second critical function that water has. Every single cell in your body needs water to keep it healthy. Every single cell in your body also needs water to clean it out on a regular basis. A safer number for cancer victims is to go up to 75% in the formula rather than 50 percent. Even then, test and see if you should be drinking more.

There is, of course, like anything, a limit to how much water you should consume. If you consume too much, especially with a meal, you will tend to flush the nutrients right on out of the stomach before they ever get the opportunity to be utilized. So, the second reasonable suggestion about water intake is not to drink it directly with a meal, but rather 10 minutes before and 20 minutes after. I personally will have a sip or two quite frequently with a meal, but I no longer down glass-fulls of liquid while I dine. Bad form. Again this is a conscious choice you must make if you want nutrients to be best utilized by your body.

Back to the question first stated. What kind of water? Pure water; that is water totally clean of anything other than the molecular structure of hydrogen and oxygen atoms. Most types of filtration systems can remove almost all impurities, but not fluoride. Only reverse osmosis (RO) and distilling truly purify water. Even distilling should be run through a carbon filter after condensation to remove any volatiles.

Is there a preference between RO and distilled? In my estimation, yes. The distilling process also leaves water with a very, very slight negative electrical charge where RO does not. In the distilling process, some of the water ionizes leaving hydrogen (H) molecules which carry a slight positive charge and a hydroxyl of hydrogen and oxygen (HO) with a negative charge. The hydrogen molecules tend to leave the water and the hydroxyl tends to remain behind. This very slight negative charge is a bonus in that it acts similar to a magnet in attracting toxic substances from the body's cells which are slightly positive. Using RO water is not a show stopper by any means. Using distilled water is just a little better.

We purchased a small home distiller that has been very economical to use and the amount of junk it removes from the water is beyond description. We are on a private well and are not city water. I always thought what we had was better than city, but it was an eye opener when I saw just how much particulate was removed with every single gallon.

Pictured here is one gallon's worth of residue inside our distiller. Note we have a softener and a manganese peroxide treatment hooked up to our water on a well that is 95 feet deep. After seeing this, I have little desire to drink anything straight out of the tap. Note: the inside of this tank is bright stainless steel when clean.

What to avoid

The final topic within the rundown of basic nutrient values is sort of a simple recap of what not to have. This really is the biggest problem when looking at most diet plan structures I have seen thus far. There is very little discussion of what to avoid and why. We have already looked at fats that are part of the food additives and have lightly touched on fluoride. We'll look at fluoride first and then do a quick rundown on other food additives, followed by dairy products, and last but not least, a quick visit to snack foods.

Fluoride

Fluoride, the savior of teeth, is the poison in toothpaste that requires a warning label placed on every single tube of fluoride-laden tooth paste marketed in the United States. Why in the world do you want to put something in your body that is a known poison? From the back of a tube of Colgate tooth paste: WARNING: KEEP OUT OF THE REACH OF CHILDREN UNDER 6 YEARS OF AGE. IF MORE THAN USED FOR BRUSHING IS ACCIDENTALLY SWALLOWED, GET MEDICAL HELP OR CONTACT POISON CONTROL CENTER RIGHT AWAY.

Try this out for size. From Cellular Biological Toxicology of 1988 come the following statistic: Fluoride can boost the effect of carcinogens and increase tumor growth by up to 25%. And the volumes being discussed are use levels, not gallons, or tank car loads, but minute amounts as found in city drinking water. That scary enough or would you like another? How about this...Cancer death rates were noted as significantly higher in cities with fluoridated water when compared to untreated drinking water in other cities. For people over the age of 65, the rates were higher yet. The problem here is that even in the minute amounts of fluoride put in water, it can damage the DNA repair enzymes. Because cancer is an attack on the DNA structure of a cell, you have significantly contributed to the development and/or spread of cancer. The tragedy here comes when other comparisons of cities with and without fluoridated water are made.

There is a statistically significant difference of cavities in teeth with the loser being fluoridated water supplies. Why? Fluoride attacks the natural enamel on teeth which in turn exposes the softer tooth core which in turn is more vulnerable to decay. This is known as dental fluorosis. When the actual statistics for tooth decay are studied in detail, the drop in cavities began prior to the addition of fluoride to drinking water supplies. This is because better hygiene in general was being practiced along with improved nutrition.

One final shot. Fluoride can and does accumulate in the bones and levels can get so high that bone deterioration is a direct result. The process is known as skeletal fluorosis.

Where does this leave us? Let's try the following course of action. If you can't or won't filter or distill your water, then at the very least, you should avoid all fluoride toothpastes, dental fluoride treatment programs, and fluoride tablets.

For details on fluoride's detrimental effects on health and teeth, see On fluoride and fluoridation causing/contributing to cancer and Fluoridated water and toothpaste damage teeth and body: Fluoride ruins teeth by interfering with bone & tooth mineralization.

Wheat and gluten

I am only going to throw in a couple of words here about wheat and gluten. Virtually every cancer diet I have looked at has lots of bread and wheat-based starches/carbohydrates in it. Take a long look at eating wheat products before you continue doing such. Gluten is one of those things that makes your body work hard. It produces an acid base histamine (something you get with allergies). It also is a contributory factor in clogging arteries. Even if these things do not play a part in your life, it is one less thing for your body to work against.

Cancer forces changes and like it or not, if you don't make the changes to help your body fight the disease, you by default help your cancer to grow. Hardest thing I have had to do with the changes I have made was to quit eating regular wheat products. That is the only, single dietary change that I can tell that has made a difference in how I feel. The rest of the things I am doing is because they are logical choices based upon many hours of research.

Food additives

A short course in food additives needs also to be addressed. Almost all additives today that are put in food products aside from the fats previously discussed are complex chemical compounds. Because all of these compounds are not in a natural state, the body must literally tear them apart (detoxify) in order to handle them during the digestive process. This extra effort is another strain on a cancer victim's already overburdened detox system. This extra effort can easily detract from the detoxifying action of attacking and disposing of carcinogens. The FDA does test for carcinogens of individual components, but as of yet, they do not look at the synergistic effect of these complex chemicals and the potential for their combinations to end up as a carcinogen.

Again, don't make your body work any harder than necessary by your doing things to it that can be changed simply by improving your diet. The less it does to fight what you eat, the more it can do to fight your cancer. It's a little thing, but a lot of little things can add up in a hurry.

In relation to food additives, we need to address the glutamate family including such things as MSG and hydrolyzed vegetable proteins, our old friend the synthetic sweetener aspartame (which was declared possibly carcinogenic to humans [group 2B] in July 2023), and cystame. All of these additives can damage nerve cells ultimately causing brain damage. Aside from contributing to cardiac issues and nervous system damage, glutamates have a major effect on existing brain tumors. Last word on glutamates comes with their pain properties. Glutamates are neurotransmitters. What this means is that by blocking them, you can reduce/relieve some pain sensations. By eliminating them from your diet, you will help to reduce overall pain levels in your body.

Nonorganic pasteurized cow's dairy

A quick look at dairy products is next. This refers to cow's milk products. Milk contains a very, very large protein molecule directly linked to dairy allergies and child onset diabetes. The relationship to diabetes has to do with many factors including the predisposition toward the disease, but there are now a number of studies that do provide a direct link. I will not get into a discussion on this problem, but if interested you can do some research for yourself. Again, the allergy factor of milk products is cause for concern. We are looking at your immune system tying up valuable resources that should be devoted to fighting cancer, not your eating habits. Don't create more problems for yourself. CHANGE THE DIET!

Dairy cattle are carriers of a number of cancer viruses, primarily lymphoma and leukemia. These two diseases are the single most prevalent infections in cattle today. Nearly 60% of all cattle in the U.S. are infected as of this writing. People living in areas where the animal infection rates are high, have a disproportionately high level of occurrences of lymphoid leukemia.

Pasteurization, killer of diseases? Not necessarily. The reason milk spoils so fast is that even though pasteurized, it still retains active bacteria.

Note: none of the above appears to apply to raw organic milk from pastured cows. For more health concerns connected to nonorganic milk, see On cow's milk and the cancer connection.

Snack foods

Last but not least on the list is snack foods that are typically given to cancer patients to help with maintaining weight while facing conventional medical treatments. Just look at the vending machines or snack bars in any hospital. Look at the things given to patients in hospital rooms that are either waiting for or recovering from surgery. Cakes, soda pop both sugar and artificially sweetened, muffins, ice cream, biscuits, rolls and margarine, peanut butter crackers, cheesecake, jello with cool whip topping, potato chips, etc... Go ahead, feed my tumors, tax my immune system, harm me, see if I care. I trust your judgment...

Many of these items not only contain omega-6 fats, but are cooked in them as well plus they can contain MSG or any number of other synthetic flavor or color enhancers. What can I say, I have eaten my share of this stuff, but not again, not with what I know now.

More nutrition advice for cancer patients by the same terminal cancer victor

Juicing against cancer Advice and experiences

How to do Dr. Coca's Pulse Test for Food Allergies Support your immune system by eliminating foods you are allergic to

Food Combining (upcoming)

... and for the best, easiest, and least expensive ways I know to heal cancer

after studying the subject for some twenty years, click here.