Friday, July 13, 2018 -- yeah, I know, Friday the 13th -- my Urologist brought me into his examination room and told me I had 2 years to live. Just like that.  He added, "I've seen guys in your situation. Twenty-four months, maybe a couple more, but I'm not optimistic."

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Not optimistic?  Wow!  There's an understatement for the books. 

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​​​After a brief explanation and discussion, I agreed to and was given my first Lupron shot, a chemical injection which started the process of killing my body's ability to produce testosterone, the primary, enabling hormone for prostate cancer.  I was also given an oral drug that would do the same.  Basically, I would be chemically emasculated.  I was willing to accept that trade-off because the implication was clear: without Lupron, I wouldn't last long; with it, I'd get two precious years.  The Urologist, who had operated on me, had -- with sympathy -- decided to not remove my prostate nor the two nearby metastasized lymph nodes, because, he said, "That wouldn't cure you." ​

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Driving home that day -- still in shock and fighting the urge to panic -- I thought to myself that if I could stay healthy enough, the 2-year window would give me a chance to figure out a way to buy time -- and, I'm happy to write, I've been able to do that.  But rather than being saved by a medical breakthrough, I found I was able to render my cancer dormant through a daily discipline of simple and specific steps I developed that maximized the effect of the medications I was given.  

 

Having passed that improbable 2-year anniversary by more than five years and having regained health, I am now having my doctors monitor my blood panels four times a year and I'm being getting scanned every year to be alerted should my prostate cancer again become dangerously active.  I have great confidence in believing it won't. 

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The turning point for me came two days after the terminal prognosis when I got a call from the man who was then my PCP -- the person who pointed me toward saving my own life.  The first question he asked was whether or not I wanted to live.  When I answered yes, he told me I absolutely could not live in fear of cancer or my thoughts would undermine critical healing and I would, indeed, die in two years.  It was critical, he said, that I change my body's chemistry and go about living my life; saying he didn't even like the term "fight cancer."  I immediately embarked upon changing my body chemistry through a plant-based diet, a regular meditation practice and a change in lifestyle.  Recognizing mental habits which I knew had affected my health, I broke my habit of ruminating and the negative internal monologue that had so often crushed vestiges of self love.  Basically, I looked back  -- and without judgement -- took stock of myself and made the changes necessary to look forward, past cancer.

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I knew I wasn't going to fold my tent.  Instead of living in fear of cancer, I was going to dive into research, make changes and own my cancer.​  And it's worked out the way I taught myself to imagine it.

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By the end of October 2018 -- just 3 months after the initial diagnosis -- a CT Scan revealed that one metastasized lymph node was dramatically reduced and the big one near my prostate had shrunk in size by nearly half.  By December, my prostate specific antigens (PSA’s) which are often -- though not always -- a reliable indicator of prostate cancer, were down to an untraceable level; basically, zero.

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The following spring, I was able to stop taking the oral medication.  I never did radiation and I never did chemo.  My Oncologist and I agreed to part ways.  (I got the sense he was unsettled by my approach and the results.  He had casually read a list of chemo treatments and the nightmare-ish side-effects I could expect before dying.)  However, I continues to take Lupron injections up to the maximum months advised by the AMA.  (N.B. Today's radiation technology and efficacy would give me cause to consider the option of radiation, especially if the cancer were caught before metastizing.

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