What to Do After a Cancer Diagnosis: Finding Hope Through Integrative Wellness

Welcome to the first ever Grateful Friends blog post.

Sorry to hear about your cancer diagnosis. Or the diagnosis of your friend or family member if you’re here on their behalf. Hearing a doctor say “You have cancer” can rock your world in a way that usually only happens in Star Wars movies on giant Imax screens with insanely loud surround sound.

Only this is real.

That’s the bad news. The good news is you’re not alone. According to the American Cancer Society, 40% of Americans will get cancer in their lifetimes, so you’re in good company. The other good news is you don’t have to be a victim. There are things you can do that could help your doctors improve your health, help you feel better after chemo/radiation treatments (no medical degree needed), etc.

Before I delve into that, I should introduce myself. I’m not a doctor, nurse, therapist or medical person of any kind. None of what I’m saying is medical advice. These are just steps I’ve taken that’ve worked for me. Before trying anything I talk about, you should discuss it with your doctor.

I’m Tom Sprague, a Certified Integrative Wellness Coach through Dr Andrew Weil’s Center for Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona.

I received my dreaded cancer diagnosis over 30 years ago. It was part of a rare condition called Gorlin Syndrome —1 in 35,000 people get it. which manifested itself by continuously producing Basal Cell Carcinoma skin cancers in my body.

Conventional/western medicine doctors told me it’s a hereditary condition with no cure. I’d need to come in for surgery to remove the skin cancers before they got too big. Every 3 months. For the rest of my life. And there was nothing I could do to improve my condition.

I panicked. “But wait, I’m in my “indestructible 20s, I have my whole life in front of me. I…I…I…played 3 sports in high school and, and baseball in college. I’m an athlete, I’m in, I’m in great shape, there’s gotta be SOMETHING I can do to improve this condition...”

“There is something you can do. Come in for surgery every 3 months…and maybe limit sun exposure because it doesn’t cause this condition, but it can exacerbate it.”

I was relegated to Cancer Victim status for the rest of my life.

Not long afterwards, Dr Andrew Weil came into my life. A Harvard Medical School grad and the Father of Integrative Medicine. “What is Integrative Medicine?” you ask. Great question.

Integrative Wellness for Cancer

Integrative Medicine integrates or combines the best of conventional/western medicine and complementary/alternative medicine to treat the whole person. Mind, body and spirit are intertwined, equally important and can’t be looked at in a vacuum. In addition, Integrative Medicine is based on the idea that every person has innate wisdom and healing potential within themselves.

When my Arizona aunt sent me Dr. Weil’s book “8 Weeks to Optimum Health,” it was a revelation. I didn’t have to be a cancer victim after all. WHAT?!?!?!?

Turns out there were lots of things I could do to empower my body’s ability to heal itself. I was familiar with my body healing a headache or a scrape or the flu. But could it actually heal cancer too? I didn’t think so at the time since the doctors told me there was no cure.

But I figured, even if I could reduce my cancer a little it’d be worth it. And thus, my cancer journey began.

I started trialing and erroring different alternative techniques. And since I had surgery appointments every 3 months, I got regular feedback on how well different modalities worked or didn’t work and how well I was mitigating the stress in my life. If something worked, I kept doing it. If it didn’t, I moved on. Simple.

I tried all kinds of things. Massage therapy, mental health therapy, organic food, yoga, Kinesiology, Rolfing, Tai Chi, Chi Gong and the world of Traditional Chinese Medicine: Acupuncture, Tui Na, Gua Sha, Shiatsu, Cupping, etc. Over time, I created what I called a Healing Regimen.

But as in life, there were ups and downs on this journey.

When I had stressful jobs and bad commutes instead of 5 or 9 or 7 BCCs/visit, I was in the 10-20 range. When I had a bad commute to a toxic workplace, I got around 30 skin cancers/visit. In each case, once I left that job, my counts returned to single digits. Better still, once I established my healing regimen, I had a baseline of 4-5 BCCs/visit or 16-20/year. I felt like that wasn’t so bad. I could live with that for the rest of my life.

Then COVID happened. Numerous lockdown-related, stressful events occurred. My mental health worsened. Stress, anxiety, panic attacks. I couldn’t function. Took 2 mental health leaves of absence from work.

Wanna’ guess what that state of mental health did to my physical health?

I got bronchitis, COVID and pneumonia. Simultaneously. Knocked me out for 2 months. Had to postpone my quarterly surgery. When I finally went in, I had my worst surgery ever. 2 days later I went home with 75 stitches and staples in my head.

Did you get cancer, or did it worsen after a stressful life event or series of events?

That’s likely not just a coincidence.

But there was good COVID news too. I learned Dr. Weil’s Integrative Wellness Coaching program had been opened up to laypeople like me. SIGN ME UP!!! I’ve been living this for decades and now I could help other people.

As I spent the past 3 years studying to get certified, I tweaked the healing regimen I’d crafted over the decades. With this ultra healing regimen 7 of my past 8 quarterly visits ended up with 2 BCCs or less. That’s more 0-2 visits the past 2 years than I’ve had the past 30 years combined. At two of the visits I had zero. Since I was told I had a hereditary disease with no cure, zero was never on my radar. Until now. Amazingly, 3 decades into this disease, the last 2 years have been my best surgery years (as we say in Boston) EVAHHHH!!!

Yeah, great story, Tom.

What’s it got to do with me?

How much can Integrative Wellness help me?

I have no idea. I’m just a (non-medical) guy with a human body. While every person and every cancer is different, you also have a human body. I’ve learned that the human body has an incredible capacity to heal itself. Heck, I’ve lived it. Who knows what your body could achieve if you fully empowered it to do its thing.

• Maybe Integrative Wellness techniques will have no impact on your cancer.

• Maybe they’ll have a dramatic impact like they did with me.

• Maybe they’ll have an even greater impact on you than they did on me.

There’s only one way to find out. And remember, I got a big boost in my health AFTER I’d spent 30 years creating a healing regimen. If you’re currently only doing a few (or none) of these techniques, you have so much more room to improve your holistic health now than I did 2 years ago.

But here’s the thing. You don’t have a whole lot to lose by making lifestyle changes. 

Many of these things I’ve done are simple and low-cost. There are no copays or deductibles. There aren’t a whole lot of side effects. For instance, when I tried Yoga Therapy, I discovered some muscles I never knew I had and they were sore at first, but they soon got better.

Even if your cancer doesn’t improve, there are often side benefits. I’ve experienced: weight loss, fewer floaters in my eyes, my back no longer goes out regularly (requiring a couple days of bedrest), my Dry Eye Syndrome is better. My PTSD from childhood (my dad had the disease of alcoholism and could be abusive) has improved substantially.

You should always check with your doctor before making changes to your diet, supplements, exercise routine, etc. 

But in my experience, many integrative wellness techniques pair very nicely with conventional medicine.

On that front, I’ve had over 500 BCCs surgically removed. I’ve taken Sertraline for anxiety/depression and Trazodone for sleep when my mental health was in crisis. Like I said, integrative medicine integrates the best of both worlds.

Lastly, four-letter words often get a bad rap. I suspect you used a bunch of them after getting your diagnosis. I know I did.

But I’d like to wrap this post with a couple four-letter words for you to take with you:

1. Help – there are many ways to get help through Grateful Friends. You are not alone. We see you and we’re here for you.

2. Hope – Even if you have a dire diagnosis, there are things you can try that could help your condition or help you feel better during your treatment. The way you breathe. The way you (and others) talk about your cancer. The way you sleep, eat and move. The people you spend time with. The things you put in, on or near your body. They all add up and build your resilience. And if you’re in need of a miracle, there is your spirituality along with renowned alternative medicine healers you may want to look to. The bottom line is you have options. Where is your innate wisdom and intuition leading you? What is your mind open to?

We’ll be getting into more detail about these integrative techniques and lifestyle changes in upcoming posts. But we didn’t want you to leave this blog without at least a glimmer of hope.