Staying Healthy

My cousin/sister is about to become a grandmother for the first time and we are all anxiously awaiting word. This is the other big news in my life today.

PSA or Prostate Specific Antigen is chemical in the blood that marks the aggressive tendencies of prostate cancer. The higher the number the more the process is progressing. It is not a marker for the elimination of the cancer but rather how docile it has become. When the marker is going up then the disease is more aggressive when low or declining it is a good sign that the cancer is contained. Before the Luprin and the other drugs and therapies vitamin C transfusions, Reiki, herbs, shaman treatments etc. the number had risen to 57 from 33 , four weeks earlier. Below 4 is considered safe for a body the age of mine. The results of Friday's test is that the number is 2.4.

This is very heartening and gives me cause for joy and relief. What I am doing is the right thing for the health of the body and I am doing better without that particular stress of a high PSA.

It is recommended by the prostate medical oncologist in LA that I indulge my body in a treatment of Chemotherapy with the drug Taxatore. The side effects are exhaustion, depression, hair loss, nausea, and even fingernail loss. The rationale behind this is that the cancer that is killed by the chemo will give me a better chance to live longer by killing some of the cells that have the potential to return as an aggressive cancer after the effects of luprin and the other two drugs are no longer viable.

Since the medical oncologists are strictly hard scientists it is appropriate to judge them using that criteria. Using that criteria there is no existing empirical evidence that demonstrates what their hypothesis suggests. It is logical that what should follow is what they are recommending but lack of empirical evidence is what lots of different treatments that are being suggested suffer from. If I followed that chain of thinking then it seems to me to allow for lots of different processes that might be as effective or more so without the deleterious side effects.

It has more heart that a body that is healing would begin to feel better and have better results from the therapies imposed upon it than the opposite result.

An opinion from a different specialist that is much more sanguine. He did not want to see me until February and told me that the general trend was more important than a single blip. Good to remember as the month by month results continue.

The argument of feeling good leading to feeling better has a tremendous appeal. If there was great suffering being endured then some of the more aggressive, injurious , and risky steps might seem much more viable. But that is not the case.

I have been a meditator all of my adult life and not to use that tool in the process of healing is a wasteful use of a life skill that has been practiced for many years. One of the paths that I am considering in this adventure is creative imagery. Using the mind to actively heal the functioning of the body.

Stories of people changing themselves are rampant. One of the biggest stories is something that is not even seen as such. The drug companies spend an inordinate amount of time and money attempting to eliminate the placebo effect. Which is nothing more than the belief by an individual that a inert substance heals them and when they take it , it proceeds to do so.

I know of a study in which it was observed that people who make an appointment to see a doctor feel better than those who have not yet done the scheduling. Merely making an appointment improves health? Rather than negating that , should not one consider embracing that idea?

Science is replete with stories of people who do not know what they are looking at and only after changing their awareness do they begin to accept what is in front of them. There is a story of two researchers at Bell labs in the 60's named Penzias and Wilson who built a ultra sensitive receiver that had a noise that they could not identify. After a year of research they were able to understand that it was cosmic background radiation that gave strong evidence of the big-bang theory of the origination of the universe. Is the placebo effect that same background noise that we are unable to look at with different understanding? The buddhist in Tantra yoga allude to an understanding that allows for creation of new forms outside of the rational and closer to the stage of belief , but not calling it such.

My prima amiga is a Vipassana meditation teacher of very high caliber and she puts forth the thought of healing energy coming through the acceptance of the vicissitudes of the mind, it's hopes and fears including that of dying. She has also repeatedly demonstrated to me that it is critical to accept what the moment offers and to live in the present. All healing takes place in the present moment.

My response is that to learn to use the imagination in the moment can also affect healing. Using the placebo effect or perhaps allowing it to happen might be more accurate. A story from Andrew Weil of a young teacher who had a student who loved to daydream and when punished for this activity would literally raise his body temperature so high that the law mandated that he be sent home illustrates something of the mental powers that are available to anyone. Interesting anecdotal observations.

It seems logical and feels right to me that a body that is healing would begin to feel better and have better results from the therapies imposed upon it, than the opposite . Vipassana seems to me a passive way to deal with a situation such as medical afflictions. It heals the soul(a non-buddhist term). I am told of great lamas of Tibet not healing themselves of life threatening illnesses . For which I have only the greatest respect. They have motives that include a view of this life as merely one in a series of which they are helpers to those of us who need their guidance and strength of character in the face of death ,that is of inestimable value.

Is it possible that others have used meditation to heal the bodies? Is it possible to use the meditation to heal and put off the date of death until a more full span of time ? Is it wise?

These are some of the questions that can be asked that I think are reasonable.

The first condition is safety. Is what I am doing gone to harm me ? That harm which is being done by not attending to the disease in a way that highly qualified specialists are recommending? That certainly needs to be investigated. There is a group called US 2 who are a prostate cancer support group and I will field the question to them. I will ask about those who have chosen and those who have refused chemo.

The second condition is life and living. To sacrifice a healthy today for a longer period of time of ill health tomorrow does not appeal. If years of misery and suffering, arrrrrgggh ,are the prospect what is the use of advancing the suffering?

The third and most important is what is good for my spiritual practice? The word sadhana is in sanskrit and generally refers to the path of learning that one is on. Wikipedia defines it is as " a means whereby bondage becomes liberation." The body binds the soul on the earthly plane. How does liberation come ? Through passive acceptance of the situation or actively changing the circumstances of suffering.

It seems that it must be a balance between to two.