Return to the Master Herbalist
Late August 2018
At this point the exterior tumor was growing rapidly. I do have pictures of it, but they are much too graphic and disturbing to include here. I will, however, give you a mental visual that will give you a good understanding of its appearance. Imagine a raw meatball of average size with mozzarella cheese melted on top of it. That is very much what it looked like. To make matters even worse, the wound from the black salve (that I thought was closing up and healing so beautifully) was now opening up again, as well as bleeding and oozing a pus-like substance!!
Needless to say, by this time I was in dire straights. This tumor showed no signs of stopping and I didn’t want it to engulf my entire chest. It’t hard to believe, but I still thought that this tumor(s) could be healed by natural means. Not one to give up, I decided to return to the master herbalist’s office that I had visited in September of 2016 and once again saw one of the naturopath’s there. It was somewhat embarrassing to return there in my current condition as it was plainly apparent that I had not carried through with the protocol they had given me back in September 2016. When I showed the naturopath the meatball on my chest, she immediately recoiled in horror and asked if I had considered a mastectomy.”NO! NO! and NO!” was what I screamed to myself internally. That’s the very last thing that I wanted! I somehow thought that the magic of herbs and fruits would turn this situation around naturally. She even called in the master herbalist himself to see the tumor and he also asked if I had considered a mastectomy. I told them both flatly that I wanted to avoid that. The naturopath then implied that I had maybe four months left to live! I should have walked out then and there, but I felt I had no place else and no one else to turn to. She then proceeded to write out an herbal protocol and fruit-only diet for me to follow with instructions for a phone follow-up in one month. At this time of the phone follow-up, a lot of white pus-like material was pushing out of the tumor and so much lymph was draining from it that I had to change my old T-shirts several times a day. I also had to sleep with a large bowl under me that was folded over several times to prevent leakage of the tumor onto the bedsheets. Because of weeks of eating only fruit and at times drinking only a specially-formulated lemonade in an attempt to “detox” the cancer out of my body, my weight dropped to 111 pounds. I was so emaciated that I looked anorexic. I was clearly starving to death.
End of October 2018
Unfortunately, this protocol seemed to be doing nothing to stop or even slow the growth of the tumor. By this time, it was bleeding easily and without much effort at all. When I reported this to the naturopath, she asked me to take a week and seriously reconsider whether or not I wanted to do the mastectomy. At that point, I had to admit that the tumor was becoming increasingly difficult to handle and was extremely painful. Only lots of Advil kept me functional. Because of the size of the tumor, I couldn’t wear normal clothes; I could only wear tops with ruffled tiers to conceal the protrusion of the tumor. These tiers also helped to conceal the drainage, but there was no guarantee that the tumor wouldn’t start spontaneously bleeding at the most inappropriate times. Going out in public was becoming very difficult. I met with a friend who was an energy healer to get her thoughts on whether or not I should have surgery. She took one look at the tumor and said I needed surgery immediately!! It was now sinking into my thick skull that this tumor was not going to heal through holistic measures. The situation was too far gone for that route. That ship had apparently sailed a long time ago.
In truth, a large part of me was more than ready for the mastectomy despite how hard I had fought against it. No more drainage, no more bleeding, no more difficulty wearing normal clothing. NO MORE PAIN!!!!!!! With the dawning of this realization and a sense of relief, I knew I needed to find a surgeon who would do the surgery for me. That was not to be an easy task!