Belief in spontaneous remissions

My last post was talking about spontaneous remissions or miracles or what ever you want to call them. I’m a stage 4 prostate cancer patient who is trying to live as normal life as possible but for me that just isn’t enough. There is no more normal anymore, I mean tonight I spent nearly ninety minutes on the toilet in agony trying to pass something that felt like a house brick, I’m sorry if you are eating but that’s my normality and it happens to me. I climbed off the toilet exhausted and just flopped on my bed, I was half expecting a midwife to come in and say congratulations Woody this is your new baby. It’s the life of a prostate cancer sufferer and I want to become one of the miracles that is known as a spontaneous remission. On top of that I’ve waited all day for the result of my latest PSA test, worrying which way the numbers are going, is it going to be good or bad that one phone call in a few words that can change everything only to be told it will be ready tomorrow. Im grateful for what I have despite all this but I want more, I need a pardon I need the life sentence to be lifted, I need proper normality, is that a lot to ask? I’m going to do my best not just sit around waiting for my last breath I believe I can have some control over my own outcome and that’s what I want to share with you.

As I said in my previous blog the people investigated for spontaneous remission tended to have a lot of things in common. I’ve long been sure that there is no such thing as coincidence, everything happens for a reason and so I want to have as good a chance of beating this as those people who suddenly healed. I want to control at least some of my destiny or even alter it if it’s possible and then at the end of the day I can look at myself and say I’ve tried my best to do something about my situation. I believe that doctors don’t hold all the answers, I believe there is far more power in just believing about something and so this is my topic today to see if I can help myself or you become one of the anonmolys in this.

There are several key things that these incredible survivors had in common and one thing that has to be on that list is belief. They had conviction in themselves, believed in their own bodies natural inate ability to heal itself. I believe nothing works unless you truly believe it works the mind body connection is a mystery that is only just started to being solved, we are at the tip of the Iceburg, gradually peeling away the layers, I believe that what you believe becomes true if you believe it enough. No matter what my doctor’s tell me I have to totally believe that I will get through this. The mind plays a huge part, every tablet I put in my body and every injection I receive will only work as well as I believe it will. I know that as soon as my belief in something dissappears then that something doesn’t happen.

This gives me hope, before my own diagnosis I already knew about the power of the mind and the effect it has on our health. A stressed mind leads to a stressed body this is scientific fact. Our cells sing to the tunes of our thoughts and our beliefs. Nothing can survive without belief. Our thoughts and feelings echo through every cell like some kind of biological tango. You think therefore you are. We as humans  live in a world where we stop believing about stuff. Father Christmas is still real to me As he was 50 years ago when I was a little boy hiding behind the curtains looking to the skies for a sneak glimpse of the mystical magical man. Although I never saw him, I never stopped believing in him and what he does for the general good of the world. My father Christmas is my oncologist my father Christmas is my tablets and injections that are prolonging my life. They are incredible but am I greedy in wanting the possible 5 years I’ve been offered as a maximum stay of execution, cancer is coming for me there is no escape. Except there is, it’s happened to others so why not me and why not you too. One of the best ways to become like someone else is to copy them. People who have become somehow free of cancer do stuff that’s not necessarily out of anyone elses capabilities and one of those on my list is to have 100% hope and belief in that I will be one of those miracles. I know I stand no chance if I don’t believe it’s possible, nothing is impossible when you have belief. People who suddenly heal seem to commonly have faith in themselves. They believe that what they are doing is right.

Since the bombshell that is my diagnosis I have consistently felt that this illness will not be the death of me despite my dire prognosis and statistics that say otherwise. I’ve have told myself a mantra that I believe in with all of my heart, every single night morning and in-between. I’ve told myself this and I believe the cells in my body are sitting  up and listening.

Every day in every way I’m feeling better and better

Every day in every way I’m becoming stronger and stronger

Every day in every way my cancer is getting weaker and weaker

I’ve been saying this for months now and every time I say it I feel some thing is happening. Some may say it’s mumbo jumbo, most who say it’s mumbo jumbo haven’t been told they’ve got a maximum of five years at the very best. Don’t get me wrong five years would be something to be grateful for but that’s not what I want and most people in my shoes would say the same especially as 8 months now since I was told that I have late stage prostate cancer have flown by in a blink of an eye, its cruel to count your life down by PSA blood tests and injections and tablets but I know the statistics that the tablets only work till my cancer says enough and attacks me again, of course there may be a new medication in a few years time, but for now I’m playing my cards with a total remission I may not get it but I’ve got a few aces to play and one of which is a very strong belief in the impossible being possible for anyone including me, which means you too.

I wonder how many people when being told they have cancer die of being told and not the disease itself. How many people accept they are going to die and therefore prime their cells in their body to die. I read a story of a man who having been given less than 6 months left to live died within 6 months and after his death it was established his cancer was misdiagnosed and in fact he was very healthy but passed away anyway. His belief was so strong that he was going to die, so he did just that and told himself he was going to die. Witch doctor’s and voodoo priests used to put death curses on people, people who were healthy, yet such was their total belief that in a short space of time their bodies would give up, deteriate and die. Well if it works that way then why can’t it be possible to work the other way.

Belief comes in many forms,  I believe it all comes from within, every single one of us facing this death sentence can start the first step into convincing themselves they believe. You can pray you can do what ever you want if it gives you belief. We all need this, every single person who has cancer has to search deep and find belief inside of them and once you find that you start lowering the odds that are so firmly stacked up against you like a mountain that’s unclimable, but once belief is with you the journey starts to become easier, each step becomes steadier and the load that you carry around called cancer gradually becomes lighter.

Writing this blog gives me hope when perhaps I have no right to have hope. If I have hope we all have hope we just have to start to believe in it. When I first started quoting the mantra I use all the time I did it to convince myself at a time when hope was but a distant ship sailing further away on a horizon, gradually disappearing from view. Now that ship has turned around and is coming to pick me up as a passenger on its next voyage. It doesn’t matter what you believe you have just got to keep telling yourself that you can beat the odds, that you are not going to let this thing steal your life and your future dreams because that’s what it does if you allow it to. It excites me to think that my life might be in my hands if I follow and model what others have done, by writing this I dont intent to give others false hope or indeed myself, I intent to give myself and you reader hope that perhaps wouldn’t be there. Hope is powerful, we can climb mountains swim seas and go on incredible journeys when we have hope and belief in ourselves. Writing this type of blog inspires me, it opens my eyes, lifts my soul and tells me to go for it, what is there to lose just by making a few lifestyle changes and believing in them with all of my heart.

Today I celebrate good news my PSA score is 0.03 the best so far, it was 288, I’ve got tumours that are shrinking, it’s all going in the right direction for now. But, I can’t rest and just accept that it will keep getting better, that the medicine will always work, I’ve got changes to make to myself both physically and mentally The best thing though is I have belief, I have faith that along with my medication my body will take over and do the job. My cancer will be with me for a while longer, it’s done damage to my spine which they say is not repareable, I don’t accept that full stop. My next blog will talk about how I now accept and am trying to come to terms with my cancer and how I’ve come to realise that hating it is not the way forward. Hating cancer is hating yourself and my belief tells me that accepting it for what it is, will be another step in the healing process.

Take care

Love Woody ❤️