cancer | Ain't Complicated

Cancer and Me

Stage 3 non-metastisizing basal cell carcinoma -- skin cancer

In five days, it will be one year since I got the official diagnosis from my new doctor. What I have on my right ear is skin cancer; specifically, basal cell carcinoma. Of the skin cancers, it is the “best” to get. (That characterization is mine, not something the doctor told me.)

Tomorrow I am to go to the clinic for an IV infusion of SOT developed by RGCC. 🙂 (Yes, yes — I’ll explain further on down.)

But that’s tomorrow. Today, as with every other day for months and months, I changed my diaper morning and evening. My ear diaper, that is. This is what a freshly installed diaper looks like (grayscaled and blurred): Read it all

Fenbendazole Kills Parasites — Will It Destroy Cancer?

"Ivermectin is good, but I like fenbendazole better."

A couple of my former high school students and their family were visiting our congregation the last weekend in April for our annual Bible Conference. They had heard of my cancer, so after one of the Saturday services, she (SS) told my wife (Ruby, in case you didn’t know) about an antiparasitic that shows promise as a cancer treatment.

I work for a New York small business that provides email services and Web work services for those who do not have Internet access. Well, the following Wednesday, I saw a project in our work queue that I took on since it was about cancer. The customer wanted information on the Joe Tippens protocol for cancer and he wanted to know about buying the Merck brand of fenbendazole. It wasn’t hard to find the info for him (and it only cost him $18). When I told Ruby the drug name, she reminded me excitedly that it was the same stuff SS had told her about. (I had forgotten the name fenbendazole already.)

At least four of my acquaintances across the country are MDs. The next day (May 4, you should know) I finally remembered to ask one of them a question I’d been wanting to ask a real doctor for a few weeks: “What do you think of ivermectin as a cancer treatment?” He replied that ivermectin is good but he likes fenbendazole better. I hadn’t ever mentioned fenbendazole to him! (I should ask my other MD acquaintances the question now!)

Cancer-killing canine deworker? — Where is this? What is it? IDK, but I like the picture!

So there you are. In the space of…what…five days, three different people from three different parts of the country brought fenbendazole to my attention. And none of them know each other. Coincidental? Perhaps. But I prefer to think otherwise.

OK, one more event. On May 19 I got an unexpected email from a nice, gray-haired grandma. Read it all

Good News…

…followed by bad.

Potential Leukemia Breakthrough

Australian scientists said Monday they had mapped a blood cell structure which could hold the key to improved drug treatments for diseases such as leukaemia, asthma and rheumatoid arthritis.

[…]

“We hope that this discovery will lead to targeted therapies, more specific to the malfunctioning cells seen in diseases such as leukaemia.”

Lesbian, Atheist, Muslim to “Attempt” Christian Life

A new television program being broadcast this month follows a group of 13 non-Christian volunteers, who, on camera, attempt to “live by the teachings of the Bible for three weeks.”

“Make Me a Christian,” broadcast in a three-part series, asks the participants to be mentored by four pastors from a variety of backgrounds – Anglican, Catholic, Evangelical, and Pentecostal – as they attempt to live like Christians, an effort that runs in stark contrast to many of the participants’ backgrounds.

The 13 volunteers who will make the effort include a tattooed militant atheist biker, a man who converted from Christianity to Islam, a lesbian schoolteacher, a lap-dancing witch with a lust for expensive shoes, a middle-class yuppie couple that can’t find time to spend with their children and a party animal who claims he’s slept with over 150 women.

Whether people can be made into Christians by a three-week crash course in discipleship, however, remains a matter of debate.

[…]

The show’s website concludes with the teaser line, “All this is just the start of their three hard weeks. Can they embrace Christian ideals and learn to live in a different way or will their old lives prove just too strong to resist?”

You cannot live the Christian life without Jesus.

There is no Christian life without Christ. Not in real life. And certainly not in for-TV life.

Help Us

As a Russian jet bombed fields around his village, Djimali Avago, a Georgian farmer, asked me: “Why won’t America and Nato help us? If they won’t help us now, why did we help them in Iraq?”

A similar sense of betrayal coursed through the conversations of many Georgians here yesterday as their troops retreated under shellfire and the Russian Army pressed forward to take full control of South Ossetia.

Note to other countries: Who will go to war against Russia for you? 😯

US-Russian Tensions “Worsen”

Dozens of Russian warplanes staged air raids in Georgia on Monday, officials said, but Prime Minister Vladimir Putin accused the United States of trying to undermine Russia’s mounting military offensive.

[…]

Russia and Georgia pursued their attacks as diplomatic tensions worsened. US President George W. Bush, Georgia’s biggest western ally, said he had told Russia’s influential prime minister that its bombing of Georgia was “unacceptable.”

Putin responded by accusing the US of trying to disrupt the Russian military operation by transporting Georgian troops from Iraq into the “conflict zone.”

“I regret that some of our partners are not helping us but in fact are trying to impede us,” Putin said directly referring to the US flights of Georgian troops.

[…]

The UN refugee agency said up to 80 percent of Gori’s population of 50,000 have fled the city because of Russian attacks.

[…]

Russia, which has already moved battleships to the Black Sea and said it has sunk a Georgian navy vessel, is preparing to deploy 9,000 troops to bolster its forces inside a second separatist Georgian region, Abkhazia, a military spokesman was quoted as saying by Interfax.

It will send more than 350 armoured vehicles to add to what is officially a Russian peacekeeping force in the breakaway region, the spokesman said.

“What is officially a Russian peacekeeping force” highlights a concept I’ve found difficult to grasp for years. Look at Russia’s track record through fairly recent history and who wouldn’t consider their “friendly” military presence anywhere without at least some trepidation?

PS to Putin: So some of your partners aren’t helping you? Well, what’s the US to do when it’s also partners with your adversary? Ah, the strange world of geopolitics. And of plain ole politics. 🙄

Well, may the good news from Australia result in new and effective cures for leukemia. Amen.

Cancer chief sees cell phone risks

Look, I know I keep bringing up this subject. If you get tired of it, just skip over it this time.

Cancer chief sees cell phone risks

The director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute and UPMC Cancer Centers plans to issue an advisory to about 3,000 faculty and staff today about the possible health risks associated with cellular phone use.

"Recently I have become aware of the growing body of literature linking long-term cell phone use to possible adverse health effects including cancer," Dr. Ronald Herberman said in the memorandum. "Although the evidence is still controversial, I am convinced that there are sufficient data to warrant issuing an advisory to share some precautionary advice on cell phone use."

The advisory suggests certain measures to limit exposure to electromagnetic radiation emitted by the devices, such as shortening the length of conversations or keeping the phones away from the head by text messaging or using headsets or speaker phone options. It also recommends that children not use cell phones except in emergencies.

A child's developing organs "are the most likely to be sensitive to any possible effects of exposure," according to the document.

Tony Snow

He died this morning.

I just stared at the headline.

I knew he had cancer. I knew he’d fought it off at least once. I didn’t know he was that bad off, though.

He had a good radio show before he went to the White House as press secretary. I enjoyed listening to him. And I was glad to hear him once in a while on The Radio Factor after he retired from his WH job. But I didn’t know him personally. So why should his death matter to me?

I don’t know.

And why should it matter any more than the young man in Somalia that died at about the same time Tony did? (I assume one did.)

I don’t know that either.

In any event, I keep wondering what Mr. Snow learned after he died.

What will you learn after you die?

And I?

So…what should we learn before we die?

And when shall we try to learn it?

“So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom” (Psalm 90:12).

“And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment” (Hebrews 9:27).

“For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21).

May the Snow family find the Good Shepherd’s comfort and peace and strength and courage.