Searching for the Positives and More on the Cost of Treatment

I have been busy researching the things I can do to help myself conquer this disease. So far I have decided on:

•  daily fresh and wherever possible organic vegetable juice. 
• more organic fruit and veg
• curcumin and mushroom extract capsules. 
• I have to decrease my dairy intake because cows milk, as I should have realised, contains lots of oestrogen, although the oestrogen is in the fat, so skimmed dairy products are not so bad. Sheep and goats' milk are not as bad as cow's milk. Soy milk and tofu are ok. Almond and hazlenut milk are also good. (Just so you know how important the oestrogen factor is - my type of cancer feeds on it.)
• More fish
• If I do eat a little meat - only grass fed - again other beasts are fed hormones (oestrogen etc) and other doubtful stuff. The advice is to mostly avoid meat. (Tim - your organic, grass fed lamb is very acceptable).

For the rest, our diet seems to be pretty good, according to the Integrative Oncology research. I still have the other modules to do - exercise, spirituality, relaxation, stress management. It is quite time consuming to study. 

I was getting rid of some old newspapers and saw an article entitled "Breast Cancer Patients complain of high cost of Treatment". One thing I am grateful for is that I am an old pensioner - if I wasn't, the medication for the next ten years could be almost $6,000. At least one of mine will be $6.10 per month. Hopefully the next one will also be on "the list". Radiation is not covered by my health fund, - it is a Medicare issue, so I pay the gap. The full weekly cost is almost $3000. Apparently we will be over the safety net, so ONLY have to pay 10% of the full cost - $280. 

I have been told that if we lived in Melbourne, the cost would be nothing at Peter McCallum. Equity? There is a huge new Cancer Centre being built at Albury Base Hospital. I wonder whether that will be different - too late for me.

So most of the time, I am concentrating on all this positive stuff. Every now and then I think - all this effort could be for nothing - but I quickly banish the thought. I have to do my best.

Tomorrow is my holiday with Kaye. I will be back at Albury on Friday afternoon and home Saturday morning. More about this next blog.