and now the rest of the story...

I was saddened to hear that Paul Harvey passed away. Not that it has anything to do with this post really - other than the plagiarized title. I tend to "tangent" frequently in discussions, which tends to drive those in discussion with me a bit crazy - but as an old friend recently said when I tried to blame it on the chemo "You have been doing that since you were 14" -Apparently you are stuck on the ride with me.

I promised to tell you how my chemo cycle plays out but only got through the chemotherapy infusion itself. The evening of the infusion is what I imagine the 3rd day awake on a cocaine trip must be like. I am tired but can't really seem to stop moving - a side effect of the steroids within my cocktail. Once I came home and cooked until 6am, pots flailing, pans flying, oven, stove top and crock pot all going at once. By the time the steroids wore down and it came to eat the food, I wanted nothing to do with it. The very smell of those particular dishes sickened me. So, needless to say, that didn't work.

The day after chemo and the day after that, I am still on the steroid high and by the evening (which is more like the middle of the day for me, having stayed up all night and then slept until mid afternoon) I begin to flush. My face feels warm and has a red, jolly-holly, Santa Claus-esk glow. This is not my favorite occurrence as I have an aversion to "Jolly-holly says", "Holly Holy", "Deck the halls with boughs of holly", and "Have a holly jolly Christmas" due to an apparent leftover grade school anxiety and unresolved issues with my parents' naming choices. It was also a fabulous occurrence when I was still working: clients must have thought I had more than coffee in my coffee cup.

The steroids dissipate and then the crash happens. For me it was on the 3rd day or Friday evening of chemo week. I would start feeling flu-ish: body aches (especially my legs), fatigue, loss of appetite (though I managed to eat, it is what my family does, and we do it well). I would generally get out my favorite blanket, find some movies and nap as much as I could all weekend long. By Monday I would try and convince myself that I felt normal. I felt better but "normal" functioning didn't occur until a full week after treatment. And with each chemo session the crash was slightly more intense and the effects lasted a little bit longer. It was tolerable - not fun, but not so bad that it couldn't be handled. It was a really intense week long hang over; but somehow you weren't smart enough to avoid drinking again 3 weeks later.

My naturopath's therapies and my acupuncture treatments lessened the effects for me. When I was able to receive 2 additional chemo session, I could tell the vast difference between the last set of treatments when I didn't have a naturopath and this set. At the first diagnosis, I used the shotgun approach for adjunct treatments - if it reportedly helped and was accessible, I tried it. I was surprised when I could feel the difference when I attended my acupuncture appointments verses when I skipped them. I can tell my energy level drops when I miss an appointment even now. There are links in the right hand column to the practitioners and programs I use - and obviously I think they are the best or I wouldn't be using them.

The last treatment was an exception -it was the only time I had a problem with nausea. The chemo "flu bug" turned into a raging and persistent "flu dragon on the attack" I had gone out of town for the week before treatment and didn't watch what I ate or drank. I missed acupuncture and shiatsu appointments and didn't take the supplements from my naturopathic doctor. I went against the advice of a friend and did not act like a "good animal": I wasn't taking care of the physical over the "shoulds" or "wants" of the mental and emotional and I paid the price.

Now I am dealing with the longer lasting effects of fatigue, shift of my sleep cycle and regaining physical strength. Also, I am anxiously awaiting the return of my eyebrows -you don't know what you've got until its gone. So that is the rest of the story as Mr. Harvey said countless times over countless years.

beans swell when you soak them

It began innocently enough with a random thought. "Maybe I will buy some dry beans, because they are suppose to be good for you". A quick double check in my "Anti Cancer" resource book (see column to the right for a link) and yes, one should get more protein from beans. OK, so I bought about 3/4 lbs of dry mixed beans for soup from New Seasons' bulk department and started the search on the Internet for preparation methods. Low and behold, you are suppose to soak beans - generally overnight!
Now that statement reflects less on my cooking ability than it does on my diet to this point in my life - I mean, being raised in the mid-west, it was a sin to not have a slab of meat, some potatoes and maybe some vegetables as an afterthought added to the plate. Beans where baked and out of a can, green and also out of a can, or they were soybeans in the field next to the corn that you saw driving down the highway. So it shouldn't be a great surprise that I was clueless that beans had to be soaked.

Back home, I discovered I had some more beans in my pantry. When or how they got there, I can't be sure - maybe the remains of a previous relationship, or a long forgotten and short lived health kick. Either way, I thought I might as well soak them too. This lead to my second bean discovery, beans swell when you soak them - they swell A LOT. All of a sudden I had beans coming out my ears. The original plan was to fill the crockpot with the beans from the pantry and cook the new beans stove top. But by the time they were done soaking, the beans from the pantry could fill the crockpot three times over - and the new ones are still hidden in the soaking bowl in the fridge. Please don't make me face them yet! After a few swear words, I devised a plan - the first third went into the crockpot and became some spicy bean soup (which came out tasty enough - but I needed to leave out the chickpeas because that was the "thing that was not like the others").
The remaining two-thirds started as refried beans but became hummus - or bean dip - or something that is tasty in which you can dip breads and vegetables. After doing the math, the anticancer friendly recipe looks a little like this:

• 8 oz bag Chickpeas/Garbanzo beans
• 8 oz bag Black beans
• 8 oz bag Lentils
• 8 oz bag Pinto Beans
• 1/4 cup Olive Oil (approximate - I used enough so that my onion slices were half deep in oil)
• 1 very large sweet yellow onion -sliced
• 6 cloves of garlic - chopped
• 1 quart box of Free Range Chicken Broth
  
• 2 tsp. Cayenne pepper
• 2 tsp. Paprika
• 2 tbsp. Sesame seeds
• 1 tsp. Hot Chili Sesame oil


• Salt & Black Pepper to taste

SOAK beans overnight, change water and boil until black and pinto beans burst (about 2 hours for me) then drain. In a separate LARGE deep skillet, saute onion in the olive oil until translucent, add garlic and saute another 2 to 3 minutes. Reduce heat and add beans starting with just a few ladles full - mix well with onions and garlic, stir in remaining spices. I got out my hand held mixer at this point, poured a bit of chicken broth in and started pureeing. Mixing, adding some beans, mixing, adding some broth and mixing some more until all the beans and all the broth were gone. I turned off the heat about half way through the mixing marathon.*

*This is my first "recipe" attempt - I usually cook by adding spices, tasting and adding some more so adjust according to your taste. Also, I ended up with with about 8 store size containers of hummus - you may want to cut the recipe in half unless you find yourself with an abundance of beans because you didn't realize BEANS SWELL when you SOAK THEM.