Hi friends, today I wanted to share a little bit more about why I'm fasting before/during/after chemo infusions and why I've stuck to it despite losing so much weight.
TL;DR: If there is one thing I'd advise everyone going through chemo to do, it would be fasting.
I had heard about fasting for chemo years ago and knew the basics of the benefits. From what I understood healthy cells go dormant during fasting and cancer cells can't. This means that the healthy cells take up less of whatever is in the blood stream (including chemo drugs) and the cancer cells take up more.
The downstream effect of that is the healthy cells get less damaged by the chemo and you end up with fewer side effects, and the cancer cells get more of the drug and end up dying off more.
I had it mostly right, but there is so much more!
While many patients are fasting for chemo now, the research is really just beginning. But the results are already incredible and pointing to diet and fasting being a very powerful tool for treating cancer.
Here are some of the things studies have found about fasting:
- Increase autophagy in healthy cells (cleaning up dead cells, housekeeping)
- Induce metabolic changes in healthy cells so they switch to fat metabolism instead of glucose metabolism. Cancer cells can't make this switch as quickly so they are still searching for glucose and uptake the chemo much faster
- Reduce inflammation
- Trigger regeneration of immune cells and improve function of natural killer cells (which kill cancer)
- Reduce IGF-1 (insulin-like growth factor) which is associated with higher cancer risk and increased aging. There's a lot of new research saying IGF-1 could be one of the biggest drivers of cancer.
My fasting protocol
I start fasting about 36 hours prior to treatment, which means I eat dinner two days before (usually Saturday) and stop after that. Then I fast though the day of treatment (usually Monday), until about 24 hours after treatment ends. That has generally meant I start eating again on Tuesday around 12:30pm.
I start with super easy foods, rice congee and bone broth, and slowly work my way up to regular eating over the course of the next week. My digestive system, all the way from my mouth through to the other end, has been the hardest hit by the drugs, so I'm very gentle on it as I begin to eat again.
The first 3 rounds I also intentionally spiked my blood sugar during my chemo infusion by drinking apple juice or ginger ale. This was to induce a spike in insulin and even further drive the chemo to the cancer cells, as cancer cells have 6X the insulin receptors of normal cells.
You don't know craving until you have fasted and taken steroids at the same time!
I get a steroid with my chemo, to help offset side effects, and though I get a lower dose than most patients (by choice) I still get a pretty good boost from it. Which also means a boost to my appetite, right in the middle of my fast!
This has resulted in nearly obsessive food fantasies and the funniest cravings each time. It's actually something I sort of look forward to now because I never know what I will crave and it's always so random.
Cravings by treatment round:
- Ham and cheese. First of all, I don't eat dairy so we're talking fake cheese here, not super craveworthy. And secondly, I never eat ham! But that was all I ate for several days that round.
- Crab. I was all prepared this time, had stocked up on ham and cheese. And what did I crave? Crab. I wanted cold crab salad with avocado. Also so random! I do like crab normally, but it's not a part of my regular diet by any means.
- Baked beans. I haven't had baked beans in years, I don't even remember the last time I had them. But I wanted baked beans on toast so badly this round. Unfortunately with my digestion I had to wait a long time for that one!
- Macaroni and cheese. I was able to have this pretty early in the week since I could have plain rice pasta and I found a fake cheese sauce that was easy on the digestion. This was a helpful craving!
- Homemade refried bean and cheese burrito. This was a very specific craving from my childhood. My mom used to do burrito bars where we could build our own burrito and it would have refried beans, cheese, tomatoes, sour cream, black olives, avocado, etc. The flavor I craved the most from this was the sour cream and black olives together. ๐
- Chowder. Specifically this bacon cauliflower chowder from a delightful restaurant in Astoria, OR.
Random, right? I was always surprised and entertained by what I would crave each time!
Choices I made and things I learned at this stage |
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1) My western oncologist has been against my fasting since day 1. They don't understand or believe the science behind it, though there is a mountain of evidence in it's favor, and since I am on the thin side they never wanted me to do it. I have had to push back every round when they suggested I should stop because I knew in my gut it was the right thing for my body.
I might make this sound easy but it's not. They try hard to make me question my well-researched choices, and it takes stubbornness and belief in myself to stand up to them each time.
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With love and gratitude,
Elizabeth
PS. As I type this, I'M DONE WITH CHEMO!! I'm still riding the wave of side effects from the last round, and I'm more exhausted than I've ever been in my life, but I'm done! I'll share more about the whole journey soon.
โ