Vitamin C and fasting

Have you read enough about vitamin C yet?  I hope not, because here’s another post.  This one will help me understand a recently published paper that shows a Synergistic effect of fasting-mimicking diet and vitamin C against KRAS mutated cancers.  To repeat myself:  I do have a KRAS-mutated cancer.  This research is potentially very relevant to me.  What I don’t have is a fasting-mimicking diet.  I’ll get to that at the very end.  But first, the paper.As the paper is about five years more recent than the...

Vitamin C and cancer

I have now read a key publication on vitamin C and my type of cancer.  On Wednesday, when I next speak to my oncologist, I will need to demand a modification to my therapy.  I have the feeling that I’m being denied better chances to survive.  The paper claims that Vitamin C selectively kills KRAS and BRAF mutant colorectal cancer cells by targeting GAPDH.  It was published in Science, one of the beacons of scientific publishing,...

Vitamin C

I’m going down a rabbit hole again.  The one paper on the synergistic effects of fasting and vitamin C that my friend sent the other day led me to download a good dozen related publications.  Reading them will take some time.  Synthesizing and condensing all the information will take even longer.  But there’s no reason not to forge ahead with what I've got already.  Let’s get started with vitamin C.  I don’t have to read papers for that.  Wikipedia and the internet in general tell me all I need to know.Vitamin...

Miracle bottle

When I returned the empty pump this afternoon, the nurse asked how it had been.  My honest answer was that I had almost forgotten about it and might have missed the appointment, had it not been for an alert on my phone.  How can this be, with a pin in my chest, a valve taped to my sternum and a plastic bottle on my hip?  The key is fasting.  What follows is exaggerated for dramatic purpose, but not very far from the truth.The first 24 hours of the pump’s presence, the only thing I think about is food.  I’m running on empty. ...

Reading list

I’m lying on a hospital bed enjoying the second chemo session of the second program.  I’ve been fasting again.  The last time I ate was exactly two days ago.  There are still 30 hours to go.  The reason I’m enjoying chemotherapy is that I can lie in a bed without anything to do.  I feel pretty weak.There are also reasons why I’m not enjoying chemotherapy.  The tiredness is one of them.  I’d much rather be energetic.  Instead of falling asleep to assorted podcasts, I’d like to read or do hospital office. ...

More on nutrition

Back in the days, when I blogged from Grenoble, most posts were concerned with cycling.  This is how I spent much of my time outside the laboratory.  This was not to everyone’s liking.  Some friends wanted to hear from me but didn’t care so much about cycling.  Some complained to me about it.I’m afraid this blog is shaping up similarly.  It is of course more monotopical than my previous writing.  You won’t read much beyond cancer.  This is not exactly a cheerful subject, but you know what to expect.  Or at...

Temporary freedom

This afternoon, I went to the hospital to get my pumped unhooked.  It was a nice day.  I rode my bicycle and was decked out for a little ride in the woods afterwards, when I would be unencumbered by the pump with its meter of clear tubing from my hip to my chest.This is not the normal way of cancer patients to arrive for any part of their therapy, but I’m not a normal patient.  Thank goodness for that.  Most of the time, I see the disease as an adventure, a challenge, a trial.  I find it easy to fool myself and draw strength...

Ready to rest

This afternoon, my third period of serious fasting came to an end.  I can’t say it was a minute too early.  Sticking with the regime of not eating was much harder than the first two times.  The fast felt quite a bit longer.  Mathematically, it was only about eight hours more.  But it stretched over four days instead of three which, mentally, put an additional strain on me.The two times before, dinner had been my last meal.  Sleeping through the night had then emptied my batteries and surely put my metabolism into some...

Fate

In parallel with the recent bad news of continued chemotherapy and my infatuation with fasting, I’ve received many messages of support, praising my strength and will to fight.  I appreciate all of them.  Every warm word lifts me up a little.  Unfortunately, they’re all slightly misguided.  I am not a strong person.I tend not to pursue goals with purpose.  If I’m not ahead, I give up easily.  I slack with passion.  The rigors of prolonged fasting are obviously not something I enjoy.  I’d much rather not do...

Round three

Tonight is the last night before the third round in my battle against cancer begins.  Cycling metaphors won’t do anymore.  Two wheels can cause a lot of suffering, but this is bigger.  It’s physical now.The first round was the operation, a.k.a. knife therapy.  I came out ahead, I think.  The cancer was gone, from looking at it.  It had taken a serious hit and suffered great losses.  The tumor was removed, the metastases had been scraped out, but I had also lost half of my colon including the appendix, my gallbladder,...