Cancer is NOT Lucky: These Four Weird Strategies Might Be Interesting to Know

This newsletter is not medical or financial advice.

Like many of us, cancer is on my mind today. If you didn’t know, you can get luckier in every aspect of your life- including getting better from injury and disease. If you’re really lucky, you don’t get injured or a disease in the first place, I suppose, but what are some things that can help ease the journey that most people probably don’t know about? Here are four science-backed weird things that might help prevent or make cancer treatment easier. Talk to your doctor, of course, but the studies are linked. I’m sending this out on Friday night so hopefully we can take this in, share it with people who might benefit, and move on to our weekend happy groove.

(I’d think I was a weirdo, but here’s an official study that might help you reduce bad luck factors that might lead to cancer. It’s not a guarantee but it’s tilting the luck in your favor. Strategies to Prevent “Bad Luck” in Cancer)

Fasting

This article is excellent describing how fasting may help prevent cancer (and recurrence) as well as make chemotherapy more effective with fewer side effects. It’s amazing to me that this isn’t better known, so I share it to hopefully spread this important information: https://www.cancercenter.com/community/blog/2021/06/fasting-cancer

Squeezing Breasts May Help Prevent Breast Cancer

Even Cosmo is getting in on this one- and it also sounds wild but breasts need some smooshing- by their owner or otherwise: “Lab experiments showed that giving your boobs some lovin' with regular squeezes moves the breast cells back into alignment, creating a normal growth pattern. Basically, smooshing the cells around kept them in line, while un-smooshed cells grew in an uncontrolled way, which could lead to cancer.”

Just in case it helps prevent other kinds of cancer as well, I’m smooshing all my inches in an effort to try to keep them in line.

Shake, Rattle, and Destroy Cancer Cells?

Some kinds of cancer appear to destroy themselves when exposed to vibration. No, really. Again, it sounds insane. Here’s the study you can read for yourself. You could also call it “why I own one of those crazy vibration plates”.

Pectin Builds Tough Cell Walls for Plants and Might Help Fight Cancer

Another wild one: different kinds of pectin- that stuff that helps build the cell walls of plants- have been studied and shown some great results in fighting cancer. I never would have believed it if I hadn’t read it. From Pectin: A Bioactive Food Polysaccharide with Cancer Preventive Potential:

“Colon and breast cancer are among the diseases for which data suggest that modified pectin (MP), specifically modified citrus pectin (MCP), has beneficial effects on the development and spread of malignancies, in addition to its benefits as a soluble dietary fiber. Cellular and animal studies and human clinical trials have provided corroborating data. Although pectin has many diverse functional qualities, this review focuses on various modifications used to develop MP and its benefits for cancer prevention, bioavailability, clinical trials, and toxicity studies. This review concludes that pectin has anti-cancer characteristics that have been found to inhibit tumor development and proliferation in a wide variety of cancer cells. Nevertheless, further clinical and basic research is required to confirm the chemopreventive or therapeutic role of specific dietary carbohydrate molecules.”

As always, talk to your medical team to determine what is right for you but these four strategies might help someone out there someday. Hopefully, none of us ever face this fight but something in this little email might help improve your luck if you do- and hopefully help all of us be so lucky as to never have it.

I’m going to zero calorie fast for 18 days in the next four weeks in the hopes it helps something in the world. I’ll document it here, but hopefully not so much that it annoys you. It’s way off topic but it feels like building luck for me the world.

Felix