cancer thriver | Pheo vs Fabulous

I’ve been living with a body that’s stuck in fight or flight since my teens. Of course for the longest time I didn’t know how to control or manage it.

Then once I knew what I was dealing with, I was conditioned to believe that it’s the nature of the disease. Basically take the medication and suck it up. In a way, this is true. Biochemically we will always be stuck in fight or flight, with the constant stream of adrenaline overflowing in our bloodstream.

But what about what we can control? Why doesn’t anyone tell us about that? I’ve accepted I can’t control all the elements of this disease, but let’s talk about what we can impact. All the ways we can help to calm our systems down, slowly reconditioning our body’s stress response. Which by the way helps with many different aspects of life, not just the grenades inside of us.

Learning more about the nervous system I believe has unknowingly kept me alive. It’s what has allowed me to combat the constant stream of stress with a balance of calm through my own daily practices. These practices I believe we should all be doing more of, with or without pheo para!

I know I will always need medication to manage the dangerous adrenaline levels that the tumors produce. I’m okay with that, but it doesn’t take your body out of fight or flight. It doesn’t calm the system’s stress response, because as humans we all experience stress. If you add in the residual impact of the adrenaline + Trauma + biochemical levels and you think – I’m doomed!

Luckily I’m a unicorn and we believe in endless hope, magic, and sparkly miracles.

You don’t have to have a crazy rare cancer to experience a fight or flight response. It can be triggered for so many reasons, the trick is being able to calm it down.

This isn’t something we learn at the doctor unfortunately, so take notes my friends!

Guided meditation. I wouldn’t make it through my most painful procedures. Fact: meditation/hypnosis used to be used as anaesthesia! Search on YouTube for free meditations specific to your mood and schedule. The mindful movement and Michael sealy are some of my personal favourites.
Deep breathing: too obvious? Most of us don’t mindfully breathe from the belly. Next time you’re feeling stressed, pause, take 3 deep breaths by inhaling through the nose expanding the belly and then exhaling by the mouth.
Noise + Light: if you’re feeling reactive or triggered, dim the lights, ask those around you to speak quietly or leave the room and go to a safe place. This is especially important in hospitals since health care workers are trained to speak loudly, and the lights are very harsh.
CBD: always check with your doctor first. I’ve had amazing success as of recent with CBD oils. I have tried both THC therapy and pure CBD, the THC aggravates my tumours + symptoms. CBD on its own alleviates and calms my system during the day and helps me sleep at night. Do your research for quality & safety! Sleep has been my biggest struggle over the years with all the residual adrenaline. However it’s so essential for our healing, if you can find something that works for you it’s such a blessing.
Zero gravity position: raising your legs above your heart. NASA puts astronauts in zero G before take-off to equalize their weight and ease the stress on their bodies as they are launched into space. Cool right?! They have special wedge pillows that offer this ability. Or you can prop your legs up against a wall, or build a pillow fort. Whatever works for you
Gentle movement, walking, light stretching, anything you’re able to do. I really love Thai chi videos to move along to and you can bring your phone or laptop anywhere outside to enjoy it in nature. I just discovered physio that is yoga centred and that made me very curious. It’s to help the body with movement while healing certain injuries. I’ll keep you posted if we try!
Red light therapy: only 10 mins to see incredible benefit for mood and anxiety. I recently invested in a home setup because I needed the access safely and consistently for what I’m looking for. Laying in the warm red light is calming in itself, but it’s proven to have benefit for depression, anxiety, stress, and a whole lot of other things! There’s plenty of clinics, spas, and salons that have red light therapy. There is also a wide range of options + sizes for home. This is the company I used.
Vagus nerve toning: a new device I’ve been trying/enjoying is called ‘sensate’. A necklace that uses is infrasonic technology to stimulate the vagus nerve. It vibrates against the sternum paired with calming sounds on an app through your phone. You choose how long you want your session to be and select the music and just enjoy. It’s scientifically proven to ‘tone’ the vagus nerve with continued use. I love when I find things like this and they actually work. Again, just the 5 mins of calm is beneficial BUT with built in deeper benefits. Absolutely phenomenal 👌🏼 @mysensate
Nutrition plays a role in everything. I’ve talked about this before and if you have pheo or para you probably follow a low tyramine diet. If you’re wondering what that is – the MAIN no no’s would be fermented/pickled foods, processed foods, and soy. Having MCAS I can’t eat foods high in histamine either or else my system goes haywire. Being mindful + learning what triggers your body’s stress/anxiety helps a lot!
H20, If you are dehydrated, your body is not functioning properly, and therefore may cause increased levels of stress. Ever notice your heart rate increases or feels like it’s skipping beats when you don’t have enough water? There are many many tricks to stay hydrated, this isn’t something to skip on.

Some added extras: different forms of healing therapy OR trauma coaching can be helpful with PTSD. Not everyone responds to talk therapy so this is an alternative approach. Post traumatic stress causes the body to be locked in fight or flight as well, so seeking the appropriate care for you can be helpful. I just began trauma coaching, using internal family systems or ‘parts work’ as the main healing modality. I’ll update more on that later when I’ve had more time to work on this.

Supplements: I won’t recommend anything specific but checking your full blood panel is so important. When you have a low nutrient level or something is off, it can cause you to feel run down which then makes your body stressed. Talk to your doctor about a FULL blood panel.

Self care practices you enjoy, Epsom salt baths, journaling, reading, etc. For me I’m writing this blog as we speak as a way to calm my own stress response.

These are my main healing practices at this moment, I use a combination of these to help normalize my baseline stress levels. I hope this helps you too. For my ‘attack survival guide’ and more resources click my drop down menu on the home page.

Remember, through channeling our energy into the things we can control – we live an empowered life. We live with intention, and remove the lens of fear.

You can follow along with my social channels @pheovsfabulous

I love hearing from you, leave a comment + share this with your community if you found this helpful 🤍🦓

You may be surprised to hear me say this, but sometimes it’s not ‘self care’ that we require…

We just need CARE, period.

Let that sit for a second, how does it make you feel?

For me: it instantly took a weight off, I immediately had this pressure lift from my shoulders and chest. I allowed myself space to deserve something I didn’t feel worthy of, until now.

I hope as you’re reading this, you will find that same empowerment that you deserve.

I often talk about being in a state of overwhelm, and how to get out of it. We are led to believe we have no control over our bodies with this disease. In some ways that’s true, but sometimes the answer isn’t more doing. We are already SO reactive, we don’t always need to do more. We need to do less.

Let me explain

When you’ve been THROUGH IT, or are still in the thick of it, sometimes just barely keeping your head above water… the word ‘self care’ feels heavy. It’s one more thing we need to worry about when we have the weight of the world on our shoulders.

When you have been dismissed so many times, when you have to fight for every single answer you get, feeling like we’re doing all the work but still not getting anywhere. It’s exhausting. The last thing you want to hear is to do MORE work because you’re not caring for yourself properly.

I’m guilty of it, I say it all the time. There’s a time and place for self care but it’s not the only form of care needed. Which is why I want to reframe the conversation about what care looks like. Period.

We’re expected to do a lot as humans, as women, as chronically ill, as cancer thrivers, survivors, when we’re at our limits of overwhelm the answer cannot always be self care.

We get misdiagnosed, or are navigating a diagnosis, we are called ‘complex’, we sometimes feel unworthy of care at all. Like it’s too much to even consider asking for help because we won’t be believed anyway. This all weighs heavily on our hearts, and this is why self care isn’t always the answer. We don’t need more work to do, we have already become fiercely independent and keep ourselves alive – we just need some kindness. The type of care we’ve been looking for and not always receiving. That’s the only self care I want to discuss.

The actual definition of care is: “the provision of what is necessary for the health, welfare, maintenance, and protection of someone or something”

Care (no self implied) is just being kind, removing resistance, and allowing yourself to just listen to what your body is telling you. Care to me is learning to listen to my body’s needs without jumping to ‘fix it’ or adding any other form of duty.

Examples of care can be speaking kindly to yourself, having patient thoughts, listening inward. When your mind is racing, just noticing your thoughts instead of stop fighting them. Sitting with how you’re feeling but not jumping to a conclusion or solution right away.

Care can be shutting down the internal argument that comes from needing rest or not wanting to add ‘another thing’ to your plate. You can care for yourself by just letting it be. I’m sure you know what I’m talking about – that story you create in your mind about needing rest or doing all the things you ‘need’ to do. You could have let yourself rest with all the time you spent arguing with no one but you.

If you’re reading this, does it feel good to just know that we can just BE? We can just feel or grieve or NOT feel at all…

We also have the option to not process anything, we can simply sit with whatever it is.

For me, knowing that’s an option made me feel less overwhelmed already

Giving yourself another ‘to do’ isn’t always helpful, listen to what YOUR needs are at this moment.

What is your heart saying?

Presence is powerful. Not planning on how to ‘fix’ what you’re feeling, just allowing it to be

Self care: the practice of taking action to preserve or improve one’s own health.

Just knowing that NOT taking action is sometimes an option, made me feel more at ease. It also made it easier for me take action when needed. It cleared the path of resistance in order to tend to my needs in a different way.

When we give ourselves care with no strings attached, we are essentially just allowing ourselves to feel kindness. Giving ourselves grace, patience, and the attentiveness we would give a loved one.

No action necessary.

Follow along with my daily journey @pheovsfabulous