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I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer and a goiter 12 years ago. Prior to that, 20 years to be precise, I was diagnosed with hyperthyroidism and nodules. I could feel these issues in my body: anxiety, intense heart palpitations, infertility, paranoia, hyperness followed by debilitating exhaustion and a constant choking feeling in my neck.
The doctor’s answer was surgery to remove my thyroid and a few suspect lymph nodes, then isolate with radiation pills. This is standard treatment today for what I had, everyone encouraged me to do. “Thats not a big deal, I know someone who had that, it’s just surgery and radiation, you’ll be ok.” My doctor actually became irritated with me when I hesitated on his treatment plan. Being a people pleaser, I nearly panicked, thinking I need to do what he and everyone else) says so he doesn’t get mad at me! Today I think that’s so silly. I rarely see that doctor anymore. When I do, he never mentions the treatment or lack of it. And ultimately, I have to live with my decision, not him. (Smile)
I’m certain these comments were intended to be kind and reassuring but over time I found them dismissive and irritating. How was the person after the surgery and radiation? Did the synthetic thyroid hormone give them enough of what they needed to function? Were there long term issues from the radiation? If they were a mom, did it affect their children or pregnancies? Pregnancy is hard enough, I couldnt imagine going through it without a thyroid!
I had bad memories stored up watching my dad go through radiation too. Of course his was much different. He had his head radiated for a brain tumor, I had taken him to some of his appointments when my mom couldn’t. I was 19 and I watched my dad very quickly change from a muscular strong reassuring military personnel, to a shriveled feeble skeleton. His skin would droop and tear and the place they administered the radiation broke down alarmingly fast. Honestly, I couldn’t see how ANY radiation exposure wouldn’t break my own body down and I didn’t want to find out!
I decided to isolate myself a bit and research anything and everything pertaining to diet, supplements and cancer.
I started with vegan. I just ate raw vegetable smoothies all day. No carbs, no sugar, no dairy, not even fruit. Just raw veggie smoothies, green tea and a ton of supplements. I won’t get into the reasons because it’s a deep dive. In short, it made my thyroid worse and my tumor started growing. I was cold and pale and began to lose hair…and oooh sooo tired!
Around that same time my son was diagnosed with an IgE deficiency. He was barely a year and I was starting him on some baby led weaning foods but I had to remove them and go back to full time breastfeeding as it was the only thing he could tolerate. I ran across Natasha Campell’s GAPS diet and after a few days reading about bone broth and healing the gut, I set about to procure pasture raised bones: chicken and beef. I spent hours making broth, straining, freezing broth cubes and fed my son broth and breast milk.
I was straining the broth one day and today I realize I was low in iron and satiating amino acids, but I didn’t understand that then. I smelled the buttery fragrant brother and I wanted it. The cold vegetable smoothies gurgling uncomfortably in my gut… suddenly I didn’t want anything more than that warm salty broth…amd maybe some of that succulent leftover meat hanging off the bone. “No! Don’t do it!” Meat causes cancer. That’s what I read. Wait. If meat causes cancer, why am I spending hours a day simmering broth and feeding it to my IgE deficiency baby?
This is where I began to find conflicting “research”. I ran across someone talking about the China Study and how the research had been cherry picked to feed the notion that meat and animals were bad for us and the environment. Apparently they were studying crowded sick feed lot cows too. I won’t get too far into that because it’s not the purpose of this post, but if you’re interested just look it up and read both sides.
Around this time I met a woman who was suffering from cervical cancer for 10 years. She had refused treatment and was eating a rotational diet. Everyday the meals were different and on Saturday, you rotated back to the beginning of the diet on Sunday. Each week I bought the rotational diets ingredients and religiously followed it. A day looked like: soaked blueberry oatmeal with a little honey and butter. Lunch would be fresh ground buttered roll with salmon and sautéed broccoli, supper would be soup with bone broth, a fresh ground roll and one cup of green tea. I was literally in the kitchen all day, grinding wheat berries, baking bread and rolls, cooking my food then my family’s food as I couldn’t afford the variety for us all. I still made my family’s food from scratch it was just more basic and monotonous with roast beef, chicken, root vegetables and my fresh ground, homemade bread products.
Each meal was different for me so I couldn’t eat leftovers, it was rather tedious and of course raising four kids and building a house with my husband, I just couldn’t sustain the effort and financial burden of this rotational diet. I did however, begin to feel better. Most likely due to the animal proteins and fats. But I knew I was reacting to the grains like oatmeal and barley so I couldn’t understand who those inflammatory grains were in the diet.
In short, I stopped the rotational diet. We were building a house, my husband would come home from work, eat and drive right back out to the acreage to work on our house. He, along with his dad, was the contractor, builder, electrician, and so much more. It was the only way we could afford to do it. So I let the rotational diet go and just ate what I fed my family: a whole food, meat and potatoes diet as it was economical, healthier than processed food, and kept us on budget for keeping enough cash in the bank as collateral for our self build mortgage.
Once we moved into our home, things settled down a bit. I gave birth to our fifth baby and I was eating more animal protein, fat and broth. My son with the gut deficiency was eating regular food and no longer reacting. I made our bread products in the form of sourdough and basically bought the same things each week to keep us in a budget. My meal rotation was: chicken dinner with potatoes and veggies, sourdough pizza with ground beef, roast beef and fresh rolls with veggies, pasta with cheese sauce and chicken, ham and bean soup. Basic, filling foods our grandmothers might have made with whatever meat they had on hand, grains, root veggies and the occasionally nicer seasonal vegetables.
I had our sixth baby and I could tell I was feeling better. Since I’m consistently pregnant or breastfeeding I have always take a good prenatal and nursing multi. However, this time my iron was very low; since I wasn’t afraid of meat and animal products anymore, I added in a beef liver supplement. I also bought milk goats and incorporated raw goats milk into our diet. I made raw milk kefir smoothies too as goats milk isn’t that fatty, I didn’t get into cheese making yet and my goats didn’t produce enough fat for butter. I gave birth to our sixth baby and had the best postpartum healing period I’d ever had. Physically, mentally and emotionally. My energy began to pick up and stay steady.
In this time, I had a few miscarriages and I still am not entirely sure why. Low iron, exposure to something, perhaps my thyroid… I’m still not quite sure. I took time to heal, increased my beef liver iron, added a better B complex multi and increased my animal meat and fat consumption. Without realizing it, some days I was eating keto, I just didn’t know that’s what it was called. I just knew I felt better the days I ate meat, fat and low carb veggies.
I gave birth to our 6th baby and he was nearly 9 pounds! My biggest baby and oddly, his birth was the easiest. He was just right in place amd I found giving birth to a bigger baby was faster. I didn’t push. Not one time. The only moment of discomfort was when he settled into the birth canal and I just breathed out a deep breath, he rushed out in one fell swoop amd my midwife frantically laughed and had to search around in the tub for him as the lights were low and none of us were ready for him to shoot out so quickly. Usually I have to push out the head, wait and then push out the body. We all laughed and she drew him up out of the water, a big healthy chubby boy with dimples and a head full of dark hair. Today he’s a sturdy active adventurous 4 year old with dimples and bright mischevious blue eyes. By far my healthiest baby and looking back, I wish I would have eaten more meat with my other kids because the difference was incredible. Today I feed all of my kids lots of good meat and fat. Get them outside to ground and get lots of sun and fresh air. They’re all tall, happy, hearty and healthy. So im glad I learned at some point regarding food!
When I was pregnant with my 8th baby, my midwife wanted to get a scan of my thyroid and see how my malignant tumor was doing. I knew that was wise, I needed to know if I should get surgery. I was feeling so good though: no more swelling in my throat, no hyperactive anxiety, more steady energy and I could feel the tumor protruding in my neck but it seemed to be getting smaller. I thought that could just be wishful thinking though.
*By the way, if you want to read about my 8th baby’s painfree homebirth, you can read that here.
The scan revealed that my tumor was in fact shrinking, my goiter was down and the report changed from surgery and radiation to a “monitor” approach. I was really emotional when my midwife told me this but I just held it all in. I could tell she didn’t understand it and I could tell she wasn’t interested to talk about it. So I respectfully held my peace, thanked her, then walked out to my vehicle to cry happy tears in my car.
I hadn’t realized how much stresss, fear and anxiety I was carrying from knowing I had cancer. Every synthetic fragrance or exhaust from a vehicle or any time I indulged in a small piece of homemade birthday cake… even holding my phone or talking on it… I was perhaps a bit irrational but it ALL stressed me out wondering if it was contributing to tumor growth. I still wasn’t even sure about the healing power of good clean pastured meat!
This leads me to carnivore. We were already eating a gluten free diet with lots of meat and fat. We had removed sourdough because I was experiencing histamine reactions with the fermented grains and in general we knew some of us couldn’t tolerate gluten. One of my daughter’s was still getting weekly food migraines that affected her social and daily life terribly. We decided to commit to one week of carnivore and see how we felt.
A few days into carnivore, I laid down to nurse my baby to sleep amd I felt this incredible reaction in my brain. Like it was “turning on”. My thinking became clear and energized. Not with anxiety but rather a steady energizing stream of consciousness. I was imagining the photos way back from anatomy and physiology classes; neurons and synapses connecting, turning on and communicating.
Other experiences: my post partum depression virtually vanished. One of my daughter’s struggles with depression and I really didn’t want her to pursue medication, her depression cleared 100%. Migraines, cheek rashes, IBS… even healthy weight loss. I was struggling to get back into my jeans and not wanting to repurchase a wardrobe, I’ve always worked to get back in my pre pregnancy clothes. I noticed my body leaned out very quickly and places that were sagging (I assumed due to age), began to move back into place. My gut never felt heavy, I had steady energy, I’d lay down in the afternoon to nurse my baby but I didn’t need a nap like I used to. I even had friends noticing the change in my face, skin and body and asking me about it. A few of them nodded and said, “yes, we’ve been eating carnivore off and on or moving in that direction, it’s incredible.”
We aren’t strict carnivore. With 8 kids we have a lot of birthdays and friends. If we host something we just make whole foods and healthier desserts. If we are invited somewhere, we eat what our hostess offers. At this point, I feel so good on my health journey that I don’t stress anymore. Everyday my habits are healthy, but if I get exposed to something or a friend brings food over or we have friends over. I no longer get stress about eating the occasional non carnivore food.
Some daily habits I do to stay healthy:
Stop stressing and choose to trust God and His timing.
Sunlight, first thing, in my eyes. Even on cloudy days.
Fresh air and grounding (walking barefoot or wearing grounding shoes, either outside or in my year round greenhouse during winter)
Eat meat and good fats.
Salt and electrolytes, a good multivitamin. I’m affiliated with everdea vitamins. They make a prenatal amd nursing vitamin. They also make a Mood and Stress vitamin. It’s been night and day for me taking these vitamins. My daughter takes their Mood and Stress vitamin too when she needs a little extra help with her depression and anxiety. You can find them here. They are located in Canada and the US now! Use my code: WILDWOODSANDHOMESTEAD for 15% off your order.
Making my own hygiene products: shampoo and conditioner bars (I plan to share my recipes soon), whipped tallow balm for face and body, deodorant (again, I plan to share my recipe soon), even my own dish bars for washing dishes. I’m still working on a dish detergent recipe but for now I buy one I can tolerate from the health food store and Sals Suds for making all purpose sprays, cleaning windows, floors, toilets and laundry. For what we use to clean our environment and what we put on our skin is just as important as what we eat.
Sals Suds (not affiliated, I just love this concentrated formula and it actually strips amd cleans laundry well. It’s pricy but a little goes a long way.)
We even began to look at clothing. Replacing polyester with cotton. We can’t always afford organic cotton but we opt for natural fabrics as much as possible. Especially bras and underwear. Anything in close proximity to our children’s bodies like that, we do our best to choose natural in an effort to not flood their bodies with microplastics and dyes.
Iodine. Everyone needs this. Every part of our body needs iodine. I’m currently working on a podcast with the research behind iodine, thyroid health and over all vitality and hope to have that article with resources up soon. We take J. Crows Lugols iodine three times a week. I sleep much better when my body is properly saturated with iodine.
High iron meat like beef and beef liver. If you struggle to tolerate beef liver you can take capsules. I buy mine from Gemstone. I’m not affiliated with them. I just love them and I feel the difference with their beef liver pills.
Topical magnesium spray. I read a study once that said most people are low in magnesium. This mineral is vital for heart function, anxiety and sleep. Most topical magnesiums we’ve tried sting. But my mother in law introduced me to a magnesium spray so gentle we even use it on our babies. I have a magnesium balm recipe I plan to share soon. For today I’ll leave the link to the magnesium spray we use. The difference is felt immediately. I’m not affiliated with them, just love them and want to help!
Don’t eat processed foods or fast foods. No Starbucks coffee or purchased coffee in general. No food dyes or preservatives. Lower sugar and if you enjoy sweets, make your own using organic non bleached sugar, maple syrup or honey. Make your own coffee at home and blend it with butter and cream for a fat burning morning treat. Drink salt water to get your body’s electrons firing and your brain turned on. Use real salt: sea salt or Redmonds salt. Get rid of seed oils and cook with tallow or butter. Increase animal products like fatty chicken thighs, eggs, and beef. Your brain and kids’ brains will thrive off the high vitamin fats!
In conclusion, I am not a doctor or a nurse or a medical professional at all. I’m not giving advice or telling anyone what to do. I am simply writing the post I desperately needed to stumble across 12 years ago as a 28 year old mom with a six month old breastfeeding baby. Terrified of the C word and not sure if there were any other avenues besides cut and burn. I scoured the internet looking for someone, anyone talking about managing cancer and specially thyroid cancer with food and supplements, to no avail. So thats a huge reason I’m writing and sharing my story.
Each person should read for themselves and decide what is best for them. Whether that’s surgery and radiation or a wait and see approach or a try a healing diet approach, or combining it all approach.
I hope my story encourages someone who might be in my similar situation over a decade ago and needs other perspectives and ideas.
Warmest Blessings,
Ashley
