The Good Supplements

I am an auditory learner.  I cannot read a map but if someone tells me "go left for 3/4 of a mile then take the second right, then the next right thereafter and you will find it on the left side of the street about 700 feet ahead" I will easily find my destination.  

I read/listen to about 85 books a year, about 45 of which are non-fiction.  I read a lot about eating healthier food, sleeping better, getting more sun, less plastic,  improving posture, lengthening my telomeres, etc.   

I have read many pretentious books on how to live forever.   I've read a few good and simple ones.  My favorite health book of 2024 was Casey Means' book Good Energy.  It was very simple.  It explained what to eat, what not to eat, how to store food/water, whether to drink (or not), how much sleep, sun, peace, love, alcohol, vacation we should have.  Keep a diary and bad habits are easier to spot then fix.   It made every bad habit seem so terribly simple to eradicate.

I am, and always have been, someone with dreadful eating habits.  Although I have rarely eaten red meat since 1978 and I do not eat sugar, I consider caffeine to be my most important food group, and often I forgot to eat until dinner time, having a bowl of Cheerios and soy milk before bed.

When I was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma,  I focused intensely on fixing my many bad habits, starting with my diet.  Thanks to this shift, I now eat many nuts, more yogurt, vegetable soups, fruit, ginger, turmeric (especially Trader Joe's Ginger and Turmeric tea which flies off the shelf at my house) lemons, smoked salmon, whole grain bread, curcumin supplements and a lot of green tea.   No sugar, hardly any meat and maybe one or two glasses of wine per month.  Maybe not.


Today I had a tele-health call with my doctor's Physician's Assistant.   I read last week on the wall of the Healthtree foundation's Health and Wellness chat that green tea limits the effectiveness of the specific chemotherapy drug that I have been taking for the past three years 
(Velcade or bortezomib).  Wow.  I drink about a litre of green tea each day. 

On the doctor call this am, I asked the question..."should I not be drinking green tea because I'm on Velcade?   
 
"Let me ask the pharmacist who is sitting right next to me..."

"Yes, you should stop consuming green tea while you're on Velcade.  Haha, I didn't know this, I just thought that you weren't supposed to take vitamin C" she told me.  
 
Is that a joke? 

"I drink a lot of lemon juice, should I stop that?"  

"Oh Yes, don't take in more than 500 mg of Vitamin C per day or it will lessen the effect of the Velcade." 

Haha.  I wish I found that funny. 

"OK, so I will stop consuming the pound of lemons that I drink each week.  Is there anything else that I should avoid so that I don't lessen the effect of my chemotherapy?"
 
"Curcumin."
 
"Hmmm, OK, so I should STOP taking the 1000 mg of curcumin that I take each morning?"
 
"Yes." 

"OK, is there anything else that I should avoid?"

"No turmeric and ginger."  

HAHAHA so now I AM finding the humor in this. 

"So I will stop drinking the three cups of ginger and turmeric tea that I drink each day?" 

"Yes."
 
"OK thank you. "
 
So there you have it.  The proverbial road to hell...
 
I take full responsibility for everything, so I don't blame anyone but myself for this horrific learning experience.  The point is, the cancer landscape, like most chronic health condition environments, is a minefield.  Ask questions, join a community of people with your own disease and read, read, read.  
 
These supplements mentioned above lessen the effect of Velcade, brand name for generic bortezomib, so please don't take this as advice for any other medicine.   
 
Please talk to your doctor if you are on Velcade and you consume green tea (or black tea), vitamin C, curcumin or ginger supplements.   Don't listen to me.  🩷

And keep your sense of humor. 

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