My Story: Bladder Cancer

I thought I was very healthy. I always prided myself on never getting sick. I don’t remember ever having so much as a cold. I have never smoked, I rarely ever drank alcohol, and I ate lots of salads and vegetables with my food; however, I ate pretty much everything, including meat, fruit, sweets, pasta, drank coffee, and so on. Until a few years ago, I was never overweight. I used to exercise a few times a week and had always been in good shape. I was always happy, positive, and spiritual.

For a variety of reasons, including financial hardships in the late 90s and emigrating twice within a few years, my stress levels increased substantially in early 2000. Between 2000 and 2005, I gained about 80 pounds (36 kilograms), mainly because I tend to eat when I’m stressed or depressed. I can count on my fingers the times I went to the gym during this period! I also wallowed in negative emotion and was angry with God for allowing my life to get into the mess it was in. I became a depressed, gluttonous, lazy cynic!

One day in July 2005, my urine was blood stained. I panicked at first, but didn’t do anything about it. I did some research on the internet and found that there are many possible causes for this in men. I told myself that it was probably kidney stones, bladder stones, or an infection and that I would deal with it if I had any other symptoms. The bleeding stopped a day later and I felt fine. In August, I had blood in my urine again and decided to go for a full medical check-up. I didn’t tell the doctor anything, just to see if they would find anything. My doctor called me a few days later and told me that all my tests were normal and that I was the picture of health. I stopped worrying.

In September, I had blood in my urine again. This time, there were large blood clots in my urine and the bleeding carried on for days. I also felt some strange, vibrating sensations in my midsection. I called my doctor, who recommended me to a urologist. He booked me in for a cystoscopy, to look inside my bladder. I was put to sleep for the procedure, which lasted less than 30 minutes. A few minutes after I woke up, my urologist came to see me and told me that he had found two small tumours in my bladder and that he thought they was cancerous. The histology report confirmed his suspicions. I had grade 3, stage 1 (G3Pt1) bladder cancer at the age of 36…

Lying in hospital, I remembered a Tony Robbins seminar I had attended years ago, in which he talked about his "Living Health" program and that living healthily will allow our bodies to heal themselves. I promised myself that I would clean up my act and start living healthily.

The day I came home, I ordered many health and nutrition books online. In reading the books, some of what I read made sense, but there were so many conflicting opinions between the equally qualified authors; I became confused and disheartened. While listening to one of Tony Robbins’ audio programs, he talked about the havoc that excess acidity causes in our bodies and how we could become and remain healthy by adopting an alkaline-rich diet and lifestyle. He mentioned Dr Robert Young as one of the experts in this field.

I immediately ordered and read all of Dr Robert Young’s books, including “The pH Miracle”. What he had to say made total sense to me. It was totally in line with my belief that nature (or God) has provided us with everything we need to stay healthy and heal ourselves. I decided there and then that I would follow the pH Miracle program and heal myself.

Early in 2006, I went back into hospital for another cystoscopy, to look inside my bladder. My bladder was clear and numerous biopsies showed no signs of cancer. When I went to see my urologist a few weeks later, he told me he was very happy with the results. I told him about The pH Miracle program I was on and he told me that diet and lifestyle (with the exception of smoking cigarettes) played absolutely no role in the deveopment of bladder cancer! He said I should eat whatever I wanted, not lose too much weight, and only do very light exercise.

I liked what he said, because I had been craving meat as well as other foods and drinks. I have permission of an authority figure to return to my old lifestyle.  I slowly, but surely, went off The pH Miracle program… My doctor also convinced me to have a form of chemotherapy (BCG, which is actually an immunotherapy drug, used in the treatment of tuberculosis) directly into my bladder (intravesically), which I did. That wasn’t a pleasant experience! I agreed to this, because my urologist convinced me that this would make sure the cancer doesn’t come back.

A few months after the BCG course, I went in for another bladder check. The cancer had come back and he strongly recommended I have my bladder removed (cystectomy). He couldn't perform the surgery and referred me to other urologist who did. I met with five different bladder cancer specialists, to get multiple opinions. Most of them agreed that I needed to have my bladder removed. When I asked if my poor diet and the BCG into my bladder could have triggered the cancer to return, they all said that there was nothing “in the literature” to indicate this.

I decided, once again, to live in accordance with The pH Miracle program, but I wasn’t totally convinced that I could cure myself by diet and lifestyle alone, based on what all the doctors were telling me… I did have live blood analysis, by a nutritionist / microscopist trained by Dr Robert Young. My blood was an awful mess (click here to read the blood analysis report).

I selected one of the five specialists that I felt very comfortable with. In June 2007, I had many different scans and tests to determine the exact nature and extent of my cancer. My bones scans were clear and the doctor was happy with my blood and urine tests. The CT scan showed some small growths in my bladder, which my urologist convinced me to have removed for biopsy purposes. He also wanted to take biopsies of various places in my bladder and of my prostate and to inject some dye into my kidneys to check if the cancer had spread.

The good news is that the cancer had not spread beyond my bladder. The bad news, however, is that the histology report showed that I had CIS (carcinoma in situ) and not just TCC (transitional cell carcinoma) as we had previously thought. This, apparently, greatly increases the risk of the cancer spreading beyond the bladder. My doctor strongly urged me to have my bladder and prostate removed (called a "cystoprostatectomy") as soon as possible and he tentatively booked me into hospital. This is major, life-altering surgery. I won’t go into the graphic details here, but believe me that life after this surgery would never be the same. I told my doctor that I needed time to think.

For over a week, I was totally despondent and didn’t know what to do. One day, while riding on the tube (London Underground), I had a moment of total clarity. I decided that I was not going to have the surgery and that I was going to use what God and nature had made available to me t heal myself – through nutrition, positive emotion, the power of the mind, exercise, and spirituality. I also knew that I needed to build this website to chronicle my journey back to health, so that I could share my story with others who have been touched by cancer (or will be touched by cancer – since it affects about 1 in 3 of us, depending on which statistic you believe).

This was an extremely difficult decision for me. Many doctors have told me bluntly that, if I don’t have the surgery, I’m not going to be around to see my children grow up! These are very well educated people who mean well. It was really difficult for me (and sometimes still is) to ignore them and have faith that by adopting a health lifestyle, I will enable my body to heal itself.  Even my family don't fully believe as I do, which makes it very difficult. 

I’m sure that there are millions of people in the world who have cancer (or some other serious disease) that are struggling with this same decision. I hope that my website will reach some of them. If you know someone who could benefit from my website, please click here to tell them about it. If I succeed in what I’m doing and I put cancer behind me, this website will provide a very detailed account of how I did it, so that others can do the same. If I fail, then everyone out there looking for natural cures to cancer will be able to study what I did and improve on it. Knowing what doesn’t work is sometimes as powerful as knowing what does. That said, I believe - with every ounce of my being - that I will be totally healthy in the near future.

I also know that there are many cancer sufferers out there who have been told that medical science can do no more for them and that they have months or years to live. I urge you not to give up, but to use natural means to heal yourselves. What do you have to lose?

By no means, do I claim to be an expert, nor am I prescribing to you. Please do your own research and get your advice from a healthcare professional. Please share anything you learn with me (and others who visit this site).  I am my own guinea pig in a scientific experiment, which I believe will show that medical science cannot hope to ever be able to compare with the natural means of healing God has made available to every one of us. The natural healing that Dr Robert Young and others have so thoroughly researched and eloquently outlined in their work on how alkalizing our fluids and tissues (not just through diet, but by everything we think and do) is the cure to all disease.

That is my story until the day this website was launched. My story (and what thousands of other cancer sufferers and various experts have to say) continues on the pages of this website. Please return often to stay up to date. And, please, if you know someone whose life has been touched by cancer (or some other major disease), tell them about this site by using my tell a friend link.