[Update: I wrote this in October of 2014. It’s been 3 years, and I’m still doing great. Thanks to all of you who continue to check up on me and wish me well!]
It was February 5th, my mother’s birthday and a month before the 20th anniversary of my becoming vegan. I was sitting in a breast surgeon’s office in a paper gown, cradling my biopsied breast and waiting. After about an hour and a half, my surgeon finally appeared, apologizing for keeping me waiting because the results had only just come in. He took a deep breath and said, “You don’t have cancer.” I thought, “I didn’t think I did.” Unfortunately, as I would later find out, we both were wrong.
He went on to explain that the biopsy found abnormal cells, officially called ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), but often referred to as Stage 0 or pre-cancer. While I was still reeling from the word “carcinoma,” he explained that these cells might become cancer, so they had to be treated like cancer. My options were a lumpectomy with radiation or a mastectomy. I asked whether there was any chance that the pathology report could be wrong, and my doctor said no.
I was stunned. I left in a daze and went over to my husband’s office nearby to give him the news.
Three months before, a routine mammogram had spotted a place that looked different from my last mammogram. I was sent to the Breast Health Center for another mam and then an ultrasound to get a closer look. The spot was so small and deep inside the breast that the ultrasound technician couldn’t find it at all, so I was given an appointment to return in three months. At that three month mammogram, the “spot” was clearly visible even to me as a glowing white circle in a sea of black and gray. A ultrasound-guided biopsy was scheduled for early the next week.
I’d had one of these biopsies four years ago, and that spot had turned out to be nothing but a harmless cyst, so I had been expecting the same results this time. Like most women, I didn’t think “The Big C” could happen to me. But because I was a vegan, I think I was even more positive that I couldn’t have cancer. After all, wasn’t I doing everything the vegan doctors tell us to do to protect ourselves from heart disease and cancer? Low-fat, lots of green and cruciferous vegetables and brightly colored fruit? No animal products? Moreover, no one in my family had ever had cancer. I naively thought I was immune.
So I didn’t really believe the pathology report, and I became even more skeptical when I read an article that said that DCIS is sometimes misdiagnosed. I decided to get a second opinion from one of the doctors mentioned in that article, a pathologist specializing in breast cancer in San Francisco. I had the hospital send him my biopsy slides, and a week later, I had a consultation with him on the phone. He was unable to confirm DCIS or rule out actual cancer because the radiologist who had performed the biopsy had noted that he had actually missed the “mass.” The biopsy needle had gone in front of the suspected tumor and gathered cells from there, just a few that looked abnormal. But until the actual mass was tested, the pathology specialist couldn’t rule out either DCIS or invasive cancer. He suggested I get another, more accurate, biopsy called a stereotactic biopsy, and I asked my doctor to schedule it.
I had high hopes that this second biopsy would show no DCIS and no cancer. Those hopes were shot down when my new medical oncologist called to give me the results: I had a small invasive cancer, Stage 1, that showed signs of being aggressive. She recommended surgery within the next 3-4 weeks. Just to be sure, I had the slides sent to the pathologist in San Francisco, who agreed with her diagnosis.
So I did what any logical person would do: I took a vacation. It was Spring Break, and my husband and I had planned a 5-day trip to take our high school junior (now senior) to visit 6 colleges in the Midwest. We wanted to do it while we could because we knew that after the surgery, I would need 6 ½ weeks of daily radiation treatments and might not be able to get away during the summer. The trip was a great distraction, but as soon as we got home, I made an appointment with the surgeon and scheduled my lumpectomy for the following week.
The surgery went perfectly. The surgeon removed the tumor and the area around it, as well as three lymph nodes which tested negative: the cancer had not spread to them. A week later, I returned to the surgeon’s office for more good news: The final pathology report showed that the “margins” or edges of the material he had removed were clean, meaning that all of the targeted cancer cells had probably been removed. The only worrisome thing to my husband and me were some figures in the report that seemed a little scary, particularly a “grade” of 3, meaning the cancer was aggressive. My surgeon was unconcerned, and my oncologist said that she would order a genetic test called Oncotype DX to more conclusively determine my chances of having the cancer recur.
A few weeks went by as I recovered from the surgery and waited for the results of the Oncotype test. I was expecting to start radiation soon when my medical oncologist called with the test results. They indicated that I was at a moderately high risk of recurrence. She was recommending that I have chemo.
This was the first time the other Big C word had been mentioned, and for some reason, “chemotherapy” scared me more than “cancer.” The oncologist explained that the type of chemo she was recommending was “well-tolerated” and without all of the serious long-term consequences of other treatments. I wasn’t convinced, and I began frantically researching the chemo itself and alternatives to it.
I was in a panic. On the one hand, I’ve always believed in fighting disease with nutrition and had always been opposed to taking any medication if it could be avoided. On the other hand, hadn’t I been doing just that for the past 20 years? My oncologist was telling me that chemo could reduce my risk of having the cancer recur and spread, that preventing it now would be much easier than trying to stop if it spread to my other organs. I went back and forth, one day deciding that chemo was just too dangerous and the next deciding that I didn’t want to take the risk of the cancer coming back. I was, frankly, a mess. I couldn’t sleep or eat for worrying about the chemo. I finally decided to get a second opinion from a highly recommended breast cancer oncologist at the University Medical Center.
My second opinion doctor came back with the same recommendation as the first: Have the chemo. She assured me that I was young (me!) and healthy and I could handle it. And it would cut my chance of recurrence in half.
My husband was very careful to stand back and let me make the decision for myself, but I knew that he hoped that I would have the chemo. And I was afraid that if I didn’t have it, I would be anxious for the rest of my life, afraid that I hadn’t done everything I possibly could to prevent a recurrence. I’d read the stories of people who had fought their cancer with diet and lifestyle choices, but those people weren’t already eating a whole foods, plant-based diet like I was.
So I decided to do the chemo, four rounds, three weeks apart. I read everything I could find about the treatments and armed myself with supplements that could help prevent side effects. And I found out my oncologist was right: the treatments, though no fun, we’re not as bad as I’d feared. My side effects were minimal, the most annoying being a bad taste in my mouth that would come and go and made it difficult to create new recipes.
Just after my initial diagnosis, I’d begun getting up at 5:30 every morning and walking with my husband and our dog. During chemo, and later radiation, I considered it a point of honor that I never missed a walk. On the weekends, my family and I tried to get out of the house and do a little hiking or local sightseeing so that I wouldn’t feel like the treatment was making me isolated. I ate lots of fruits and vegetables to support my immune system and was careful to avoid coming into contact with people who were sick, and I sailed through my summer of chemo without so much as a sniffle.
When chemo ended, I was determined to take a family vacation before I had to start radiation therapy, so at the beginning of August, we spent a week in the mountains of North Carolina and a few days in Nashville, seeing my newest niece for the first time (and, of course, my brother and sister-in-law).
I got back home and jumped right into daily radiation treatments–33 of them. Again, the treatments weren’t nearly as bad as I expected, but I was thrilled when they ended last week. I couldn’t wait to put all of this cancer stuff behind me.
I didn’t write about this while it was going on mainly because I was afraid that people would offer suggestions and criticisms of my decision to go through with chemo and radiation, and I just couldn’t risk the additional stress that would have put on me. So why am I telling you now? Even though this blog is recipe-oriented and not usually very personal, I wasn’t sure if I could go on writing it if I had to pretend like something this big hadn’t happened to me, something that has consumed the last eight months of my life and has changed the way I see myself and the way I think about diet, veganism, and health.
My first month post-diagnosis, before I had the specter of chemo to worry me, all I could think about was “why” and “how”: Why did I, a vegan who tries to eat healthy, get cancer when no one else in my Standard American Diet-eating family has ever had cancer? What had I done wrong? Had I eaten too few nuts? Too little cilantro? Not enough flax seeds? BPA? Soy?! I worried that I had caused my cancer by never being able to get to my goal weight and stay there, that I didn’t exercise consistently, that I had had only one child late in life and that I hadn’t breastfed her long enough.
I was blaming myself, and I had a lot of help from the Internet. I couldn’t visit Facebook without seeing posts about how eating X (broccoli, nuts, soy, orange) would help prevent cancer. Or people posting about their frustration that a friend or family member had breast cancer and refused to treat it by adopting a plant-based diet. If I, someone who had been eating all the right things (and not eating all the wrong ones), got the message that I was to blame for my cancer, how must other cancer patients feel, the ones who hadn’t been stuffing themselves with kale and mushrooms? Is there a way to promote a plant-based diet that doesn’t point the finger of blame, that doesn’t make grand promises of health, and that doesn’t make people like me feel so confident in the invincibility of our diets that we put off mammograms or other screening tests?
I don’t know. But for me, it’s been helpful to think of the vegan diet as promoting health, but not providing a “Get out of Disease Free” card. My friend Maria made me see that even if my diet didn’t prevent me from getting cancer, perhaps the cancer would have grown much more quickly if I hadn’t been vegan. Perhaps I wouldn’t have sailed through chemo without ever needing nausea meds if I hadn’t been nourishing my body with fruits and vegetables. Perhaps my immune system wouldn’t have stayed as strong as it did or my energy as high if I had been consuming animal products.
It’s also been helpful to me to remember my real reason for being vegan. Though I’ve followed a McDougall-type diet ever since I became vegan, my ultimate reason for becoming vegan was not to improve my own health but to decrease the suffering of animals. So if you’re reading this and worrying that I’m going to be another vegan blogger who goes back to eating animals for her own health, don’t. No diagnosis in the world could convince me to eat another animal or animal product.
As for my current health, I feel great, and I’m confident that I caught this cancer early and have done and am doing everything medically and nutritionally possible to make sure I never have to worry about it again. I’ve tweaked my diet to reduce or eliminate foods I don’t need (sugar, soy, wine, and coffee) and to increase those I wasn’t eating enough of before (broccoli sprouts, flax seeds, organics). I walk at least once and sometimes twice a day, and soon I’ll be starting a workout routine at the gym. I plan to lose the extra weight I’ve been carrying around, which is the biggest threat to my health.
I think the hardest struggle I’ve faced isn’t physical but emotional. My image of myself as a healthy person who never took pills and was confident her vegan diet would protect her from anything–that image took a pretty big hit. I’ve been worried about “coming out” as a vegan with cancer for fear that non-vegans would see it as proof that a vegan diet “doesn’t work” and that some vegans would skewer me for resorting to traditional medicine. In the end, I decided that I had to put my truth out there so that I can get past it and get back to blogging as usual. Next post, you can expect a recipe. Cancer isn’t on the menu.
Thank you to all my family, friends, and friends of friends who offered love and support. And to my church, the Unitarian-Universalist Church of Jackson, and my parents’ church, The First Presbyterian Church of Hammond, LA (love the shawl and cap, y’all!) And to Maria Maggi, Nava Atlas, Dreena Burton, and Stephanie Weaver–wise women all, whose words of advice and offers of support helped me more than they probably know.
doris swenson
October 9, 2014 at 5:08 pmThank you for your beautifully well-written post. Your honesty and forthrightness are refreshing. No lifestyle, not even vegan,is a guarantee of an illness-free life. Bless you for being truthful about that. We do all we can, eat well and healthfully, exercise, work on keeping stress under control, live and love. What happens, good or bad, we then have the tools to deal with. This is what is life.
Best wishes for continued good health. And many thanks for all you do. Your site has been helpful to me and many others.
Debbie Maslov
October 9, 2014 at 5:10 pmOh Susan., I am so relieved to read that your health story has a happy ending! Though sorry that you are struggling with the fact that you are a long-time vegan faced with cancer. You are a beautiful human being….and none of us are immune from medical woes no matter what. I too am a long time vegan (12 years) & even longer vegetarian (since age 17). But I have had to deal with a roller-coaster of health problems – some very rare & serious. Who knows what I would have dealt with if I ate differently. Your love for animals & huge contribution to the vegan movement makes you my hero. I will always be grateful for all your phenomenal recipes, cooking tips & delightful blogs. Thank you a million times! I wish you nothing but the best of health in the future.
Stephanie
October 9, 2014 at 5:10 pmWhat a lovely blog you have! I originally came here because I had cancer, gained tons of weight from the treatment, and found your recipes had put me on the right track to loose the weight. And now, after reading your latest post, I will keep coming here for recipes, and will also think of you in a little different way, because now I know you are a survivor, and a strong person. Thanks for sharing with us, I’m glad you did.
Betsy
October 9, 2014 at 5:10 pmYou don’t catch cancer, it is a natural growth that gets misprogrammed. There isn’t one kind of cancer, there are 100’s. Glad you are no longer blaming yourself, and that you have a great prognosis as well as a forum for helping people enjoy healthy food!
Jesuva
October 9, 2014 at 5:12 pmThank you for sharing your very personal story. Best wishes for your health and comfort.
Jenn
October 9, 2014 at 5:13 pmThank you for sharing. Such a powerful and vulnerable position to be in. What matters is that today you are ok. We all need to take care of ourselves the best way we see fit. There is no shame in choosing what you believe is the best option.
Nancy Padden
October 9, 2014 at 5:15 pmHi Susan,
I am not writing this for posting, but just to tell you how grateful I am for sharing your story. I have always been a fan of you as much as your recipes and approach to health. When you wondered about cutting back on eating a lot of Dates, I started looking at that….when you have taken trips, or shared stories about your daughter, that is what I connected to. I moved to Germany from NY years ago and I miss things still and your food blog has always made me feel a Little more connected to my real home. So thanks for taking a leap of faith with this, trusting us, making us feel like we are all in this together.Stay strong and healthy and reach out when you need a little help from your friends out here. We care aboout you very very much.
Valerie
October 9, 2014 at 5:15 pmDear Susan…..well after reading your totally *heart-felt* essay today….I can only send you the B-I-G-G-E-S-T (((((((((((((((((((( HUG ))))))))))))))))))))) I am able to do over the internet……sometime actions…not words….. are the best….love from your friend (and a very dedicated reader) Valerie up in Vancouver, BC.
oceanfrontcabin
October 9, 2014 at 5:15 pmSusan: when my husband was diagnosed with myelodysplasia (MDS) a bone marrow cancer, we did the why me, a McDougaller, bit. We still puzzle over how this could have happened as we ate this diet, yet in our hearts we’ve felt maybe the reason he’s still alive is because of the diet. Then one day his hematologist said, “One reason you do so well is because of your vegan diet, no alcohol, good activity level and no co-morbidities.” It said it all.
The healthy low-fat vegan diet does matter. It has allowed you to stay stronger during your treatment and will help you keep cancer away and remain healthy. Thanks for divulging this. I continue to send love and to keep you in my positive health thoughts. You’re a very special person.
Susan
October 9, 2014 at 5:15 pmWow. Thanks for sharing. Hoping for continued good health for you in the future. We cannot know what lies ahead for us. We can only do the best we can in the here and now.
Pinky
October 9, 2014 at 5:17 pmYou beautiful, strong woman. You are an inspiration. Big hugs xoxo
Silvia Sanchez
October 9, 2014 at 5:18 pmThank you for sharing. I wish for you a lot of love, happinnes, light and health. Big hug
christy kuhlman
October 9, 2014 at 5:20 pmYou are a brave women and I am glad to consider you one of my (facebook) friends. Keep strong and keep on 🙂 I am looking forward to many more (years) of recipes. Love them all <3
Rita Wagstaff
October 9, 2014 at 5:21 pmSusan
You are such a wise woman! When you put your self out on the internet you can be judged from all points of view. You had the courage to listen to your inner voice and walk the path you chose. I understand the feeling that we are protected from these illnesses by our lifestyle but the universe is not ordered according to our understanding. I think your friend Maria is an angel who spoke words of wisdom to you. I feel like I know you because I have come to your website for the best vegan recipes and read your blog for almost 2 years. You may be in a position to help others with your story in the future. You will emerge stronger and wiser from this experience but you will be victorious. I admire you and wish I could give you a hug. Stay strong !
Beth-ann
October 9, 2014 at 5:22 pmThank you for bravely telling your story – and SO glad you are well! I totally understand why you didn’t choose to share (publicly) while you were on your journey. You had a lot on your plate! I also completely understand the mindset of thinking we are immune. I applaud your resolve and am thankful you are now well!!!!
Victoria
October 9, 2014 at 5:24 pmDon’t ever feel bad. You made the right decision for you.
Belinda
October 9, 2014 at 5:26 pmSusan, I am so sorry you had to go through this. I truly hope that this is now all behind you. I wish you peace of mind and soul.
Belinda
Diana
October 9, 2014 at 5:27 pmThank you so much for sharing. I’ve been of the type of thinking that because I eat whole foods and no oil that I’m immune to breast cancer and have not gone for a mammogram in almost three years. Your post makes me think that maybe I should. The last time I went it turned into having a biopsy and it was a cyst. I was told to go back in 6 months and well, almost three years later and I still haven’t. So I guess maybe I should re-think that. Thank you again.
Riva
October 9, 2014 at 5:30 pmI am so very sorry that this has happened to you. The most important thing is that you are doing exactly what is right for you. And, no one has the right to tell you otherwise. We are all mere mortals and we are not immune to all diseases regardless of our healthy vegan diets. Unfortunately we cannot control everything but we do the best we can and live the best life we can through our lifestyle choices. You are a brave and courageous woman and I wish you only the best. Sending you love and hugs…
Gail Davis
October 9, 2014 at 5:33 pmDearest Susan, Thank you so much for sharing your deeply personal story. I am so sorry you had to go through this, and I think your friend, Maria, is right. If you had not been eating so healthfully for so long, the cancer may have grown faster and you may not have responded so well and with so few side effects to the treatment. The association between dairy intake and breast cancer has been shown in study after study. And I don’t think anyone is quite sure how much the dairy we consume as children might contribute to breast cancer in adulthood, even after we’ve stopped consuming it.
There are so many environmental factors we are exposed to that can contribute to cancer, most of which are totally out of our control. I am thrilled to know that you are taking the best possible care of yourself and taking the time you need to self-nurture. You are a gift—having contributed so much to the health and well-being of so many. I send you lots of love and my most heartfelt wishes for your most vibrant health and happiness. xox
Ann
October 9, 2014 at 5:36 pmThank you for sharing your experience. Congratulations on completing your chemo. I wish you well and look forward to more of your delicious dishes. Stay strong, live long!
Ash
October 9, 2014 at 5:36 pmThank you for such a wonderful post. I love your website and I can honestly say that I am not vegan. your experience and choice doesn’t change my opinions of veganism. I think it’s always good to have as much vegetables and fruits in a person diet but no matter what you put in your body it doesn’t make a person invincible. We have millions of cells working in our bodies that it’s not surprising that something occasionally goes wrong – sometimes it’s minor, sometimes it’s major. Whether vegan or not, we can’t always expect our cells to work in the manner we expect it to. Furthermore, no one should judge the choices of how another decides to treat their own medical problems. Only you can judge what is best for your body.
Marylyn Nolan
October 9, 2014 at 5:37 pmThank you for sharing your story. You are an inspiration in all you do! I wish you well!
Cathleen C.
October 9, 2014 at 5:37 pmThanks for your honest and generous sharing. Continue the good healing!
Marie
October 9, 2014 at 5:37 pmSusan, Thank you for posting this beautiful blog, no letter to all of us who enjoy your recipes and bits of information of your personnel life. Your friend Maria is so right in her advice to you. I am sorry you had to go through this, but your experience has already inspired a multitude. Thank you for being
Jenn
October 9, 2014 at 5:38 pmThank you for sharing. May peace, love, and light be with you as your journey continues.
Marge Evans
October 9, 2014 at 5:41 pmSusan, big hugs to you! don’t second guess yourself. although not nearly as serious as you I always thought that being hwp, vegan and active would save me from medicine. well it didn’t I have high blood pressure and I can only control it through meds. thank you for your honesty.
Tani Klein
October 9, 2014 at 5:41 pmThank you for so openly sharing your story. I stopped to read through it all as it rings a bit true for me. I am at the point where I am waiting for results from a mammogram guided core needle biopsy. Actually, my second, because on the first they did not get the right area. I am only 31, vegetarian and am one of the healthiest eaters I know! I just keep thinking it CANT be cancer, not to me! But it is certainly there in the back of my mind and I will be very glad to get the results – either way – and move on. Its good to hear about your experience and how you maintained a (semi) normal life throughout. Keep us posted, yeah?
Susan Voisin
October 9, 2014 at 5:54 pmTani, please keep me posted about your biopsy (feel free to write me at susan@fatfreevegan.com). I am sending all good thoughts that the results come back in your favor!
Emily
October 9, 2014 at 5:42 pmYou are a rockstar. Truly. Be gentle with yourself. Thank you for your honesty and candidness.
Connie Fletcher
October 9, 2014 at 5:45 pmI am so very heartbroken to hear of your diagnosis, and yet so uplifted to hear all that you’ve been through…..veganism, I’m sure, helped you get through chemo without medications for nausea. I applaud all that you’ve done!! My prayers shall now include you, my friend…..
You made decisions based on what felt right to you. Let the naysayers say their nay, and just remember that they weren’t walking in your shoes. We all get to eat in the manner that works for us individually….the same with our health care…..
God Bless you…..
Abigail Taylor
October 9, 2014 at 5:46 pmHi Susan, I thank God for you, my friend for some years now. Thank you for all your writings which to my mind are great encouraging and helpful to everyone. Thank you also for sharing about yourself, and the trying time you went through, and I thank God for He has been with you, bringing you through all this difficult period. I believe “Vegan” is the best antidote to help keep us from many illnesses and disease. I have been vegan for over 17 years, and in good health. I used to wear reading glasses before, now I do not, and am 74. I use no sugar, and I use very little sea salt, and eat fresh fruits and vegetables, few raw nuts ( except peanuts), a few natural supplements, not forgetting water to be taken daily. I do have raw meals, but not daily like I know I should as I am working part time, and the rush of times do prevent this. God heals through medications, chemo., etc., as well as the natural pathway of healing, and miracles, and healing by process. I am happy that you took the stand, and made your decision like you did. We need indeed like others have said, respecting someone’s choice and being supportive in any way possible is the right and proper thing to do.
You are doing a great work in all that you do, helping very many, and I join with others, to say, I appreciate you a lot, and all that you do. All in all you are a blessing. Keep eating the healthy way, girl.
Helen Greengrass
October 9, 2014 at 5:47 pmSusan, thank you for sharing your personal story. Cancer is not an easy issue to write about. Your inspiring story gives hope and also reminds us that we must always strive towards health. Hugs and prayers to you
Barb Maas
October 9, 2014 at 5:48 pmThank you so much for trusting us enough to share this with us. I also was diagnosed with breast cancer a year ago. It hadn’t spread to my lymph nodes so I didn’t need chemo but I’m dreading a double diagnostic mammo on both breasts coming up in November. I follow your blog for health reasons and have/had exactly the same beliefs you did. My breast surgeon is even Vegan!. I guess none of us are bullet-proof but you know that your lifestyle has helped you in many ways. It’s all we can ask for. Thank you again … I’m so sorry you had to run into that Cancer wall but you’ve helped me think about what options I might need if I don’t hear the good news I’m hoping for. You’ve helped me. Another fellow UU member … 🙂 good people.
The Peace Patch
October 9, 2014 at 5:49 pmI think you’re brave and beautiful and extraordinarily generous of heart and spirit for enduring so much and sharing it so openly. Many thanks…you are an inspiration! Blessed be. 🙂
Jennifer Ingram
October 9, 2014 at 5:50 pmSusan, Thanks so much for sharing your story with us. I guess no one is immune or safe from the big C. I wish you all the best.
Tracy
October 9, 2014 at 5:50 pmSharing recipes is the way to share a lifestyle, but sharing our stories is the way we share our lives. The knowledge gained from hearing other peoples stories is so sacred. Thank you for sharing yours. It’s the best thing you have prepared for us.
Susan Voisin
October 9, 2014 at 6:04 pm“It’s the best thing you have prepared for us.” That really means a lot, Tracy!
Lynn
October 9, 2014 at 5:50 pmHi Susan,
Thank you very, very much for sharing your story. This means so much to me!
I was diagnosed with cancer (oral cancer) over six years ago, and went through surgery and extensive treatment. This was after more than ten years of following the McDougal kind of diet. I felt so guilty, as if I had done something wrong!
It has been almost seven years since then, and all but one (besides me) of the 12 people in my Cancer Survivors’ Support Group have passed on. I am convinced that this kind of diet is the very best way to go! Yes, it doesn’t guarantee that you won’t have any problems, but it does have the best possible outcome!
Thanks for your wonderful website, and for all of your great recipes.
Love,
Lynn
Sherry Shrallow
October 9, 2014 at 5:51 pmSusan,
You are a blessing to us all. May your return to good health continue on as you resume helping change the way Americans eat. G-d bless you and all the work you have done to truly change the world!
Sherry Shrallow
Donna
October 9, 2014 at 5:55 pmThanks for sharing your story. Yours was my first vegan cooking blog years ago when I went vegan. No doubt your diet helped to boost your immune system to fight the cancer. Health treatments are so personal. No one really knows what they will do until faced with those decisions. Contined good health and I look forward to more great recipes–been meaning to make your persimmon fall harvest cake since picking up a buzzilion persimmons last week.
TARA DORAN
October 9, 2014 at 5:55 pmThanks so much for sharing….