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Suzanne Somers needs to shut the fuck up. She needs to shut the fuck up A LOT. I wasn't going to make this ranty post, but the rage has been building instead of subsiding after hearing her comments on how she believes Patrick Swayze died because he chose to treat his cancer with chemotherapy instead of alternative treamtments. She can motherfucking BITE ME, is what she can do.
Now, to be clear, I think there are rational reasons someone might choose to forgo traditional cancer treatment, or to combine them with alternative methods. I also think that in terms of cancer prevention there is a lot to learn from natural medicine. My issue with Suzanne Somers (other than that she is an insensitive twat for backseat caregiving a man who just DIED) is not that she chose to treat her cancer alternatively...it is that she DIDN'T, but is using herself as an example of an alternative success story. That's right. She didn't.
Standard of care for stage I, hormone positive, breast cancer (which is what she had) is lumpectomy (or mastectomy) and radiation. Suzanne Somers had...a lumpectomy followed by radiation. By her own admission at least one of her physicians were clear that chemotherapy was not recommended in her case, indicating a low grade and her2 negative cancer. She did refuse to go on Tamoxifen (an estrogen suppressant), but while I find that to be a rather dumb decision that I wouldn't make, her risk would still relatively low given her prognostic factors and the fact that she had the big guns aimed at treating her cancer. Tamoxifen is a followup medicine that reduces risk after the cancer itself has been treated. And since she is hormone positive, the risk that she does have could take years to reveal itself if it comes back. And by years, I mean that there are cases of estrogen positive cancers popping back up as metastasis as much as twenty years later.
And lets talk about hormones for a minute. Like the fact that she's hawking (and taking) a 'natural' form of estrogen replacement as being harmless for breast cancer patients. JESUS JUMPING CHRIST ON TOAST. This is one of the few things about breast cancer that EVERYONE agrees on, right on down to most alternative and natural practitioners. The science is crystal clear on this one. Estrogen feeds estrogen positive cancer. Period. Adding estrogen to your body if you have had estrogen positive cancer is putting out a freaking welcome mat for it to come back. She is killing people with this assertion. Possibly even herself, though, again, that could take years.
But since most people aren't aware of the details of how breast cancer works, she gets to run around telling people that she cured herself with injections of mistletoe or some bullshit, scaring already terrified women into rejecting treatment that could save their lives, many of whom probably have far less rosy prognostic factors than her. Fuck. That.
To be super clear. Suzanne Somers did not refuse indicated chemotherapy. She didn't need it. She needed surgery and radiation. Which she had. Estrogen positive cancer can take years to reassert itself, so the fact that she does not currently have a recurrence means nothing (the five year rule does not apply here). Even the alternative medicine community generally agrees that taking estrogen in any form once one has had estrogen positive breast cancer is STUPID AS FUCK, and yet she promotes this very thing. She is not a success story. She's a disasterous time bomb waiting to happen, who may only be saved from her own quackery by luck, the traditional treatments she did have, and some highly favorable prognostic factors. She could have, quite literally, stood on her head singing Jingle Bells every morning and promoted that as cancer prevention with the same results, and possibly better on account of Christmas carols contain no estrogen.
And now she's running around telling people how to treat other kinds of cancer as well, when she shows zero understanding of her own? When she's telling people not to even have the same level treatment she did (she advocates against radiation as well). NO. NONONONONO. And if you think it's coincidence that she's making money hand over fist with her books blathering on about all this nonsense, I've got a bridge to sell you.
Not to mention it is exactly this kind of nonsense that continues the divide between traditional and alternative methods of treatment where there is validity, and opportunity to work together. First, do no harm. Pretty good rule for everyone to follow.
EUNICE SMASH. ARGH.
Now, to be clear, I think there are rational reasons someone might choose to forgo traditional cancer treatment, or to combine them with alternative methods. I also think that in terms of cancer prevention there is a lot to learn from natural medicine. My issue with Suzanne Somers (other than that she is an insensitive twat for backseat caregiving a man who just DIED) is not that she chose to treat her cancer alternatively...it is that she DIDN'T, but is using herself as an example of an alternative success story. That's right. She didn't.
Standard of care for stage I, hormone positive, breast cancer (which is what she had) is lumpectomy (or mastectomy) and radiation. Suzanne Somers had...a lumpectomy followed by radiation. By her own admission at least one of her physicians were clear that chemotherapy was not recommended in her case, indicating a low grade and her2 negative cancer. She did refuse to go on Tamoxifen (an estrogen suppressant), but while I find that to be a rather dumb decision that I wouldn't make, her risk would still relatively low given her prognostic factors and the fact that she had the big guns aimed at treating her cancer. Tamoxifen is a followup medicine that reduces risk after the cancer itself has been treated. And since she is hormone positive, the risk that she does have could take years to reveal itself if it comes back. And by years, I mean that there are cases of estrogen positive cancers popping back up as metastasis as much as twenty years later.
And lets talk about hormones for a minute. Like the fact that she's hawking (and taking) a 'natural' form of estrogen replacement as being harmless for breast cancer patients. JESUS JUMPING CHRIST ON TOAST. This is one of the few things about breast cancer that EVERYONE agrees on, right on down to most alternative and natural practitioners. The science is crystal clear on this one. Estrogen feeds estrogen positive cancer. Period. Adding estrogen to your body if you have had estrogen positive cancer is putting out a freaking welcome mat for it to come back. She is killing people with this assertion. Possibly even herself, though, again, that could take years.
But since most people aren't aware of the details of how breast cancer works, she gets to run around telling people that she cured herself with injections of mistletoe or some bullshit, scaring already terrified women into rejecting treatment that could save their lives, many of whom probably have far less rosy prognostic factors than her. Fuck. That.
To be super clear. Suzanne Somers did not refuse indicated chemotherapy. She didn't need it. She needed surgery and radiation. Which she had. Estrogen positive cancer can take years to reassert itself, so the fact that she does not currently have a recurrence means nothing (the five year rule does not apply here). Even the alternative medicine community generally agrees that taking estrogen in any form once one has had estrogen positive breast cancer is STUPID AS FUCK, and yet she promotes this very thing. She is not a success story. She's a disasterous time bomb waiting to happen, who may only be saved from her own quackery by luck, the traditional treatments she did have, and some highly favorable prognostic factors. She could have, quite literally, stood on her head singing Jingle Bells every morning and promoted that as cancer prevention with the same results, and possibly better on account of Christmas carols contain no estrogen.
And now she's running around telling people how to treat other kinds of cancer as well, when she shows zero understanding of her own? When she's telling people not to even have the same level treatment she did (she advocates against radiation as well). NO. NONONONONO. And if you think it's coincidence that she's making money hand over fist with her books blathering on about all this nonsense, I've got a bridge to sell you.
Not to mention it is exactly this kind of nonsense that continues the divide between traditional and alternative methods of treatment where there is validity, and opportunity to work together. First, do no harm. Pretty good rule for everyone to follow.
EUNICE SMASH. ARGH.