This is an odd bunch of possible causes of cancer to lump together that really do not have much to do with each other than they are all physical. Like many things in the beginning of Conquering Cancer we are introducing what will be covered in greater detail later. More will be said about fast breathing and low body temperature, but you will get the complete picture about the importance of exercise and physical stress as causes of cancer in this chapter. (This chapter I will break down into three newsletters for it is long.)

Exercise

One of the most potent cancer-fighting weapons is exercise. Several studies have shown that physical activity is linked with decreased risk of some cancers, particularly breast and colon cancer. People who followed healthy lifestyle habits, including exercising for more than 30 minutes daily, lowered their risk of colorectal cancer, according to a study published online in October in the British Medical Journal.

A study of 45 peer-reviewed articles published from January 1950 to August 2011 shows that exercisers are less likely to die of their cancers than non-exercisers. In addition, observational studies strongly showed that exercise is associated with reduced death from breast and colon cancers specifically.[1] Those who exercised were also less likely to die from other diseases such as heart attacks.

A second study, from the Netherlands, showed that cancer survivors who exercised had far more energy, were far more active, and were less tired than survivors who did not exercise. Exercising simply gives them more energy.

According to Ciaran Devane, chief executive of Macmillan Cancer Support,"Cancer patients would be shocked if they knew just how much of a benefit physical activity could have on their recovery and long term health, in some cases reducing their chances of having to go through the grueling ordeal of treatment all over again."

One in four adults worldwide doesn’t get enough exercise, putting “more than 1.4 billion adults at risk of developing or exacerbating diseases linked to inactivity,” a new study says. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society, urges careful attention to the “three-legged stool” of excess weight, poor diet and inadequate physical activity, which together are linked to between a quarter to a third of cancer cases.

For patients who have gone through breast or colon cancer treatment, regular exercise has been found to reduce recurrence of the disease by up to 50%. A study published in the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management found that patients who exercised regularly before their diagnosis were more likely to keep up their routines afterwards. Being thinner helps beat breast cancer: Risks of disease returning rises in step with weight.

According to Dr. Lee Jones, “Fitness levels before surgery will predict your risk of surgical complications as well as following surgery. Now we have data suggesting that your fitness levels pre-surgery may also predict how long lung patients may live beyond traditional markers of longevity.”

According to Ciaran Devane, chief executive of Macmillan Cancer Support, "Cancer patients would be shocked if they knew just how much of a benefit physical activity could have on their recovery and long term health, in some cases reducing their chances of having to go through the grueling ordeal of treatment all over again."

For cancer patients who can still exercise the very best way to use exercise as a powerful treatment option is to use Exercise with Oxygen Therapy (EWOT). The beauty of any EWOT system is that it combines exercise with oxygen. Combining two important cancer therapies into one makes perfect sense if you can use a treadmill, standing bicycle, a rowing machine or even a jumper to get one’s heart rate up. (Write me or sign up for fifteen-minute free consultation to review different options and companies of EWOT)  

For cancer patients oxygen is a powerful treatment option because, as we shall see in later chapters, low oxygen delivery to cells is one of the main causes of cancer. Cancer hates high levels of oxygen because it brings life not death. Oxygen makes cancer cells weak and less resistant to treatment. Cancer cells low in oxygen are three times more resistant to chemo and radiotherapy.

There is a special form of EWOT called contrast or high-altitude training where you have the option of going between high and low oxygen (hypoxia) each of which stimulates different kinds of immune cells that get pumped up to attack cancer cells. It is more expensive than basic EWOT but for those who do not have tight budgets it is worth it.

This book is for people on high or low budgets. In terms of oxygen, for instance, few know and understand why bicarbonate is such an effective, safe and super low-cost cancer treatment. Bicarbonates increase oxygen delivery to the cells in several ways. First it turns to carbon dioxide when it hits one’s stomach acid or when you squeeze a lemon into the glass. This is hugely important, especially for those who do not or cannot exercise because what is so wonderful about exercise?

When we exercise, we get more oxygen because we produce an avalanche of carbon dioxide, which needs to get eliminated by faster breathing. In the next section (Part Two) directly below, we find cancer patients breathing way to fast eliminating too much CO2, which reduces oxygen delivery to the cells. Oxygen and CO2 are the perfect yin yang pair that work together. Both are necessary health and medical gases that bring life and healing.

The American College of Sports Medicine released a report that advised cancer patients to avoid inactivity. The organization further stated that physical exercise is safe during and after most types of cancer treatments. Recent research indicates that while regular exercise will not cure cancer, it can help you recover faster from the disease. Add oxygen (EWOT) and then its one of the most powerful cancer treatments one can employ.

Physical Trauma

Three types of physical stress can affect your body—trauma (wear & tear), temperature, and pressure. Even everyday physical stress (minor trauma, being too cold or too hot, pressure changes) can aggravate established disease processes. For some people, extreme physical stress (severe trauma, severe hypothermia, severe hyperthermia, altitude sickness) can be the primary trigger for allowing disease processes to occur. In the eyes of ancient Chinese medicine cold is a major cause of disease with the kidneys being the most sensitive organ to cold in the body.

No matter how much you read on Google search that physical trauma cannot cause cancer, if you look hard enough and think arduously enough, one can find evidence that physical trauma can cause cancer. Researchers have in fact found that a causal link between physical trauma and cancer is plausible. “The most likely explanation of our findings is that physical trauma can cause breast cancer.”[2]

Physical trauma resulting in cancer is relatively rare, but it does happen. One accepted source is frequent, long-term application of hot objects to the body. It is possible that repeated burns on the same part of the body, such as those produced by kanger and kairo heaters (charcoal hand warmers), may produce skin cancer, especially if carcinogenic chemicals are also present. Frequently drinking scalding hot tea may produce esophageal cancer. Generally, it is believed that the cancer arises, or a pre-existing cancer is encouraged, during the process of repairing trauma. Repeated injuries to the same tissues might promote excessive cell proliferation, which could then increase the odds of cancer. [3]

Trauma is a serious injury or shock to the body. It is caused by a physical force, such as violence or an accident. The injury may be complicated by psychiatric, behavioral, and social factors. This can cause the injuries to be greater than just physical ones. Add the fact that X-rays and CAT scans are often used we should be able to understand that all of these factors together can be a trigger for the initialization of cancer.

During a traumatic event, the nervous system goes into survival mode (the sympathetic nervous system) and sometimes has difficulty reverting back into its normal, relaxed mode again (the parasympathetic nervous system). If the nervous system stays in survival mode, stress hormones such as cortisol are constantly released, causing an increase in blood pressure and blood sugar, which can in turn reduce the immune system’s ability to heal. (Or prevent cancer.)

Revisiting Stress as a Major Cause of Cancer

There is a link between physical abuse/trauma, emotional trauma, sex and cancer, which will be explored in more depth later on in this book. Esme Fuller-Thomson, PhD, and Sarah Brennenstuhl, MSW, of the University of Toronto have drawn a link between physical abuse as a child and increased incidence of cancer. Physical abuse is accompanied directly with emotional trauma and I would imagine that not unlike a cancer diagnosis, this emotional trauma likely lingers long after the physical body has recovered, if it recovers. Physical trauma and emotional trauma both create stress, which is one of the basic causes of cancer.

Trauma caused by childhood neglect, sexual or domestic abuse and war wreaks havoc in our bodies, says Bessel van der Kolk in The Body Keeps the Score. He explains how trauma and its resulting stress harms us through physiological changes to body and brain, and that those harms can persist throughout life. Excess stress can predispose us to everything from diabetes to heart disease and even cancer.

The long-term release of stress hormones can also induce DNA damage and affect DNA repair, said Dr. Melanie Flint, a senior lecturer in immunopharmacology at the University of Brighton.

There is "growing evidence that chronic stress can affect the cancer risk and progression through immune dysregulation," said Dr. Elisa Bandera, a professor and chief of Cancer Epidemiology and Health Outcomes at the Rutgers Cancer Institute