Reiki in the Hospital

My mom misses her Reiki sessions! I'm amazed. So, I started just putting both hands on her leg, and making sure I stay there for an hour, even though nurses come in and out. It is amazing how comforted she is by the Reiki energy. She just laps it up, and feels much better when I let her know that she indeed has received a total of an hour.

What I mostly do is just put a hand on her while I sit there, and turn on the Reiki. That works too. Both hands are better, but the one hand is comforting enough.

She'll be in there until probably Tuesday.

I'm in hell again though. And I am a new hater of chemo and the oncologist paradigm. What was I thinking letting an 84 year old woman do chemo anyway? Desperate or not, I should have put my foot down - my instinct was to refuse, but I let myself get talked into it.

Lesson: ALWAYS follow your gut. I knew this was wrong, and I let the world do what it wanted, not what I wanted.

Once my mom gets to the point where she can eat a semi normal amount of food, I'm going to put her on the Budwig Protocol. Full force. At the very least, people's qualities of life are improved. At the most, they go into remission. I think my mom's set to go out next year, for a number of reasons, but if she can be out of pain naturally and have some energy, I'll take that.

And we'll probably get her into hospice for the support in the meantime.

My mother is my best friend, and just a wonderful person. She is the biggest light in my life, and I'm devastated having to face all of this right now.

Diary No. 19 Things are getting bad and mom misses our Reiki sessions

No posts for a while because I've been on the cancer roller coaster.

Things were going on as usual, and then we decide to do chemo. I was more worried about than my mother was. At first she was supposed to get Gemcitabine and Tarceva, but then when we went for the appointment it was Gemcitabine and 5FU, the toxic one. Shit. But the oncologist is highly regarded around here and promised my mother he would take her age into consideration.

So, first, she's just a little tired, and I'm happily relieved. Then, as the week progresses she has less and less appetite, and I have a hard time getting her to even drink water. Then she gets whacked with fatigue and some horrible constipation. At first, Pauline came over, and she was fine. Then she gets so horribly constipated she's got pain all over, and especially bad stomach pain. The oncologist's office recommended a shocking amount of laxatives, but they worked. Very horrible. Poison in, poison out. The second time Pauline comes over, she has to work on her while she's in bed. Later on she's too weak to get on the massage table for our nightly Reiki session, so I do it while she's lying on the couch. By the 4th of July, 6 weeks of physical therapy are down the drain.

So then she gets hit with a horrible urinary tract infection and in the middle of the night her fever gets to 105. Off to the hospital in the ambulance.

She's now recovering on the oncology ward (which has the best nursing staff I've ever seen in a non-ICU situation). She's now on pancreatin, a sign the tumor has progressed.

I was really mad because I thought it was all from the chemo. But the oncologist said the cancer didn't respond to the CyberKnife and her tumor marker, which initially had dropped sharply, was back up again. Crap. She'll be in the hospital 5 more days while they give her extra antibiotics and figure out how to proceed.

So I went to the local Master psychic, Daniel Akner, (check him out here) last night (I had gone for the first time when she was just out of surgery - which was totally traumatic for her). I'm freaked out because I'm thinking that mom's end is nearer than I had thought. She had been doing spectacularly well, going from a wheelchair to a cane in 2 months, and was getting perkier and perkier, and suddenly, wham!

Daniel gives the most incredibly spiritual readings possible. The nightly Reiki seems to be evolving us, to make a long story short, and is the equivalent of a daily Hawaiian vacation for mom (OK, the Dick Sutphen tapes have something to do with that since the relaxation section is a tropical beach).

He didn't think that what my mom sees in an aura was a hallucination brought on by the anesthesia or something. He thinks she's getting energy into her system and is seeing it in her aura.

He didn't think the red was bad. He thought it was life force or something good like that. I also told him that on the first day of her chemo the spot turned white with black around it. He had seen that spot recently himself, since he had been severely ill as well. He thought it was energy coming for her.

All very good and cool about Reiki and its energizing and spiritual effects!

I also asked him to throw some tarot cards out on some of the supplements I've been giving mom. I had them on 3x5 cards. Resveratrol, quecertin and green tea extract, antioxidants, will interfere with the chemo (thereby resolving a controversy in the chemo field!!), however COQ10 will not, but it's also an antioxidant. Melatonin, recently recommended as an antioxidant with potential cancer fighting abilities, is a big no no for her because it will negatively impact her sleep patterns and freak her out. Polyerga will help, but Maitake MD fraction is too exotic and strong for her system (she had begun to refuse to take it anyway). Whey protein shakes, and flax, fish, and coconut oil, and multivitamins are all good.

It's interesting that the cards were slowly eliminating most non-food (ie extracts) cancer fighters, and they lead to the next thing.

The Budwig Protocol (see thisfor more info. There is also a yahoo group dedicated to supporting members on this diet. The address is flaxoil2@yahoogroups.com.) was associated with a card that had a woman with restored youth. That was the best so far.

What I'm going to do is start my mom out with the whey protein shakes, into which I put the Budwig-type of flaxseed oil and cottage cheese mixture, but less of it, and vitamins, with whey protein. I'll do this until she can eat enough to ingest enough flax seed oil to switch over to the Budwig protocol completely (if you're interested in trying this, get the recipe book from Amazon). I am very impressed with the results people on that list have. Many people with stage 3 or 4 cancer whom the oncology community has given up on, or who refuse to have all the toxic chemicals in their system, have had remissions. Others just have a lot of energy and a wonderful quality of life until they pass.

As I said before, I'm sure each cancer has its own energetic signature, so it does make sense that some of these supplements would be inappropriate for my mom in her current disease process, and still be helpful to others.

Today my mother looked MUCH better, but was still very tired. She's coming along slowly. But she was very tired, and sleeping most of the day. That's fine.

This next phase will be very scary for all involved.

Yesterday she wanted to go home very badly. One of the things she missed the most was the nightly REIKI SESSIONS!!

Diary No. 18

Tonight the same - she's seeing the sponge thing in her aura, but now it's partly red and the other part is turning fuscia. Don't know what that means, my first impression was that some light was getting in there to lighten up the red (anger?). Whatever it is, she's not in touch with the emotion behind it, so I don't know what to do or think even.

Center of her stomach got a little sore when I touched it. So I did some ART aura cleansing, and that got it back to normal. I had this feeling that I was clearing black gook when I did that. Not sure why, but I got that visual in the back of my head.

We then had a little cathartic emotional session, mainly me freaking about about mom's complaining about things about the house. I'm doing my best and I can't take it anymore, especially since I'm wiped out from handing in the final copy of the dissertation on Friday. Then she felt bad that I felt bad, and we had a nice little mother/daughter chat, where she told me she just realized that health is the most important thing and she should stop worrying about the money because the house is paid for and she can get a reverse mortgage if necessary (which would be wonderful, because it would mean she survives this thing).

Mom also misses her sisters. As of late March she's the only one left of her nuclear family.

So then Pauline called me up with some Reiki homework. I need to send Reiki to my mom receiving the perfect drug combination and dose in the perfect time sequence.

Diary No. 17. It's been an interesting 2 weeks

Still doing basically the same routine. Trying to get a Reiki session every night to Dick Sutphen's Healing Force CD.

The week before last, I had to miss 2 days in a row though, because I was so intensely editing the final copy of my dissertation that I ended up being either totally exhausted or too late to start one.

So Pauline comes over to do vortex healing, checks her chakras with the pendulum, and it's obvious from the lack of movement that without the Reiki, she doesn't stay in balance. Very interesting.

Got the CA-19-9 numbers back too. March, pre-surgery: 749, End of April, home for 3 weeks, no other treatment, hardly any appetite: 2700. Crap, the surgery, anesthesia, and preservative-laden hospital food did a number on her immune system.
End of May, 3 weeks after CyberKnife, and 2 weeks after she got her appetite back (so she could drink they whey protein/supplement shakes): 1400. Still double March, but half of the previous month. Just did another test last week, so I'll have that number soon.

Medical oncologist wants to start her on Gemcitibine and 5FU. Supposedly she'll have very mild side effects, with no nausea or vomiting. Possibly her blood count will go down. I'm working as hard as I can with the nutritional and Reiki support so this actually comes true, because from what I see on the net, this isn't really true. Also would like to avoid that low blood count.

Propax NT is recommeded in a great book by a neurosurgeon Natural Strategies for Cancer Patients by Russell Baylock, MD (neurosurgeon). If she starts getting side effects that the other supplements I'm giving don't address, I'll try that.

In any case, she keeps seeing images in her aura. Mostly it's this sponge-like blob that varies between grey, black and red (not too happy to see it could be black or gray). I don't know if that's the cancer she seeing or not. She started telling me it had holes in it the other day.

Also, one night, father's day night to be specific, when I had started the Reiki late and let her stay in her bed to do it, she fell off to sleep, and then woke up saying she had a nightmare in which her father was trying to get her to go somewhere she didn't want to go. THAT was interesting. Not sure where the place was, but I think it's indicating emotional aspects that need to be healed

Tomorrow is the chemo. I think I'm more nervous than my mother.

Diary No. 16 - She's still seeing stuff in her aura

I'd never have expected my mother to get to seeing things in her aura, as I said in the previous post.

Last night I did Reiki while the Dick Sutphen CD was on. We get to the music part, she's sleeping and suddenly says "Lake Como." OK, so I say, "what?" and then she wakes up. When she woke up, she saw a big, dark pink flower in her aura, and next to that was a kidney shaped spot. Now it was just an outline, translucent. Good that it went from black, to gray, to red, to clear. I just wasn't sure what the whole thing meant.

Pauline came over this afternoon and thought that Lake Como is kidney shaped. OK, that makes sense. She also thought that the things in her aura had something to do with part of the origins of the cancer.

So, after a very long and powerful vortex healing session (I sit and put Reiki into the room while she's doing it - supports them both), she came up with my mother's childhood and her parents worrying about money, which possibly made life seem like a grind, and not too sweet, to my mother. A similar feeling came up early in her marriage. Made sense both times. My mother was raised during the depression, and while my grandfather didn't lose his job, he got fewer commissions and was making less money to raise four girls. My father lost his drugstore to the big chains at the beginning of their marriage, and his employment situation didn't really stablize after that for ten years.

Worries about money definitely contribute to my mother's cancer. It was particularly appropriate today because my mother had been feeling desperate about her own money situation, and just before Pauline arrived we had been having this little dramatic argument where I was adamant that she was cutting her life short by worrying so much.

Of course when Pauline tested her chakras with the pendulum, they were very low, hardly moving. The root was the best of them all, but not great. By the end of the session, they were all moving much better. It really was direct proof of the power of the emotions to suppress one's energy and thereby immune system. It is only when my mother is depressed about money that she has these non-moving chakras. Worry is a complete waste of energy, that's for sure!

Later tonight, she had no complaints about dinner, and told me she decided that she was going to stop complaining about things and be more cheerful. I hope that doesn't mean she's going to keep things in more, because I also know that THAT particular aspect of her personality also lowers ones immunity.

So, things get scary when these types of events occur. I start to get scared that she'll start getting really sick again. She is pretty much fine now, apart from being a little tired, and not having the muscle tone she lost in the hospital really back enough to want to go outside in the garden by herself.

Diary No. 15 Are these Reiki Sessions Making my Mom psychic?

You know, when you're really sick, you often become highly sensitive to different energies. For example, when my mother got home from the hospital, and I started these nightly Reiki sessions with her, she saw her whole family there.

When I decided to start doing the aura cleansing technique I learned in ART she was able to identify the exact size and shape of her tumor. I was impressed, but figured that she was in tune with her body, and was just more sensitive.

Now I think she's also becoming more sensitive to all types of energy. Last night, when I wanted to to the aura cleansing with her again, instead of envisioning it in her body, she again saw the energy of it in her aura. Kidney shaped. At first she saw it a black, she told me. Then she saw it as gray. Last night it was red. After I did the cleansing thing it was gone. I also included sweeping her aura with a seagull feather.

She's really starting to enjoy these sessions, and asks for them every night if I don't initiate them.

We should get her blood test results later in the week.

Diary No. 14

Last night we used music only. It was kind of a nice break from having to be so active mentally during the session (even though the Sutphen CD is for her, I end up getting into it too and moving my hands in accordance with it).

One interesting thing occurred - while the night before she had seen a grey shape in her aura, which I cleared out, last night when I asked her to identify the size and shape of dis-ease she saw in the same place, in her aura instead of her body, and this time it was red with jagged edges, kind of like a sunburst shape. I wonder what that was? Is that what cancer cells look like.

For someone who never meditated outside of some yoga classes she took while she was in her '70s, my mother is sensing some pretty interesting things, which seem really metaphysical to me.

Diary No. 13

Last night - same, used Dick Sutphen's Healing Force self-hypnosis CD. Mom found it a little long.

I usually ask her if anything went on for her, and she usually has had nothing happen. Last night it was similar, but her perceptions were heightened. She saw me with a light yellow (gold?) aura around me. That was cool.

I also decided to use the aura cleansing technique from the Rand Advanced Reiki Training class (Kathie Lipinski in my case). You have the person visualize the dis-ease. In this case, she saw her tumor falling apart from the CyberKnife treatment. However, when I asked her if it had a particular shape and had anything to teach her, she saw a gray amorphous shape, kind of kidney-shaped, in her aura. It was telling her to eat her vegetables and be nice to people (she's already a sweet person, so I'm thinking that had to do with communication style). She saw me take it out of her aura, which was great.

Something about the night before last that I forgot. When she first got home from the hospital and I did Reiki on her while she was in bed, she wanted to know if I saw any of our relatives who had passed. I have never done so. She saw her whole family one night when we were doing the Reiki session (she's the last one left). Very interesting.

She's gotten over the crabby thing. That's nice. We also sat out in the sun for a while today - nice for the vitamin D production.

More on tonight's session tomorrow.

Diary No. 12

Mom went for her cyberknife checkup yesterday.

Nothing much, the doctor was glad the procedure had alleviated her symptoms, and we're scheduling a CAT scan to see exactly how much the tumor has shrunk. He basically said to try chemo or just "enjoy the time you have left." My mom didn't want to hear that at all, and pretty much blocked it out. But the Dr. was happy about her lack of pain, and we've got to go for a CAT scan in 2 weeks so they can see how much the tumor has shrunk. Love that the only side effect she had was a little tenderness in the stomach area too.

Today we went to the medical oncologist, who did blood tests. Depending on how high (or low) her tumor markers are, he will probably put her on Gemzar and Tarceva. Told her they don't cause nausea or vomiting. The side effects are supposed to be "relatively" mild, but "relatively" is something else for an 84 year-old woman. It's still scary. However, Pauline's other pancreatic cancer client, who is in what seems to be remission, has had very few side effects, and is off traveling right now. So, lets see. I'm going to Reiki whatever I can, and hopefully Pauline will be able to do something with the meds as well.

He was thrilled and surprised that she had only lost about 1.5 pounds since the Cyberknife treatment, that she wasn't jaundiced at all, and that she really feels great. Also, he thought her surgical incision was remarkably-well healed considering how "fresh" it is.

Even though the blood tests are scary in a way, I can't wait to see them because I know they'll be unexpectedly low in tumor markers, etc.

Something is definitely working....and I was thinking that since I do Reiki in the area of the scar every night, that definitely has to have something to do with this.

Heh heh heh....

Funny thing, I was trying to tell him about the smoothie with the supplements, but he didn't really care. So, onward and upward with this. Better to have someone who thinks they're irrelevant than to have someone who thinks I've got to stop.

Tonight I'll go back to doing Reiki on the table with the Dick Sutphen Healing Force CD. And the foot, leg and back massage with jojoba oil.

This is very good.

I'm admiring how unafraid my mother is about this whole thing. She's been a queen of denial all her life, and right now it seems to be serving her very well!

Diary No. 11 Worry, Energetics, and Reiki

Mom has come down with a urinary tract infection. Not a severe one, but we'll see a doctor this week. Don't want her immune system having to work overtime on that, it needs to address the cancer now. She has this terrible habit of downplaying any sickness, so I should have called the doctor this morning, but she thought she was fine. Now in the afternoon she told me it was feeling acute again. Back to cranberry powder, vitamin C, water, and crankiness. I hate that aspect. She's usually easy to take care of, but when she has these cranky days sometimes I want to throw in the towel.

That and financial worries were actually what made her cranky today. When she's like this she makes sure she complains about a few things, mostly that she can't eat or there's something not put away in the kitchen.

Some days, like today, I just have a hard time tolerating the whole situation. Does she want to stay or go? She seems to want to live, but other times life seems to be joyless for her, especially when she focuses on her dwindling bank account, and living with a daughter who's getting her PhD way too late in life for financial comfort. Days like this make me wonder how long she can keep getting better if she lowers her energy level with things like this, and it makes me really sad.

Last night we did have a nice Reiki session though. I did the pendulum and her chakras were not in the greatest shape strength-wise when I checked with the pendulum. Later they were better, but only more balanced.

I also noticed that when I was doing Reiki on her, her whole body was pulling it, all except for the solar plexus/heart chakra area. I did it anyway, because that's an area that's really needed, I know with my head, but my hands weren't telling me anything. It was odd. When I went over to her right side to work on the liver area a little more, yes, I did feel my hands heating up a lot, and mom commented that they felt very hot there.

I also had a feeling that I wanted to go work on her feet for a while. Again, she loved how hot my hands got (Reiki feels so good on the feet!).

Well, this afternoon, Pauline came over and validated some of what I was feeling.
First, she did her own pendulum on the chakras. They were VERY still, except for the root, which was surprisingly good. But that demonstrated to my mother exactly what effect worrying has on your energy system, which supports your immune system.

First, she did a little affirmation work with my mother around the financial worries (I really think this aspect of her personality had a huge effect on her immune system, and let the cancer emerge). Then she turned on the Dick Sutphen CD while working. Previously, my mother didn't want to sit or lie still for the whole session, but since it's self hypnosis, it gets her relaxed enough to conk off to sleep for most of the session.

Pauline thought the dead energy feeling in the chest area was related to the worrying. By the time she got here, the chakras were really really dead, all except for the root, interestingly enough. After the vortex session, they were back to normal. Phew.

Interestingly enough, Pauline also did some work on the feet area, suggested by her guides. Grounding something?

Tomorrow is the cyberknife checkup. I can't wait to see the doctor. OK, mom's got a UTI, but all around she's energetic and looking great.

Diary No. 10 "Every Cancer has its Own Energetic Signature"

Now my mom is starting to have some symptoms that I'm thinking may be her liver getting overloaded with debris from the Cyberknife radiation treatment. Two days of bad headaches, one day of not seeing well, tired. I'm thinking it might be the liver because Pauline was detecting a gunky liver at the last vortex healing session. When I went online to look up liver cleansing those symptoms were there. I've started to give her Milk Thistle (nothing fancy, just Trader Joe's), so maybe things are moving around.

Doing some fresh juicing as well. I wish I could give her fresh veggie juice every day, but she doesn't like it that much. I have to say, my mom is beginning to get so appreciative of my efforts here that she's really cooperating, even though her stomach always tells her it's never hungry, and even though she doesn't really like the morning smoothie or those veggie juices (carrot, apple, beet, cabbage - esp. the cabbage, which is very anticancer - and whatever else is lying around that's organic. Today I had some swiss chard and left over salad from my organic garden, so in they went. The apples make the flavor better). She likes my cooking, which is good.

I'm in the process of deciding to get away from meat, even fish, as much as possible if I can keep up her protein intake in other ways (very important for cancer patients, or anyone who has muscle atrophy from an extended hospital stay). My way is my "kitchen sink" whey protein shake in the morning. One indication of this is that one day she had some (organic, free range) chicken, which she loved, but which she found a little hard to digest. The next day I made this great thai-oriented tofu recipe, and she assimilated that much better. Fish, we both love it, but it's also pretty loaded with toxins these days, so I'm sticking to a couple of times a week, if that. Better just add Carlson's fish oil to the cottage cheese(or strained yogurt)and flax oil mixture I throw into her smoothie to get the Omega 3s (especially the EPA).

I just came upon a site of a clinic in Quito, run by Dr. Wickman, a DO (website here). I'd never get my mother to go, but I think the doctor has one super-profound statement on his site: every cancer has its own energetic signature. The doctor's idea is to address that first and then have the people do a vegetarian diet. Whether or not you would agree with the rest of what he does, I think that is a profound truth about cancer.

It turns out that this idea comes from Dr. Royal Rife, who did work around this idea in the 1930s. There is a website with info on his work here.

The idea resonated with me simply from what I know about homeopathy -- I've gone to a really great homeopath and after a while you learn that every sickness has its own emotional signature, and the homeopathy goes after that to heal the dis-ease. My homeopath "doesn't go near cancer," apart from giving remedies to deal with the emotional components of adjusting to having it, but still I think there is a larger truth to the whole idea.

The last two nights were good Reiki-wise. The night before last, I was very tired from gardening and we started late, so we just did a music cd, and no massage. Now, I always do lavender aromatherapy as well. On the nights I'm doing music instead of the Dick Sutphen self-hypnosis CD "Healing Force," I tell my mother to envision a great white light coming down through her crown chakra and really energizing the killer cells to gobble up all the cancer cells, like they are little Pack Men. The Pack Men are super energized by this visualization, or that's the intention at least. She likes it.

I'm specifically envisioning the liver and sigmoid colon full of wonderful Reiki energy. In the case of the colon, where there has been a suspicious spot, I envision the Reiki energy causing such a state of energetic balance that anything out of balance cannot survive, and therefore the cancer cells have to be just harmlessly absorbed. I envision no other choice for them as I light up the area with Reiki.

For the liver, I just imagine it illuminated with Reiki energy. I also invoke the distant symbol if she's in bed and I can't reach the spot. Not sure why this occurred to me, but I do feel my hands getting hotter when I do this. One time I actually felt my liver tingle, which to me was a confirmation that my mom's liver needed some Reiki.

I've also started sending Reiki to the Palladin gene - which apparently is the gene found to be turned off in pancreatic cancer patients. I intend for the Reiki to turn on the tumor suppression qualities at the DNA level.

Last night I got in another full session on the Reiki table, phew. For some reason I also wanted to work on her legs and feet a lot - sometimes I get intuitive feelings when I'm doing Reiki, and the feelings are stronger than different feelings in my hands. Her muscles got really atrophied by a week and a half in intensive care, and they're still not really back. That may be what I'm picking up on. But little by little.

All I can say is that my mother by all logic should not be feeling this well at this point. Late stage pancreatic cancer often just takes people right down, especially after their systems are weakened by major surgery. I feel if she hadn't had the cyberknife she would have started going downhill anyway, but the treatment gave her immune a chance to start rebuilding itself (and for me to help her with diet and all this energy work). My mom looks and feels better all the time, aside from her legs, which I attribute to not moving around enough or doing her pt exercises enough.

What I think is happening is that all the energy work is working together with the nutrition and some emotional work we do when we have our intimate little Reiki sessions. Healing is happening on many different levels.

Her first bloodwork "after" the Cyberknife and all of this other complimentary medicine will happen on Thursday. Wednesday is the Cyberknife follow up.

A full report scientifically confirming how extraordinary my mother's response has been will follow when I get it!

Diary No. 9 Reiki and Pancreatic Cancer

I am continuing to have mom listen to the Healing Force self-hypnosis CD while I do the Reiki session. What's nice about it isn't just the suggestions. The subliminal section at the end is just music, so you feel like you're going back to a regular Reiki session.

Up until last night I was reaching over onto my mother's bed to give her the Reiki sessions. Luckily I have short legs, but there's a limit to my ability to put up with being uncomfortable EVERY night. So, last night I got her to use the Reiki table. What a difference. I felt like I gave her a more balanced treatment (although I did want to focus on the liver/pancreas (liver because after the Cyberknife I'm sure it's doing overtime getting rid of all the flotsam and jetsam) and sigmoid colon (there was a spot there that nobody biopsied - were they just giving up or did they not think it was significant. Sucks either way.).

I pulled out my rose quartz pendulum last night after the session too. I had once gone to a wonderful workship about clearing chakras with Reiki and crystals, so I was curious about what effect the session had had that I could actually test - all of the chakras were moving at a very nice speed and force. I'll have to test the "before" next time.

I'm still giving her my "kitchen sink" shakes in the morning: Organic frozen berries (usually strawberries, but sometimes raspberries or blueberries mixed in - Trader Joe's has organic berries for cheaper than the pesticide-laden ones at the grocery store), Jarrow's unflavored whey powder, Barlean's flax oil, Carlson's fish oil (I'm using brands because internet research leads me to think those are the best brands), resveratrol, quercetin, green tea extract. One of those things is slightly bitter, so sometimes I use a little agave sweetener (low glycemic index - sugar feeds cancer, so keep your glycemic index in mind when preparing foods)and some vanilla flavoring. I now add ground flax. Using Red Mills for now, but it's recommended using freshly ground. The golden flax is overpowering ground, so I bought the brown. Haven't tried it yet.

I am becoming fascinated by the Budwig Protocol. Google it. German scientist believed that if you thoroughly mix the flax into the cottage cheese, and add freshly ground seeds and some berries (there's a whole program attached to this, but this is the center of it) that it will strengthen the immune system. It has worked on lots of hopeless cancer cases. Something to do with electrons. Anyway, so when I'm preparing the shake, I often get out some cottage cheese and mix both the flax and fish oil (lemon flavored) into it. Something to do with the sulphurated protein in the cc that makes the body absorb the flax better. Heck, I figured it must also help with absorbtion of the fish oil too. So, I don't do Budwig, but I tried this aspect of it.

Is this all working? Well, my mother is doing really unreasonably well. After the Cyberknife treatment she stopped having pain in her side, and got some of her appetite back (all won't come back due to stomach surgery). She's also a lot stronger and can walk half way up the block with a walker. All I've heard of is pancreatic patients crashing and burning after a couple of months, but not here. It has now been 2 months since her stomach surgery, and once she got out of ICU the trajectory has only been upward (well, thanks to the Cyberknife especially).

What does Reiki have to do with this. Well, I believe it's working on a lot of levels. Since it is relaxing, it's helping her own immune system to work better. But judging from the things my mother is saying during these sessions, I'd say that it's working on an emotional level as well (SHK for sure). Pauline still comes over once a week to do vortex. I'll have her come over weekly until bloodwork indicates it's safe to do it every other week. I think the vortex is a really valuable adjunct right now.

Diary No. 8

Last night uneventful. Dick Sutphen's Healing Force seems to have an amazing power to both relax and make cheerful. Even though by the end of the CD it's always pretty late, my mom always ends happy and relaxed. This is a true gift.

I also decided to do some more aura clearing - from the entire abdomen area. I feel there are bits of dis-eased energy that somehow were loosened up by both the Cyberknife radiation and all of this Reiki, so I feel like getting them out of her aura. To her it feels like grass clippings in her aura that I'm clearing. Pretty interesting.

There's also emotional healing going on in the midst of all of this. While putting my hand on an old broken leg injury I got the impression that her lower back disk issue (which over time has given her a waddle) might have been related to that accident (crack the whip ice skating or the heartless doctor who set the leg without anesthesia). She said that maybe it started there, but it was somehow related to all the stress from the responsibilities when we were kids. She has NEVER conceptualized this like that before. A true indication of healing in my book.

On the healthy living side, I've discovered that modified citrus pectin may help prevent metastases, so I ordered some through Amazon.com today. She needs more fiber in her diet, so what the heck. I might as well hit 2 issues at once.

I also finally got my mom to drink fresh vegetable juice that I make. That was another sign of progress.

Today I had to tell her that there is a spot on her colon. We've never been told whether they found it was cancer, but my mom didn't know about it all. She is feeling so much better that she was trying to refuse to have Pauline come, so I had to tell her (it's all about the money and the unreal/out of paradigm issues she has with energy healing, except when I do it, because there is a great deal of intimacy that we have developed through me doing nightly Reiki, which I feel is also healing in and of itself).

Reiki and my mother's pancreatic cancer. Diary No. 7

Two sessions - last night was uneventful. My mother woke up on Mother's Day really full of energy and life. It was really wonderful to see. She also ate an entire lobster dinner - an entire 1.5 lb lobster, some potatoes and sauteed baby arugula, with some ice cream for dessert.

Reiki last night was uneventful. I was kind of tired, so I only did 1/2 hour. With a plain Reiki CD.

Tonight was a little more eventful. I returned from teaching this evening to find her a little uncomfortable - that area of her tumor was sore and her back ached. This is to be expected, I suspect, when you're killing it off with such intense radiation - inflammation.

So, I gave her a dose of Maitake D fraction tincture, IP6 Inositol, and tumeric. I put the Mushroom tincture in some freshly made juice - beet, celery, carrot, apple, and a splash of oj. I'd like to make it less sweet but otherwise she won't drink it. The resistance to the supplements disappeared today with the appearance of the pain again (she had no pain last week while undergoing cyberknife treatments). She was also worried about what she'd be like in 6 months. We're not going to have any idea of that until the check ups and blood work at the end of the month. She still says she wants to live 10 more years and is determined to heal herself. Her mind kind of got blown out by the anesthesia, so it's hard for her to really organize her thinking enough to take charge of anything, but lets see. It's a good sign in any case.

One of the most enjoyable parts of the treatment are the massages I give her - jojoba massage oil scented with lavender and chamomile. She really feels soothed and gets relaxed, although I always have trouble getting the left side of her body to really relax - like her left foot is always wanting to flex. I wonder what kind of tension causes that.....

She's really beginning like that Dick Sutphen Healing Force CD. He's forceful and not wishy washy, while still being gentle. By the end she's always happy and relaxed. I do Reiki while she listens to it.

At the end of the session tonight, I figured I should do the aura clearing I learned in the ART class, given the radiation she received. Tonight she told me she feels fresh and polished when I'm done with it - interesting.

She also was visualizing old grass clippings as I was clearing her torso area. Very interesting as well, since I was also thinking of something like that - little bits of old energy that's not useful anymore, so it's healthier to get it out of there. And she feels all polished afterwards.

Now if we can only get consistent eating, without feeling like her inner child has come out in full force around the food issue, I'd feel like she's really going to be successful with the self-healing.

Reiki and Pancreatic Cancer. Diary No. 6

Quick update on today's energy healing sessions. Yes plural. I'm going to report on the Vortex healing sessions that Pauline comes over to do weekly, as well as the Reiki sessions that I'm doing every night with my mother. We've become a healing tag team and things are working synergistically I feel.

Vortex healing seems to be able to work in a more self-directed, different way than Reiki. The practitioner can use his or her will to guide the energy. In this case, Pauline is a psychic and medical intuitive, so she can get stronger (or should I say louder?) guidance. When I'm doing something it's just a strong intuition that comes through.

The vortex healing session also has an order that involves relaxation, energizing, and then the work. I find it fascinating. I've received healing sessions where I get distinct energetic sensations where the healing is taking place, or where Pauline is putting in "structures."

Anyway, this afternoon my mother's 70-year old leg injury (a broken tibia from an ice skating accident as a chile) was hurting her. It has NEVER hurt before this, and I thought that was fascinating. She hurt it when she was the end of a whip at a night skating session, and her skate caught on a bracelet that had been frozen in to the ice. Her father found it the next day, and she thinks she still has the bracelet in her possession.

I'm not sure whether there are mother issues around the injury - i.e. not emotionally nurturing enough during the recovery (I'll tell you why in a minute), or whether it's an emotional issue around the fact that the bone was set without anesthesia, which obviously was extremely painful, or whether it's related to the fact that her mother was always trying to get her to eat things she didnt' want to as a kid (as you can imagine, I'm having this trouble right now). Whatever it was, I'm sure the pain came up to get healed or as part of the process of healing. It was hurting my mom quite a lot actually.

I thought the pain could be related to a nurturing issue because Pauline got the sense that my mom's mother, who was a lovely person but who, as a traditional Victorian-era WASP was not apt to be physically demonstrative with her children, was at the session and Pauline felt that she was regretting not being more physically affectionate with her children. Hmmm, somehow this is related to the emotional component of my mom's cancer. Perhaps my mother's problem communicating her emotions, or sometimes feeling them in the first place comes from this?

Tonight the Reiki session was similar to the other ones, except my mom felt my hands were especially hot. I invoke the heavy hitters for help - Drs. Usui, Hayashi, Mrs. Takata and all the ascended Reiki Masters, Jesus, Mary, Buddha, St. Luke, archangel Michael and Gabriel, as well as anybody else in a helper capacity who wants to help, and give thanks in advance for the blessings received.

I was tired, so it was only 45 minutes. I got the idea that I needed to help my mom engange her free will to ask for a healing miracle from our helpers/angels, etc. I was asking myself, but spiritually one really has to have the will engaged and ask for the help, because it can't really come by itself, unless of course it's your relatives (why? - this planet being a free will zone, everything we do is by free will, right down to solving problems. Those in spirit aren't allowed to help unless we ask because they can't violate our free will. Some people don't actually want help, and others - like me - forget to ask for it enough).

Tomorrow is another Cyberknife treatment. So far, I see no side effects. In fact, today, 2 days later, she's looking better than she has in months.

The first session was less than 45 minutes. I'm going to have the Dick Sutphen Healing Force self-hypnosis CD piped in as the music this time. Lets see what happens.

Reiki and my Mom's Pancreatic Cancer. Diary No. 5

I guess I'm a little behind on this.

On Sunday night, I did the Dick Sutphen Healing Force CD a second time while I was doing Reiki on my mother. This time she stayed more alert but relaxed. After the relaxation section when the suggestions started coming on she suddenly said, "this is probably really good." Then we just did the rest of the CD, which ends with music and subliminal suggestions.

That was the night before we went to do the Cyberknife radiation treatment. She was fine after that, but a little tired by the afternoon. The only problem she had during the 45 minute treatment was that the mold on her back was uncomfortable.

Monday night I went back to "plain" Reiki using the Reiki Magic/Merlin CD. We were both very tired from not sleeping well the night before, but I still did the full hour.

Last night(Tues) a very interesting thing happened. I did Lavender aromatherapy for the first time, and I also decided to use the aura cleansing technique I learned in Advanced Reiki Training (which I took with Kathie Lipinski - of the International Center for Reiki training. She's a nurse here on LI. The only reason I'm not doing Master level training with her is that there was someone who lived a lot closer - she's a fabulous teacher).

For the aura clearing from the ICRT school you extend your energy past your finger tips, and then ask the person to visualize the area of dis-ease - color, shape, and what it might be telling you. You are supposed to ask the person if they are willing to learn from it, but I just asked my mom if it was saying anything.

Astoundingly enough, without having seen the doctors' description of her tumor, she identified its correct shape and size. She then said it was pink. I'm wondering if that's the irritation from the radiation.

When I asked her if it was saying anything, she just said that it wanted to get out of there. I thought that was her projecting her feelings instead of going deeper, so I didn't work with her on that too much.

HOWEVER, about 5 minutes later she suddenly said, "you know, I think worrying about money can give you cancer." While it's certainly not cause and effect, since cancer is multi-faceted dis-ease (genetic, environmental, emotional, dietary), she did correctly identify one of the sources of her own emotional dis-ease, which I thought was a huge breakthrough.

She explained how money was always at the back of her mind, and she really constantly worried about it. To put it simply, this kind of thing can really depress one's immune system. It surely damaged her energetic bodies. This is a person who doesn't really have too much in the bank, but who owns a house that she surely can get the equity out of if necessary, and who for that reason doesn't really have to worry - except that she wanted to give us a larger estate. The fact that there isn't too much money to inherit has much more to do with my father's lack of concern to provide for his wife in a life insurance policy than anything else, but that's my opinion.

So, I tried to make her understand that although a reverse mortgage isn't ideal, it's certainly a viable option, and that sometimes life comes out not the way you want it, but you have to be flexible and go with the flow.

I also was explaining how to meditate by following the breath and trying to make that empty space between inhale and exhale larger, so your mind calms down. I think that would really help, but I think I might have to start her with guided meditation CDs first.

I also now think she needs to do abundance affirmations, in addition to physical health ones. That would address the spiritual malaise that is feeding the physical dis-ease.

Tomorrow and Friday we go for the remaining Cyberknife treatments. Meanwhile, I'm trying to get her to drink strawberry (frozen organic ones) smoothies with a good powdered multivitamin, fish and flax oils, resveratrol and quecertin, and green tea extract. Sounds like a lot, but the fish oil is lemon flavored and doesn't affect the taste of the shake. However, because she had the stomach surgery to bypass the obstruction, she has no appetitite and gets filled up just someone with a lap band procedure does. She's also got swallowing issues. This is by far the most challenging part of her illness so far.

On the supplements, except for the resveratrol, which I'm giving her because in vitro it has been shown to kill pancreatic cancer cells along with quercetin. In vitro isn't the same as in vivo, but considering that her tumor is bisecting her duodenum, her stomach contents do hit it, so to me it's the next best thing!

This morning mom's looking better - better color in her face and the energy around her seems better - less dark. She gets very tired after she eats - in this case half of a smoothie (saving the rest for later), and really hates food now. That's also really sad because she has always loved food. Like she's living some food hell too.

She has some tenderness in the lower rib area, but not enough to take a pain killer for. Considering that some doctors think she's only got a few months to live, this is all wonderful to me. She does seem much better.

The Reiki Sessions - My Mother's Pancreatic Cancer. Diary No. 4

So, I finally did Reiki while my mother was listening to Dick Sutphen's self-hypnosis CD, "Healing Force." She's gotten to love the Reiki sessions. When she's ready to go to bed, if I'm not downstairs with her, she just washes up and waits in her bed. It's really very sweet.

The first time we listened to the CD, she was talking through the full-body relaxation that Sutphen does with you, so she really only got the suggestions in a semi-relaxed (ie Reikified) state.

Last night was different. We set out to listen to the whole thing. By the time he got half way through the relaxation part, she was asleep. I was wondering whether she was really benefiting from it aside from possibly subliminally. Well, I was really pleasantly surprised at one point to see that she was really "in" the zone. Although she was snoring intermittently, at one point Sutphen counts back from 5, saying that you will open your eyes and be alert and aware. So, here my mother is sound asleep, supposedly, and when he gets to the number 1 her eyes pop open!

She quickly went back to "sleep" or wherever she was, but she seemed to be awake during the section where he puts in the suggestion for your mind to exert a powerful healing force on your body, and that your body is filled with healing energy, etc. She started snoring toward the end of that and then stayed asleep throughout the subliminal section where there is just nice music.

I pretty much just let her stay asleep after that.

Monday we're doing Cyberknife radiation. I am extremely excited about it. Missile technology to send high doses of radiation only on the tumor. And only 3 times. A good friend had it and had zero side effects.

I've also been giving her multivitamins in a formula that has a high dose of Vitamin C, but the other day Pauline told me that her oncologist 10 years ago told her to stop taking antioxidants before radiation. She was especially worried because I was giving her a gram of C. I'm cutting it down to be on the safe side, but I think this radiation is so strong that it won't matter either way. There have been a few studies showing C having a good effect with radiation though, so I'm confused and torn (btw - cancerous tumors take in Vitamin C because it has a molecular structure so like glucose - which the tumor uses to grow - so the theory is that it could protect the cells - but that doesn't take into consideration the fact that cancer cells have an abnormal metabolism). In the end, who knows.

From what I've read, I probably won't be doing any harm due to the nature of this treatment. The cyberknife people also had no opinion on it one way or another.
I have read a recent study showing that resveratrol and quecertin kill pancreatic cancer cells, and that resveratrol has been shown to sensitize cells to radiation in vitro. Due to the location of my mother's tumor, cutting across the duodenum, that seems practically in vitro to me, so I'm giving her those things. Also, extra Vitamin A just for next week. Since A is a fat-soluble vitamin, her doctor wants me to cut back on it over the long term.

She's liking the whey shakes also but since they're rich (flax and fish oils) she sometimes gets worried they'll make her too full. However, whey protein is the most easily assimilated protein powder and protein is vital to cancer patients. I put in a splash of orange juice for flavor and then add frozen organic berries, some almond milk or water, and then powdered vitamins and Maitake D mushroom tincture (although that is supposed to be taken on an empty stomach, so I'm not sure it works to put in the shake - she won't take it alone, so I'm stuck doing it this way).

So, Reiki is part of a total healing program for mind, body and spirit. I feel that the relaxed mental state it puts people in is as important as the relaxation the body gets from the energy.

Two new things I'm investigating: the Budwig protocol (flax oil and cottage cheese as key elements in a vegetarian diet, with relaxation, detoxification, and sunlight elements) and Essiac tea. I now know too many people who swear by the second thing not to try it.

A friend told me that the stuff they sell at the pet store is much cheaper than at the health food store and that they're the same (this was after telling me that she had a dog who outlived all expectations on that stuff, as did someone else's dog. Another friend had her mother go into remission from terminal gall bladder cancer with radiation and Essiac tea, and she herself takes it as part of her recovery from breast cancer). I bought the powder to make my own - more economical. It's worth a shot. It's only herbs and in the quantities suggested nontoxic. Vamos a ver.

One objective result:

We have a wonderful new geriatrician as a physician. Wow, you never know how bad your doctor is (although only my mother couldn't tell that her old doctor had been an out to lunch, disrespectful ass), until you get a great one. Anyway, he had never seen my mother before but told her that she looked terrific, no qualifiers (i.e. for a woman with cancer, or for your age, etc.) She also doesn't have swollen lymph nodes either. I thought that was major. By all rights she should.

I'm definitely doing something right. The Cyberknife will be a huge help now, but I'm convinced that the healing program that's developing here is in the right direction at least.

The Reiki Sessions and my Mother's Pancreatic Cancer - Diary No. 3

Last night my mother fell asleep for the entire Reiki treatment! A first. She might have been tired from seeing this wonderful new geriatric physician we found. Wow, what a find. Brilliant, nice, and compassionate! If you're on Long Island and you need a physician for an older person, Dr. Lawrence Rand in Bellmore is a gift to humanity.

She even dreamed - and talked a little. New as well.

I had a LOT of Reiki coming out of my hands last night. That might have had something to do with it. Because we were both tired, I didn't do the Sutphen self-hypnosis CD, just some nice Reiki music.

Every Reiki session is different. Even if you're working on the same person every day.

The Reiki Sessions - My Mother's Pancreatic Cancer Diary no.2

May 1st

Well, it's just May 1st. I just finished the hour long session. I am finding it interesting that my mother seems to become emotionally open (but not totally so) during these sessions. She looks forward to them before going to sleep. I just love that.

Tonight I massaged her arms and legs with some nice jojoba aromatherapy massage oil, which smells great with chamomile and lavender, put on a CD called Reiki Magic with Merlin, or something like that (I'm almost overdoing the other one Reiki Whale, which we both love), set up some frankencense aromatherapy, and lit that quartz crystal tea light. She especially loved the massage tonight.

Her back is getting stiffer and today she admitted that she in fact does have some kind of pain every day, although it's not constant or severe. She's also having trouble eating enough, like all pancreatic cancer patients. In this case, I also suspect some nerve damage from the surgery.

I'm nervous and creeped out that it's probably the tumor in her pancreas. I gave her some oxycodone. No need to be constantly reminded through intermittent pain what's going wrong. Trying to stay strong and not project my own fear about what she's facing. She's not particularly aware of how bad of a cancer this is, and doesn't really want to think about it. I don't blame her.

Monday is cyberknife radiation to reduce her tumor burden. I really think that will get rid of a lot of the pain for a good while.

Anyway, back to the session. Tonight at first I placed two hands on her hip area, toward the side, below the pancreas area. Then I moved one hand to her knee. More for variety and not to be too intense.

She seems to have a pattern of thinking of something from childhood at the beginning of these sessions. Tonight she was thinking of the lady at the end of her road who had chickens. This woman put plastic eggs in the hens' nests, I guess to promote egg production. So my mom, as a kid, would go exploring the hens nests, and one day took an egg to the woman who owned the hens. She was told to put the egg back, even though she was just showing it to the woman. I guess not in a scolding way, but just wanted the egg back under the hen.

I then reminded her of a dream she had one night during her second week home. She dreamed she was in a plane crash, which was very scary. But she and another women were among the few survivors. The woman was even making wise cracks, and after a while they started to have a little fun there. I thought this was really significant in terms of her own survival. But she doesn't remember the dream, so I have to remind her.

This also made her give me a little metaphor about life - sometimes you get stuck going down the wrong road and soon you are stuck in the mud, and you have to do all these things to extricate yourself. VERY interesting! Not only was this wise, but it really was a metaphor for what we're going through now.

Then she was worrying (argh, this is the root of a lot of this dis-ease, I tell you!) about the home health aide not having enough to do on her last day. Then it was returning some books to a friend and wanting to go to the library, which would be the first time since she got home. Yay.

I have to say, all of this little talk makes the hour go by quickly. When she first got home I was doing it for an hour, but she was really too weak to talk, or to really want to be touched at all. At that point, I just held my hands over her body, especially over the stomach surgery incision area.

I also get a chance to gently remind her that the worrying suppresses her immune system, and maybe she should do a meditation where she sends those worries off on clouds. She agreed, but the level of worrying she does comes from her subconscious, so it's going to be a challenge to get it to turn off.

Tonight she realized that she doesn't like to lie flat to sleep anymore. Is it the cancer, or osteoporosis, which is giving her a slight hunch? I really hate seeing my sweet mother deteriorate like this after being healthy and eating well forever.

So, at the end of this session, we were both more relaxed, at ease, and she was happy. We both look forward to the sessions, even though she sometimes tries to get me to go to bed after 1/2 an hour.

Tomorrow I'm planning on using Dick Sutphen's self-hypnosis CD "Healing Force" during the session. I'm figuring the Reiki will relax her so that she's especially open to the healing suggestions.

My huge worry is the not eating thing. She tries to make herself eat, but I am stretched to get her to eat even 1,000 calories per day. She's lost 5 pounds this month, and this can't go on. If the cancer doesn't get her, malnutrition may. I do give her a whey protein, flax and fish oil, berry shake that has vitamin powder in it, but really things are soooo difficult. The only time she eats is if I remind her. I can't even remember to get her to eat more than 4 times a day, if 3, so this is a big problem.

I hope the Reiki will eventually help with that too, since it is working to heal her on all levels.

The Reiki Sessions - My Mom and Pancreatic Cancer. Diary No.1

April 30, 2008

I've been doing Reiki on my mother, who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer during a stomach surgery, nearly ever day since March 18, the day of her surgery. First, I did it for hours at a time for the week she was in the ICU. After she was transferred to a regular room, I did it every day, but one day I did it for 3 hours straight.

That in itself was interesting because I noticed that the Reiki energy itself ebbed and flowed. When I give a 1 or 1 1/2 hour session, it flows strongly the whole time. She's been home for nearly a month, and I now give her nightly one hour sessions. I try to get an hour in every night, but lately I've become exhausted, so this past week I did 2 half hour sessions instead. The day I was really exhausted and didn't do it all, I didn't like the gastrointestinal symptoms she had when she woke up.

My Preparation
To prepare my mom to relax and make the environment a healing one, I light a tea light made of a large piece of quartz crystal. The effect is that it looks like a piece of glowing ice on her dresser. Sometimes I add aromatherapy elements, such as frankincense (which, along with lavender, was recommended at a Reiki workshop I attended a few years ago). My mom, though she's 84, especially likes Patchouli, so sometimes I use that alone, or with ylang ylang *(these are heat diffusers - drops of essential oil in water, heated by a tea light below. No irritating smoke involved). Then I darken the room, and put on a Reiki or meditation CD. I often also massage her legs and arms with aromatherapy massage oil, since her skin is now especially dry. It also relaxes her, another immune boost.

I then call Dr. Usui, Mrs. Takata, and Dr. Hayashi along with the other ascended Reiki Masters, along with Jesus, Mary, the Buddha and anybody else who occurs to me that night, giving thanks in a advance for the blessings received.

Since I'm sitting in a small downstairs room next to her bed, I don't usually do all the hand positions. It's awkward to stand up leaning against the bed, and sitting down I often can't reach. So, what I do is when she has some rib pain, I put my hands there, or I put them on her abdomen or hip. Sometimes I end up placing one hand on a thigh or knee and the other on a hip. I have the feeling that when I'm going that's balancing the chakra system more than just 1 hand position.

the session
I often envision the Reiki lighting up her whole abdomen, energizing the normal cells and weakening or dissolving the malignant ones. I do this acknowledging that Reiki has its own intelligence, but just for my own self, I want to direct some of it there, and then the rest of the Reiki can go where wants.

What these nightly sessions have turned into has been this incredibly intimate series of conversations between me and my mother. Many times she talks about her childhood, sharing information or thoughts I've never heard from her before, or some emotional issue that she's also never spoken about before.

Last Night's Session
Last night, we talked about her family, and she told me that when she first came home from the hospital in early April she would see her whole family in the room with us, up in the corner (she's the only one remaining from her nuclear family). She NEVER said a word about this to me before last night.

I also had gotten some information that the emotional component of my mother's dis-ease had to do with an inability to communicate effectively at times, in addition to an unconscious, but intense, tendency to worry all of the time. So, it's been interesting to see if she can recognize these elements, and heal that part of her. I don't push this or try to analyze her. I'm not a psychologist, and she doesn't like the kind of prying that that would take anyway.

The issues come up anyway. Last night she was talking about how her mother talked non-stop (and her father always had patience with that, telling the kids "just let her talk, she'll be alright," but really it was her father who didn't talk all that much, and didn't express his feelings very well either. Typical WASPY thing. My grandfather was an extremely kind and gentle man. He died when I was 11, but I always remember his kindness, and yes, his quietness. Since my own father was a rage-aholic, it was quite a relief to be around a man who was quiet, settled, and kind. His daughters all idolized him for that. Last night my mother told me she thought he was a philosopher. She also talked generally about how, yes, sometimes it is difficult for her to communicate because nobody really ever taught her how to do so.

The night before she came up with something from childhood. Her neighbor up the hill had a mother who wasn't too well, and they were talking about putting her in a nursing home. She never found out what happened in the end. I asked her why she often thought of her childhood during these sessions, when she really doesn't talk about it much otherwise, and she replied that she thought her life was more fun and interesting than it is today. She also loved to ride her bike everywhere, and loved to take her baby sister out in the stroller, thinking aloud that today she would never let a small child wheel around an infant like her mother had with her. That whole reminiscence was very sweet, and I thought of what life must have been like in Westchester County in the 1920s.

Every night
I make sure that I always do a Reiki session every night because of 1 experience I had the week before last. This winter my mother's health problems started with a bout of bleeding diverticulitis, which sent her to the hospital for the first time in 40 years, and the second time in her life. The ONE night I missed because, again, I was too tired, she had some bad digestive symptoms pointing to the diverticulitis. So, now I never miss, even if we're not too focused, or whether my mother feels like talking the whole time. Getting that energy into her system has been vital.

And it heals her on many levels. My friend and Reiki Master, Pauline, now comes over once a week to do vortex healing on her (see thiswebsite for more information). She's a medical intuitive as well, and says she can tell that my mother's had lots of Reiki - just from her energy level and the way her energy system feels when she works on her.

Outside validation is great.

My "inside" validation is that on the days that she's having a bit of pain in her side, if I give her oxycodone and do the Reiki, it takes care of it for the rest of the day. If it's acute, and I do Reiki, it takes a half an hour to start to show that it's working, but the Reiki definitely calms things down.

Next report tomorrow.

Pancreatic Cancer, My Mother, and Reiki

When I started this little blog, I never imagined for a minute that I would be putting anything in it but Reiki Master student stories. I had stopped writing for a while because I was trying to finish up a doctoral degree. I'm still doing that, but my mother, for whom I am the caregiver, got very sick this winter with a blockage in her stomach, After surgery to connect another part of her intestine to her stomach so it could empty, the surgeons determined the blockage was caused by an inoperable tumor wrapped around a blood vessel - coming out of her pancreas. So, now our family joins 30,000 others in facing this disease, which does not have a good cure rate.

Cancer. Shit.

My mother's sister, who I mentioned in the previous post, died just days before my mom got out of the hospital. That was another tragedy.

My mom nearly didn't make it out of her surgery alive either - she spent over a week in ICU. I probably would have had a nervous breakdown if she hadn't survived. Not only do I take care of her (before now it was minimal, just making sure she could stay in her house), but she's really my best friend.

What I did do for hours on end while she was in the hospital was give her Reiki. One day, I did it for 3 hours straight. I found that it doesn't come out as strongly for the entire 3 hours as it does for an hour session.

I also had Pauline, my Reiki Master, come in and do vortex healing on her at one point, when she was still extremely weak after ICU. That's going to be the next class I take after this one.

My mother has now been home from the hospital for 3 weeks. She's getting much stronger and able to be in the house by herself for a few hours at a time, even though sometimes she's really tired as well.

At the same time, I've been researching treatment options (the doctors and social workers at the hospital were so depressing about the whole thing, so I decided to check out things myself - you have to be your own advocate in the health system). I found a new radiation technique called the cyberknife, which is based on missile technology and delivers radiation with such pinpoint accuracy that it doesn't really damage the surrounding tissues. My best friend from high school coincidentally had it done a few months ago and had no side effects at all. We're having that procedure done at Winthrop Hospital the second week in May. Three shots and you're done.

I've also been researching complimentary and nutritional approaches, including the Budwig protocol (based on flaxseed oil and cottage cheese), resveratrol, tumeric, Maitake mushroom D fraction, quercetin, etc. All of those can be used together with the radiation. Some, like tumeric, have been shown to make the chemo she may try, gemcitabine, work better.

I advocate using both. Chemo hasn't been so successful with this cancer, but this isn't a very strong agent, so we'll give it a try.

Cancer patients also have emotional issues that have suppressed their immune systems, so we're working on that too.

The big problem so far is her appetite. She went from sick but eating to feeling better and refusing to eat. Even though many pancreatic cancer patients lose their appetites, I am convinced that the surgery did nerve damage to the stomach - it's one thing to not be hungry, but it's another to feel super full after 3 bites. I'm going to get her to an acupuncturist to work on that as well as the cancer issue.

I also have been doing relaxation with her, and nightly Reiki sessions. Those sessions have been interesting on a number of levels, from the nature of our interactions, which often are very loving, to the sensations and intuitions I get while giving the treatments. I try to do an hour a night, but lately I've become a little rundown, so sometimes we only do a half an hour. But in any case, I'm religious about not missing a night. I did miss one the other day, and she woke up with symptoms of diverticulitis that she hasn't had since February. So, I have my proof of how important daily sessions are.

In the case of cancer, there are so many levels to address that I'm not sure what is being healed. I haven't seen a miracle yet, but that doesn't mean I won't. I do know that on the nights when she's got a little pain in her side the Reiki helps the oxycodone work better. She hasn't had any pain at all for the last 5 days, which I attribute to the vortex healing sessions.

So, this journal is going to be my account of nightly Reiki sessions and other aspects of my journey with my mother through her pancreatic cancer. It will literally be a journal of this Reiki experience.

I am both sad that my mom will be leaving me sooner than we both had anticipated, (but how much sooner I don't know - people have already told me about friends and relatives with the disease who are unexpectedly still here 3 or 4 years later), but I'm honored to be able to help her on her healing journey.

Tomorrow night I'll begin the reports on the sessions.

How My Aunt Got Scared Off by a Success Story

I have an aunt who has terminal melanoma, and probably only has a few more months to live. To make matters worse, my uncle is also declining rapidly with dementia, which makes him a burden instead of a help for my dying aunt.

Also, since she lives in another state and it's difficult to get to her from where I live, we haven't seen the family much in the 15 or so years since they moved. However, I had to get my 84 year-old mother to see her only remaining sibling, probably for the last time, and I was also looking forward to assisting her a bit with a Reiki treatment.

Since I'm studying to be a Reiki Master now, and have had a significant increase in the energy coming through me, I really wanted to give my aunt a treatment, especially since she's starting to be in a lot of pain (she also has severe rheumatoid arthritis, and had to discontinue that medication since it suppresses the immmune system. At times she can't tell which is giving her the pain, the arthritis or the cancer).

I had been sending Reiki to her long distance, with the instruction that if she didn't want it that it go to someone else who did.

Since this family is not at all versed on any kind of energy healing or alternative medicine, I had to ease my way in slowly. On the third morning of the visit, I broached the subject by telling her that I knew a Japanese laying on of hands technique that was good for pain management. She seemed interested, and open to it, so I planned to do some Reiki on her after dinner

So, I brought it up again during dinner. This time I used the word "Reiki" while the whole family was there. My cousin, who has his own problems with a leg injury while trying to care for his two parents, immediately brightened up.

He proceeded to explain that while he had been working assembling lasers in an old job in Texas, he had gotten a bad case of carpal tunnel syndrome. The doctors could do nothing. However, he had a friend who was a Reiki Master. She simply asked him to hold his hands up in front of him, palms facing her. She put her hands up to his, a couple of inches away, and kept them there for a few minutes.

My cousin proceeded to explain that his entire arm suddenly went numb, and he was having a hard time absorbing what was happening to him. His friend told him that he was the most receptive person she had ever given Reiki to. My cousin's carpal tunnel syndrome was healed immediately, and the pain never returned after that.

You would think that with such a great success story my aunt would have been very receptive to a treatment. However, my cousin added one more element to the story that scared her off.

His Reiki Master friend was sick for 3 days after treating my cousin. It sounded like she had absorbed my cousin's pain on his behalf and was processing it.

I explained that that's more of a shamanic thing to do, and that Reiki as a healing modality is the only one that doesn't drain your own energy to do the healing, since the energy is passing through you instead of coming from you, and that she wasn't doing Reiki by absorbing that energy.

I thought I had explained myself sufficiently, so I proceeded to get up and move my chair over to my aunt, who could have really used receiving the Reiki in her upper back and neck, since that's where the melanoma has invaded the bone.

But when I approached her she cringed and said, "stay away from me."

I thought she hadn't overcome her closed-mindedness about this, but two friends who heard the story provided what seems to be a more accurate observation. She probably thought I would absorb her cancer, given my cousin's story.

How sad. I felt as if I had to suspend sending the Reiki too, since she rejected it.

We as Reiki practitioners sometimes may become so emotionally involved in our work that we want to remove the pain from other people. This is human and natural. However, as you can see, it can not only be detrimental to our own health, but we don't know how people who hear these stories will process them. This is not what we want to promote.

I have been very careful to be aware of only channeling the Reiki energy while I give Reiki to people. The person's spirit is then in charge of using it. I have had personal experiences trying to help people in other ways and have become drained by it. So, from experience I know to keep my boundaries in tact when trying to help anyone in any way, including giving them a Reiki treatment.

I'm not passing judgment on anyone who has any desire to lift the pain from someone else, and does so, even unconsciously. I totally respect anyone who would go that far in a shamanistic tradition as well.

However, once you start absorbing the other person's pain, you've started to do something other than Reiki. Our clients may not be best served by us communicating what happens to us as a result.

Articles on Reiki from PubMed

The National Institutes of Health has a National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine. Lots of people are always looking for references to use in Reiki classes to show that Reiki isn't all "woo woo" (or perhaps even voodoo?). I thought I'd share the sources that the Center came up with when its staff used Pub Med. You can go to more information from that site here.

Barnes PM, Powell-Griner E, McFann K, Nahin RL. Complementary and alternative medicine use among adults: United States, 2002. CDC Advance Report #343. 2004.

Chu DA. Tai chi, qi gong and Reiki. Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation Clinics of North America. 2004;15(4):774-781.

DiNucci EM. Energy healing: a complementary treatment for orthopaedic and other conditions. Orthopaedic Nursing. 2005;24(4):259-269.

Engebretson J, Wardell DW. Experience of a Reiki session. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine. 2002;8(2):48-53.

Healing touch: hands-on help for the heart? Touch therapies are reaching growing numbers of patients. Harvard Heart Letter. 2005;16(2):3.

LaTorre MA. The use of Reiki in psychotherapy. Perspectives in Psychiatric Care. 2005;41(4):184-187.

Miles P, True G. Reiki-review of a biofield therapy history, theory, practice, and research. Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine. 2003;9(2):62-72.

National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Expanding Horizons of Health Care: Strategic Plan 2005-2009. Bethesda, MD: National Institutes of Health; 2005. NIH publication no. 04-5568.

Nield-Anderson L, Ameling A. Reiki: a complementary therapy for nursing practice. Journal of Psychosocial Nursing and Mental Health Services. 2001; 39(4):42-49.

Reiki. Natural Standard Database Web site. Accessed at http://www.naturalstandard.com on March 30, 2006.

Here are some more that look good as well:

LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF ENERGETIC HEALING ON SYMPTOMS OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DEPRESSION AND SELF-PERCEIVED STRESS. By: Shore, Adina Goldman. Alternative Therapies in Health & Medicine, May/Jun2004, Vol. 10 Issue 3, p42-48, 7p; (AN 13123196)

In Vitro Effect of Reiki Treatment on Bacterial Cultures: Role of Experimental Context and Practitioner Well-Being. By: Rubik, Beverly; Brooks, Audrey J.; Schwartz, Gary E.. Journal of Alternative & Complementary Medicine, Jan/Feb2006, Vol. 12 Issue 1, p7-13, 7p; DOI: 10.1089/acm.2006.12.7; (AN 19859455)

Using Reiki to Decrease Memory and Behavior Problems in Mild Cognitive Impairment and Mild Alzheimer’s Disease. STEPHEN E. CRAWFORD, M.Sc.,1 V. WAYNE LEAVER, Ph.D.2 and SANDRA D. MAHONEY, Ph.D. THE JOURNAL OF ALTERNATIVE AND COMPLEMENTARY MEDICINE
Volume 12, Number 9, 2006, pp. 911–913

An Integrative Review of Reiki Touch Therapy Research. By: Vitale, Anne. Holistic Nursing Practice, Jul/Aug2007, Vol. 21 Issue 4, p167-179, 13p; (AN 25846572)

I think I am going to get the ones that review other research on Reiki for the purposes of teaching my first class. I'll put up a review after I read them.

Some Reiki Esoterica

I am taking a Reiki Master class from a local woman, Pauline Southard who’s a photographer and psychic as well as a healer (see her website here). It’s so interesting asking her questions because if she doesn’t know the answer, she asks her Reiki guide and then channels it.

So I thought I’d share with you one of the answers to a question I had back in September.

I’m being trained in using the method that William Lee Rand teaches at his International Center for Reiki Training, which uses 2 Tibetan symbols in addition to the Usui ones.

Of course, I was curious about why this came about. Apparently, Rand was working with a couple of psychics when he came up with using these symbols. But that’s not what I wanted to know. I wanted to know what their purpose is, since we’re really getting Western Reiki training, and not just the original Usui training.

This was the response:

First, I was a bit spaced out for the class so my first message was that I need to remember the vital importance of intention when passing an attunement, since passing it to someone is really activated by one’s intention. You always need to say/pray to yourself that you are intending to pass the Reiki attunement or the violet fire to the person.

OK, so getting to the meat, the Tibetan DKM is less literal and more related to the non-linear, instinctual part of our energy system. It’s Sanscrit-based, and Sanscrit is really based in the male/female, active/passive, stop/go binary oppositions in duality, and in quantum states and it can get into the more primitive part of people’s brains, which is tied to our energetic connection to the universe, energy, and matter. In quantum states there are no halves, only wholes, and so there are whole jumps between levels.

The origins of the symbols were in Lemuria, and are preverbal. Some of the famous cave paintings in France have rudiments of the symbols.

This tells me that the capacity to send energy healing is really an ancient ability that we have lost track of, and that even though people today can indeed send healing energy, our true potential for energetic healing - which we always remember is just activating that capacity in the person who is in need of a healing - is really being re-activated by Reiki and other energy healing modalities.