#“but liz” you say “this is just typical depression symptoms”

[tunaababee]

.

[oveliagirlhaditright]

Hey, well again it's been a looooooong time since we last talked, how have you been (I certainly hope you're better from your illness by now)? I hope you''re having a good Halloween so far, are you watching any Halloween related movies/TV show episodes/specials?

Hey, anon! How have you been? It HAS been forever! Thanks for checking in! I hope you've been well!

And I'm still dealing with a lot of the stuff and trying to figure it all out. In some ways, I think I might be a bit better. But then there are moments where some of the symptoms are worse? Like my arm shaking crazily--and seeming pretty seizure-y, that it wasn't doing before?--and now I'm trying to figure out if they are seizures instead of tremors, and it's all getting to the point where it's just kind of stressing me out and I'm sick of it all at this point.

Not to get too depressing here, or to bore you with too much information with me! But I'm hanging in there and trying to power through. And thank you so much for caring enough to ask:)

I was watching a lot of Halloween baking shows with my sister, and that was a lot of fun. LOL. Other than that, I just rewatched the first two Halloween episodes of Buffy and the Dark Angel one. I meant to get to the Smallville ones, but didn't. And for some reason, I decided to rewatch the Roswell episode "The End of the World" on Halloween... which is not a Halloween episode or really Halloween-y at all. But maybe if you squint you can see the supernatural element of Future Max that way a bit. Especially since Liz is freaking out when he first shows up. But that's a big stretch, I know. LOL. What can I say? I don’t really like to be scared, so don’t watch typical Halloween things.

What about you?:)

[krisiunicornio]

A volunteer yoga program at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego is bettering the lives of its oncology kids.

Aimee DeLuna practice yoga in her hospital bed. 

The cornflower-blue sleeper sofa. The formica closet. The tea cart clanking by. Jaymee Jiao will never forget the eight months she spent living in this hospital room with her son Savior-Makani Jiao as he underwent around-the-clock treatment for acute myeloid leukemia. But today, the rambunctious two-and-a-half-year-old is in remission, and he’s arrived at his former bedroom at San Diego’s Rady Children’s Hospital in a red plastic Radio Flyer. “I had to buckle him in because he was going crazy downstairs,” Jiao says when we meet, exhaling. It’s true: Right now, Savior’s energy could fuel a turbine. The familiar nurses who pass by gush over his vivacity and thick, wavy tuft of black hair. You’d never guess that just last year he was undergoing chemotherapy full time.

Five months post-discharge, Jiao is settling into life back at home with her husband and four children, of whom Savior is the youngest. She is visibly tired, yet cheerful. Atop her left shoulder is a large, tight lump, and she points it out, pulling on it as if it might loosen and slip off. “I carry my stress physically,” she says with a shrug.

Also in Savior’s old hospital room is volunteer yoga teacher Liz Fautsch, a smiling brunette who worked weekly with Jiao to ease tension and stress while she was holed up at Rady. “Your shoulder is looking better!” Fautsch encourages. Jiao nods. “Yoga helped relieve my shoulder and back pain,” she tells me. “And,” she says, lowering her voice a little, “it would take my mind off things when we were having a bad day.” But between school drop-offs and shuttling her kids to sports practice and chasing Savior around the house, Jiao admittedly hasn’t kept up a regular yoga routine since she lived in this room.

See also Building a Strong Foundation for Cancer Healing

JAYMEEundefinedJIAO with her son, Savior-Makani Jiao in their former hospital room at Rady Children's in San Diego.

The yoga program for cancer patients and their families here at Rady is powered by volunteers from the Sean O’Shea Foundation—a nonprofit organization that aims to empower youth through yoga, mindfulness, and optimistic teachings. It was founded by Gloria O’Shea to honor her late son Sean, a children’s yoga teacher who died in a fluke car crash in 2006. He was 32. While the foundation has been running programs for San Diego kids and teens since 2008, it partnered with Rady in 2011 to harness the research-backed benefits of yoga for kids undergoing cancer treatment and their families. Volunteer yoga teachers such as Fautsch, many of whom are health care professionals and specialize in yoga for cancer recovery, visit the hospital’s oncology unit three days a week, going bed to bed to offer individualized sessions to whoever’s in the room—be it patients, parents, or friendly visitors. Sessions typically last about 30 minutes and range from pranayama and meditation in bed to asana on colorful mats carried in on carts by volunteers.

“When the yoga instructors would come by, my eyes would blink little hearts,” says Jessica Davidson, whose 10-year-old daughter, Julia Davidson, spent two years at Rady battling stage four neuroblastoma. Today, after undergoing surgical tumor removal and six rounds of frontline chemotherapy followed by immunotherapy—plus plenty of yoga and bedside dance parties (’80s and ’90s music were the jams)—Julia is precocious and thriving in remission. She still dances and practices yoga regularly, and tells me, “It’s really calming and good for the human body, so I recommend it.”

Chemotherapy and other cancer treatments like radiation are notoriously volatile and can slow growth in children. The most common side effects apart from hair loss include nausea and vomiting, trouble breathing, nerve damage (neuropathy), and a weakened immune system. While a growing body of research from the past two decades supports yoga’s ability to reduce symptoms and stress and improve mood and overall quality of life in cancer patients, yoga and physical therapist Kelli Bethel, the director of yoga therapy at the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Center for Integrative Medicine, says customized practices tailored to each patient, like those at Rady, work best in real-life scenarios. In a health-research setting, however, proving yoga’s absolute potential through standardized clinical trials is nearly impossible: “Everyone’s cancer journey is different and their needs and symptoms vary,” she says. “It’s one thing to understand which methods of yoga apply to cancer patients, but having everyone follow a script—this pose, this exercise—that will never accurately demonstrate the full benefits.”

Pediatric research is also hard to come by, but according to a 2019 clinical feasibility study that examined the impact of yoga on pediatric outpatients receiving chemotherapy, the results of two recent pilot studies show that individualized yoga programs improved quality of life for adolescents receiving cancer treatment. Ultimately, the authors called for further investigation. To date, much of the evidence for yoga’s treatment benefits comes from breast cancer clinical trials, says Bethel.

To that end, Julia Fukuhara was working as a nurse and volunteer yoga instructor at Rady in 2013 when she realized her unique potential as a data collector. “We have some research that shows how imperative integrative medicine is for adults and for kids, but to actually see it frontline was mind blowing,” she says. Kids could sleep better afterward. They were less anxious. Oftentimes they required less pain- or anti-nausea medication.

When making their yoga rounds, Fukuhara and the other teachers on the ward kept detailed notebooks with dated entries describing patient conditions, applied yoga exercises, and outcomes. “We already had all this documentation in place, so we thought, let’s see if we can numerically capture this data with some kind of pain, anxiety, and quality-of-life measure,” she says. What ensued was a six-month study of 32 kids and their families who were surveyed before and after yoga sessions. The results will hopefully be published in the coming months, and Fukuhara is excited to report that she saw significant positive change.

See also This is How One Yogi Doctor Used Ayurveda to Treat His Own Cancer

Ten-year-old Julia Davidson keeps up with her yoga practice while in remission from neuroblastoma.

Common chemo drugs are known to depress the nervous system, says Fukuhara. For the kids she worked with at Rady, this often manifested as trouble breathing, balancing, and focusing—and eventually irreversible neuropathy and numbness in fingers and toes. During her study, which she co-authored with pediatric oncology nurse practitioner Jeanie Spies, Fukuhara found that stimulating power poses such as Virabhadrasanas (Warrior Poses) and Vrksasana (Tree Pose) fired up her patients’ nerves, making them resistant to the negative side effects of their medications. “It’s like we were enhancing the nervous system,” she says.

Spies is the founder of the integrative medicine program at Rady and coordinator of the yoga initiative. Her warm red hair feels like an extension of her personality: She geeks out over things like bone marrow biopsies and witnessing a patient’s first steps (she beamed recounting Savior’s as he bounced around the room). Spies says that what surprised her most was the profound effect the yoga sessions had on parents, like Jiao, who face sleepless nights marked by constant worry and interruptions from hospital staff. “We turn their lives upside down with the diagnosis of cancer,” Spies says. “The beauty of the yoga here is that it gives them a sense of relaxation and control, even if it’s only for 10 minutes.”

Ping Cao has a petite, fragile-looking frame—but don’t be fooled. The lines on her soft, worn face, like the glossy black hair she wears in a tight pixie cut, are evidence of her perseverance. The Chinese immigrant is a volunteer yoga teacher with the O’Shea Foundation who recently finished treatment for breast cancer. Yoga and, in particular, Sama Vritti Pranayama—a technique in which you breath and hold to counts of four—helped Cao mitigate fatigue and nausea while she was undergoing chemotherapy and radiation. The strength she’s derived from the practice and from the support of other cancer survivors is what she says led her to start volunteering at Rady.

See also Dharma Talk: Yoga by the Throat

AIMEE DE LUNA practices yoga with breast cancer survivor Ping Cao during treatment.

Research shows that yogic exercises as simple as pranayama (controlled breathing) can stimulate the immune system, and Cao begins most of her sessions in the pediatric oncology unit this way. Today she sits in a little teal chair beside 17-year old Aimee De Luna’s hospital bed. Four weeks earlier, De Luna, a high school senior, was prom-dress shopping at the mall with her mom when she fainted in the checkout line. Her pediatrician suspected anemia, but blood tests revealed leukemia. As an outpatient, she and her parents make the 1.5-hour drive from their home most days so Aimee can get chemotherapy. Today she smiles, eyes closed, sitting up still in her hospital gown, a gray beanie atop her head, as Cao guides her through a bedside meditation and stretching exercise. They’ve been practicing together like this for about three weeks now.

“The first time she asked me if I wanted to do it, I was a hard No,” De Luna laughs. “But by the third time, I was feeling a lot better and was up for the challenge.” She likes Cao’s “relaxing vibe” and calls their sessions “a fun little escape from chemotherapy and needles and all that bad stuff.” She’s come to look forward to it—it’s relaxing, the stretching feels good, and she enjoys spending time with Cao, who not too long ago was in De Luna’s shoes.

“I’m in a unique position,” Cao says. “When I walk into a room, I can see it in the kids: They are in pain, or they are experiencing something uncomfortable from their treatment, or they are scared. And I can feel it in the parents, too. But I can say, ‘Here I am. I had the same experience. I felt all these difficulties physically, emotionally, too, and I did yoga. It helped. And today, I’m still surviving, and you will, too.’”  

[cedarrrun]

A volunteer yoga program at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego is bettering the lives of its oncology kids.

Aimee DeLuna practice yoga in her hospital bed. 

The cornflower-blue sleeper sofa. The formica closet. The tea cart clanking by. Jaymee Jiao will never forget the eight months she spent living in this hospital room with her son Savior-Makani Jiao as he underwent around-the-clock treatment for acute myeloid leukemia. But today, the rambunctious two-and-a-half-year-old is in remission, and he’s arrived at his former bedroom at San Diego’s Rady Children’s Hospital in a red plastic Radio Flyer. “I had to buckle him in because he was going crazy downstairs,” Jiao says when we meet, exhaling. It’s true: Right now, Savior’s energy could fuel a turbine. The familiar nurses who pass by gush over his vivacity and thick, wavy tuft of black hair. You’d never guess that just last year he was undergoing chemotherapy full time.

Five months post-discharge, Jiao is settling into life back at home with her husband and four children, of whom Savior is the youngest. She is visibly tired, yet cheerful. Atop her left shoulder is a large, tight lump, and she points it out, pulling on it as if it might loosen and slip off. “I carry my stress physically,” she says with a shrug.

Also in Savior’s old hospital room is volunteer yoga teacher Liz Fautsch, a smiling brunette who worked weekly with Jiao to ease tension and stress while she was holed up at Rady. “Your shoulder is looking better!” Fautsch encourages. Jiao nods. “Yoga helped relieve my shoulder and back pain,” she tells me. “And,” she says, lowering her voice a little, “it would take my mind off things when we were having a bad day.” But between school drop-offs and shuttling her kids to sports practice and chasing Savior around the house, Jiao admittedly hasn’t kept up a regular yoga routine since she lived in this room.

See also Building a Strong Foundation for Cancer Healing

JAYMEEundefinedJIAO with her son, Savior-Makani Jiao in their former hospital room at Rady Children's in San Diego.

The yoga program for cancer patients and their families here at Rady is powered by volunteers from the Sean O’Shea Foundation—a nonprofit organization that aims to empower youth through yoga, mindfulness, and optimistic teachings. It was founded by Gloria O’Shea to honor her late son Sean, a children’s yoga teacher who died in a fluke car crash in 2006. He was 32. While the foundation has been running programs for San Diego kids and teens since 2008, it partnered with Rady in 2011 to harness the research-backed benefits of yoga for kids undergoing cancer treatment and their families. Volunteer yoga teachers such as Fautsch, many of whom are health care professionals and specialize in yoga for cancer recovery, visit the hospital’s oncology unit three days a week, going bed to bed to offer individualized sessions to whoever’s in the room—be it patients, parents, or friendly visitors. Sessions typically last about 30 minutes and range from pranayama and meditation in bed to asana on colorful mats carried in on carts by volunteers.

“When the yoga instructors would come by, my eyes would blink little hearts,” says Jessica Davidson, whose 10-year-old daughter, Julia Davidson, spent two years at Rady battling stage four neuroblastoma. Today, after undergoing surgical tumor removal and six rounds of frontline chemotherapy followed by immunotherapy—plus plenty of yoga and bedside dance parties (’80s and ’90s music were the jams)—Julia is precocious and thriving in remission. She still dances and practices yoga regularly, and tells me, “It’s really calming and good for the human body, so I recommend it.”

Chemotherapy and other cancer treatments like radiation are notoriously volatile and can slow growth in children. The most common side effects apart from hair loss include nausea and vomiting, trouble breathing, nerve damage (neuropathy), and a weakened immune system. While a growing body of research from the past two decades supports yoga’s ability to reduce symptoms and stress and improve mood and overall quality of life in cancer patients, yoga and physical therapist Kelli Bethel, the director of yoga therapy at the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Center for Integrative Medicine, says customized practices tailored to each patient, like those at Rady, work best in real-life scenarios. In a health-research setting, however, proving yoga’s absolute potential through standardized clinical trials is nearly impossible: “Everyone’s cancer journey is different and their needs and symptoms vary,” she says. “It’s one thing to understand which methods of yoga apply to cancer patients, but having everyone follow a script—this pose, this exercise—that will never accurately demonstrate the full benefits.”

Pediatric research is also hard to come by, but according to a 2019 clinical feasibility study that examined the impact of yoga on pediatric outpatients receiving chemotherapy, the results of two recent pilot studies show that individualized yoga programs improved quality of life for adolescents receiving cancer treatment. Ultimately, the authors called for further investigation. To date, much of the evidence for yoga’s treatment benefits comes from breast cancer clinical trials, says Bethel.

To that end, Julia Fukuhara was working as a nurse and volunteer yoga instructor at Rady in 2013 when she realized her unique potential as a data collector. “We have some research that shows how imperative integrative medicine is for adults and for kids, but to actually see it frontline was mind blowing,” she says. Kids could sleep better afterward. They were less anxious. Oftentimes they required less pain- or anti-nausea medication.

When making their yoga rounds, Fukuhara and the other teachers on the ward kept detailed notebooks with dated entries describing patient conditions, applied yoga exercises, and outcomes. “We already had all this documentation in place, so we thought, let’s see if we can numerically capture this data with some kind of pain, anxiety, and quality-of-life measure,” she says. What ensued was a six-month study of 32 kids and their families who were surveyed before and after yoga sessions. The results will hopefully be published in the coming months, and Fukuhara is excited to report that she saw significant positive change.

See also This is How One Yogi Doctor Used Ayurveda to Treat His Own Cancer

Ten-year-old Julia Davidson keeps up with her yoga practice while in remission from neuroblastoma.

Common chemo drugs are known to depress the nervous system, says Fukuhara. For the kids she worked with at Rady, this often manifested as trouble breathing, balancing, and focusing—and eventually irreversible neuropathy and numbness in fingers and toes. During her study, which she co-authored with pediatric oncology nurse practitioner Jeanie Spies, Fukuhara found that stimulating power poses such as Virabhadrasanas (Warrior Poses) and Vrksasana (Tree Pose) fired up her patients’ nerves, making them resistant to the negative side effects of their medications. “It’s like we were enhancing the nervous system,” she says.

Spies is the founder of the integrative medicine program at Rady and coordinator of the yoga initiative. Her warm red hair feels like an extension of her personality: She geeks out over things like bone marrow biopsies and witnessing a patient’s first steps (she beamed recounting Savior’s as he bounced around the room). Spies says that what surprised her most was the profound effect the yoga sessions had on parents, like Jiao, who face sleepless nights marked by constant worry and interruptions from hospital staff. “We turn their lives upside down with the diagnosis of cancer,” Spies says. “The beauty of the yoga here is that it gives them a sense of relaxation and control, even if it’s only for 10 minutes.”

Ping Cao has a petite, fragile-looking frame—but don’t be fooled. The lines on her soft, worn face, like the glossy black hair she wears in a tight pixie cut, are evidence of her perseverance. The Chinese immigrant is a volunteer yoga teacher with the O’Shea Foundation who recently finished treatment for breast cancer. Yoga and, in particular, Sama Vritti Pranayama—a technique in which you breath and hold to counts of four—helped Cao mitigate fatigue and nausea while she was undergoing chemotherapy and radiation. The strength she’s derived from the practice and from the support of other cancer survivors is what she says led her to start volunteering at Rady.

See also Dharma Talk: Yoga by the Throat

AIMEE DE LUNA practices yoga with breast cancer survivor Ping Cao during treatment.

Research shows that yogic exercises as simple as pranayama (controlled breathing) can stimulate the immune system, and Cao begins most of her sessions in the pediatric oncology unit this way. Today she sits in a little teal chair beside 17-year old Aimee De Luna’s hospital bed. Four weeks earlier, De Luna, a high school senior, was prom-dress shopping at the mall with her mom when she fainted in the checkout line. Her pediatrician suspected anemia, but blood tests revealed leukemia. As an outpatient, she and her parents make the 1.5-hour drive from their home most days so Aimee can get chemotherapy. Today she smiles, eyes closed, sitting up still in her hospital gown, a gray beanie atop her head, as Cao guides her through a bedside meditation and stretching exercise. They’ve been practicing together like this for about three weeks now.

“The first time she asked me if I wanted to do it, I was a hard No,” De Luna laughs. “But by the third time, I was feeling a lot better and was up for the challenge.” She likes Cao’s “relaxing vibe” and calls their sessions “a fun little escape from chemotherapy and needles and all that bad stuff.” She’s come to look forward to it—it’s relaxing, the stretching feels good, and she enjoys spending time with Cao, who not too long ago was in De Luna’s shoes.

“I’m in a unique position,” Cao says. “When I walk into a room, I can see it in the kids: They are in pain, or they are experiencing something uncomfortable from their treatment, or they are scared. And I can feel it in the parents, too. But I can say, ‘Here I am. I had the same experience. I felt all these difficulties physically, emotionally, too, and I did yoga. It helped. And today, I’m still surviving, and you will, too.’”  

[amyddaniels]

How Yoga Is Helping Kids with Cancer

A volunteer yoga program at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego is bettering the lives of its oncology kids.

Aimee DeLuna practice yoga in her hospital bed. 

The cornflower-blue sleeper sofa. The formica closet. The tea cart clanking by. Jaymee Jiao will never forget the eight months she spent living in this hospital room with her son Savior-Makani Jiao as he underwent around-the-clock treatment for acute myeloid leukemia. But today, the rambunctious two-and-a-half-year-old is in remission, and he’s arrived at his former bedroom at San Diego’s Rady Children’s Hospital in a red plastic Radio Flyer. “I had to buckle him in because he was going crazy downstairs,” Jiao says when we meet, exhaling. It’s true: Right now, Savior’s energy could fuel a turbine. The familiar nurses who pass by gush over his vivacity and thick, wavy tuft of black hair. You’d never guess that just last year he was undergoing chemotherapy full time.

Five months post-discharge, Jiao is settling into life back at home with her husband and four children, of whom Savior is the youngest. She is visibly tired, yet cheerful. Atop her left shoulder is a large, tight lump, and she points it out, pulling on it as if it might loosen and slip off. “I carry my stress physically,” she says with a shrug.

Also in Savior’s old hospital room is volunteer yoga teacher Liz Fautsch, a smiling brunette who worked weekly with Jiao to ease tension and stress while she was holed up at Rady. “Your shoulder is looking better!” Fautsch encourages. Jiao nods. “Yoga helped relieve my shoulder and back pain,” she tells me. “And,” she says, lowering her voice a little, “it would take my mind off things when we were having a bad day.” But between school drop-offs and shuttling her kids to sports practice and chasing Savior around the house, Jiao admittedly hasn’t kept up a regular yoga routine since she lived in this room.

See also Building a Strong Foundation for Cancer Healing

JAYMEEundefinedJIAO with her son, Savior-Makani Jiao in their former hospital room at Rady Children's in San Diego.

The yoga program for cancer patients and their families here at Rady is powered by volunteers from the Sean O’Shea Foundation—a nonprofit organization that aims to empower youth through yoga, mindfulness, and optimistic teachings. It was founded by Gloria O’Shea to honor her late son Sean, a children’s yoga teacher who died in a fluke car crash in 2006. He was 32. While the foundation has been running programs for San Diego kids and teens since 2008, it partnered with Rady in 2011 to harness the research-backed benefits of yoga for kids undergoing cancer treatment and their families. Volunteer yoga teachers such as Fautsch, many of whom are health care professionals and specialize in yoga for cancer recovery, visit the hospital’s oncology unit three days a week, going bed to bed to offer individualized sessions to whoever’s in the room—be it patients, parents, or friendly visitors. Sessions typically last about 30 minutes and range from pranayama and meditation in bed to asana on colorful mats carried in on carts by volunteers.

“When the yoga instructors would come by, my eyes would blink little hearts,” says Jessica Davidson, whose 10-year-old daughter, Julia Davidson, spent two years at Rady battling stage four neuroblastoma. Today, after undergoing surgical tumor removal and six rounds of frontline chemotherapy followed by immunotherapy—plus plenty of yoga and bedside dance parties (’80s and ’90s music were the jams)—Julia is precocious and thriving in remission. She still dances and practices yoga regularly, and tells me, “It’s really calming and good for the human body, so I recommend it.”

Chemotherapy and other cancer treatments like radiation are notoriously volatile and can slow growth in children. The most common side effects apart from hair loss include nausea and vomiting, trouble breathing, nerve damage (neuropathy), and a weakened immune system. While a growing body of research from the past two decades supports yoga’s ability to reduce symptoms and stress and improve mood and overall quality of life in cancer patients, yoga and physical therapist Kelli Bethel, the director of yoga therapy at the University of Maryland School of Medicine’s Center for Integrative Medicine, says customized practices tailored to each patient, like those at Rady, work best in real-life scenarios. In a health-research setting, however, proving yoga’s absolute potential through standardized clinical trials is nearly impossible: “Everyone’s cancer journey is different and their needs and symptoms vary,” she says. “It’s one thing to understand which methods of yoga apply to cancer patients, but having everyone follow a script—this pose, this exercise—that will never accurately demonstrate the full benefits.”

Pediatric research is also hard to come by, but according to a 2019 clinical feasibility study that examined the impact of yoga on pediatric outpatients receiving chemotherapy, the results of two recent pilot studies show that individualized yoga programs improved quality of life for adolescents receiving cancer treatment. Ultimately, the authors called for further investigation. To date, much of the evidence for yoga’s treatment benefits comes from breast cancer clinical trials, says Bethel.

To that end, Julia Fukuhara was working as a nurse and volunteer yoga instructor at Rady in 2013 when she realized her unique potential as a data collector. “We have some research that shows how imperative integrative medicine is for adults and for kids, but to actually see it frontline was mind blowing,” she says. Kids could sleep better afterward. They were less anxious. Oftentimes they required less pain- or anti-nausea medication.

When making their yoga rounds, Fukuhara and the other teachers on the ward kept detailed notebooks with dated entries describing patient conditions, applied yoga exercises, and outcomes. “We already had all this documentation in place, so we thought, let’s see if we can numerically capture this data with some kind of pain, anxiety, and quality-of-life measure,” she says. What ensued was a six-month study of 32 kids and their families who were surveyed before and after yoga sessions. The results will hopefully be published in the coming months, and Fukuhara is excited to report that she saw significant positive change.

See also This is How One Yogi Doctor Used Ayurveda to Treat His Own Cancer

Ten-year-old Julia Davidson keeps up with her yoga practice while in remission from neuroblastoma.

Common chemo drugs are known to depress the nervous system, says Fukuhara. For the kids she worked with at Rady, this often manifested as trouble breathing, balancing, and focusing—and eventually irreversible neuropathy and numbness in fingers and toes. During her study, which she co-authored with pediatric oncology nurse practitioner Jeanie Spies, Fukuhara found that stimulating power poses such as Virabhadrasanas (Warrior Poses) and Vrksasana (Tree Pose) fired up her patients’ nerves, making them resistant to the negative side effects of their medications. “It’s like we were enhancing the nervous system,” she says.

Spies is the founder of the integrative medicine program at Rady and coordinator of the yoga initiative. Her warm red hair feels like an extension of her personality: She geeks out over things like bone marrow biopsies and witnessing a patient’s first steps (she beamed recounting Savior’s as he bounced around the room). Spies says that what surprised her most was the profound effect the yoga sessions had on parents, like Jiao, who face sleepless nights marked by constant worry and interruptions from hospital staff. “We turn their lives upside down with the diagnosis of cancer,” Spies says. “The beauty of the yoga here is that it gives them a sense of relaxation and control, even if it’s only for 10 minutes.”

Ping Cao has a petite, fragile-looking frame—but don’t be fooled. The lines on her soft, worn face, like the glossy black hair she wears in a tight pixie cut, are evidence of her perseverance. The Chinese immigrant is a volunteer yoga teacher with the O’Shea Foundation who recently finished treatment for breast cancer. Yoga and, in particular, Sama Vritti Pranayama—a technique in which you breath and hold to counts of four—helped Cao mitigate fatigue and nausea while she was undergoing chemotherapy and radiation. The strength she’s derived from the practice and from the support of other cancer survivors is what she says led her to start volunteering at Rady.

See also Dharma Talk: Yoga by the Throat

AIMEE DE LUNA practices yoga with breast cancer survivor Ping Cao during treatment.

Research shows that yogic exercises as simple as pranayama (controlled breathing) can stimulate the immune system, and Cao begins most of her sessions in the pediatric oncology unit this way. Today she sits in a little teal chair beside 17-year old Aimee De Luna’s hospital bed. Four weeks earlier, De Luna, a high school senior, was prom-dress shopping at the mall with her mom when she fainted in the checkout line. Her pediatrician suspected anemia, but blood tests revealed leukemia. As an outpatient, she and her parents make the 1.5-hour drive from their home most days so Aimee can get chemotherapy. Today she smiles, eyes closed, sitting up still in her hospital gown, a gray beanie atop her head, as Cao guides her through a bedside meditation and stretching exercise. They’ve been practicing together like this for about three weeks now.

“The first time she asked me if I wanted to do it, I was a hard No,” De Luna laughs. “But by the third time, I was feeling a lot better and was up for the challenge.” She likes Cao’s “relaxing vibe” and calls their sessions “a fun little escape from chemotherapy and needles and all that bad stuff.” She’s come to look forward to it—it’s relaxing, the stretching feels good, and she enjoys spending time with Cao, who not too long ago was in De Luna’s shoes.

“I’m in a unique position,” Cao says. “When I walk into a room, I can see it in the kids: They are in pain, or they are experiencing something uncomfortable from their treatment, or they are scared. And I can feel it in the parents, too. But I can say, ‘Here I am. I had the same experience. I felt all these difficulties physically, emotionally, too, and I did yoga. It helped. And today, I’m still surviving, and you will, too.’”  

[soulinquest]

Major Changes

The past year has been one of the most challenging of my life. In 2013, my girlfriend of 5 1/2 years was killed in a tragic car accident during a winter white-out. I knew at this point, that the way I processed this and moved forward could go in one of two directions - a healthy rebound putting that pain into something positive, or a self-destructive lifestyle.

I spent around 6 months digesting things and just coming to accept what had been done. I was in a daze for a long time, and frankly, don’t really even remember the following month from being in that hospital room. But in that month, I got a bicycle.

I grew up riding bikes, dirtbikes, four-wheelers, mini-bikes, all of that stuff that an ol’ Indiana kid would be into. Cycling was something that my highshool best friend, and still thankfully current best friend despite living on the other side of the world, got me into. We exchanged hobbies - he bought a dirtbike, and I got a mountain bike when I graduated college. I LOVED my new bike - a 2013 Trek Superfly AL Elite. I may write more about my cycling life at another point.

But after my girlfriend’s passing, I ended up with a roadbike that was drastically beyond my abilities that I could grow into - a 2015 Giant Defy Composite 0 with a full electronic Ultegra Di2 component set. We got a killer deal on it, but again, I don’t fully remember the details around the time I got it.

Friends of mine said they could even say they saw it on me. I thankfully never got into a very destructive habit at that point, beyond the anti-anxiety medications that helped me move forward. Those with the combination of stress and PTSD symptoms lead to this blackout period.

From there, I racked up around 5,000 miles over the next few years. I dropped 30lbs. I was in the best shape of my life and happy. I loved that period of my life. I spent so much time biking alone, which was obviously lonely at times, but I loved the freedom and having a hobby as intense as this to spend my money on - roof racks, bike upgrades, kits and gear, and even more bikes.

When that best friend of mine referenced above graduated college and got a job, it ended up being in Florida. This was something tough for me to reconcile with because this guy was my best friend and directly responsible for the most enjoyable trips and adventures I had ever had. We have had ups and downs, together and individually. We grew apart, grew back together, and now have a long distance friendship that allows us to see eachother a few times a year maybe, but the quality of our friendship never changed, and I’m thankful for that. It’s hard to find genuine friends these days to connect with, that have the same interests in you, and that aren’t already married or in a serious relationship of their own which they understandably are putting an enormous amount of time and effort into.

The day my best friend, who I’ll reference to as Arthur (not his real name, but an inside joke between us), left to go to Florida, he stopped by my apartment on his way out for a going away/roommate birthday party. It was one of the best parties I’ve ever been to. I don’t typically love these ragers, but having so many close family and friends and the electricity in the air made it amazing. 

That night, I met up with a girl, who I will refer to as Liz (also not her real name), that went to my high school and I had been one date on. We went out and had an amazing evening together that night as I split from the party some. This eventually turned into a very intense, tight knit relationship that felt like it made my life complete.

The point of this post is to talk about that. My relationship with Liz went strong for a year and a half. We were happy, we did many things, I even got a passport and left the country for my first time. She broke down a lot of barriers in my life, showed me how to be vulnerable, and was nothing but a positive influence that I was so proud to have. We had our issues with communication that I think plagues many relationships, but that didn’t alter my opinion that we had something great.

The truth of it is this though, as this was all going on, I ended up being isolating myself and not allowing myself to be the full person I was or who I wanted to be. I didn’t treat her as well as I wanted to. Not in an abusive way, but I wish I could have made her feel special. The reason that I couldn’t was because I was living somewhat of a double life. One side was a successful young professional with a great salary, friends, hobbies, and seemed to have life figured out. The other side was someone who fell into a trap with opiates that I struggled with for around a year. 

A friend from college who I will refer to as Bill (not his real name), offered me heroin on the first day we moved in together in 2015 or 2016. I was told “hey man, this is just like the vicodins and percocets we have done in the past, it’s fun. Not a big deal. It has a stigma that I think is bullshit but I do it a few times a month maybe now, you should give it a try”. That exact moment is something I wish I could go back and change so bad. I enjoy drugs. I enjoy the experiences and mind altering effects. Opiates were always my favorite. I drew a line for myself at Cocaine and Heroin, knowing that I would probably enjoy either of those TOO much, and would have hard time not falling into the stereotypical story that the “not even one time” campaign refers to. That one time sparked something that I didn’t reconcile or identify for a long time.

I tried it. I loved it. I don’t think anyone could NOT love it. The chemical reactions that it causes in your brain would pretty much keep you from ever not enjoying it. We smoked it. It tasted good, like a roasted marshmallow. I did a small amount with him that night, which turned into a “let’s get more for tomorrow to celebrate our new apartment”. 

This post could go on forever, but I think the direction it’s moving is obvious. A special occasion turned into weekends which turned into weekdays, which turned into every day. I looked forward to it, but the first time we couldn’t get any, I suddenly realized that I had become physically dependent. It became a fun activity to what felt like a necessity that you could place in line with eating food, drinking water, and breathing air. I was a mess without it. Flu symptoms, depression, everything. 

This didn’t last long though. Even though I crossed that bridge, I realized how wrong this was. I substituted this for oxy and vicodin. In comparison, these are much better, but still was not great. It just allowed me to keep functioning.

All during this time, I was dating Liz. She had no idea. At first, all of this second life didn’t feel like a second life. It felt like something that just happened here and there and that I just wasn’t sharing with her. I became so upset with Bill for introducing me and convincing me “It’s not a big deal” and blamed him for so long. But this was a decision I made - I could have said no, walked away, he only offered. So despite Bill still being on that path and us not talking at all anymore, I was still stuck with this habit. 

I remember panicking at times, thinking “What the fuck did I do? How did I get to this place? This isn’t me. Am I going to be able to escape from this? Can I do this on my own? How does this story end?”

From there, I did months of research to quit, recovery help, vitamins and supplements to assist and make it easier to stop to prevent the possibility of a relapse. I was so angry at Bill and never wanted to bring someone else into this world with me. I would do anything I could to tell people to avoid that devil’s powder. I feel that people may be able to enjoy low level opiates on a responsible basis, but I think that the ability to do that with dope is nearly impossible. 

I had my supplements, vitamins, knowledge of what I was against, and had successfully tapered down from the worst of the worst, to just Oxys. “Just Oxy” is kind of a joke to say cause it’s still a monster itself, but at least it wasn’t the dope that I know Bill was spending $100/day on, previously was selling to me and ripping me off and taking from my portion, whatever. I felt like I was taking steps in the right direction. 

Liz never knew any of this. Turns out, she had suspicions all along by how I acted, looked, occasional money issues, or her wondering why I was leaving the house sometimes. Most of that was due to my second life. I kept this all from her because I didn’t want to pull her in. Having social support was something I always wanted, but I know the stigma, judgement, embarrassment for asking for help, and everything else kept me from doing that. 

I convinced myself I was going to do this on my own. That I’d fix this, and move forward with Liz without ever looking back. I had gotten clean 3 times for drug tests, vacations, and other things, but ended up right back in it because I may not have wanted it to stop and endure the shit of withdrawals at all so that I could continue functioning, and so that I could be the functional person I needed to be for my job, relationships, and friends.

But that second life ended and became my main life. I was caught. Liz found a stash and was pissed, with every right to be. I had fabricated stories to cover things up, lied about things, and probably acted a bit weird or messed up at times. She felt crazy convincing herself that she was overthinking things and that there was nothing to worry about, but she obviously knew for a lot longer than I thought. I thought I was so sneaky, that quitting would be easy, but I was wrong.

Fast forward to today. Liz and I are on an indefinite break or broken up. Kind of blurry there. She wants the best for me, but also won’t let her be with me for feeling like I lied to her to an extreme amount about something huge for a very long time. I don’t deny or disagree with any of that. This past Saturday, I was two weeks clean. She gave me the chance to fix things and work through it all. I was going through my camping supplies to prep for a surprise trip for her birthday in an effort for me to do more for her, and came across some lost old scraps. You know what happens next.

I fell back in. I didn’t think about it. I felt accomplished in my two weeks, but should have just thrown it out rather than enjoying it. She caught me there, and that was the last straw. She called my brother, parents, and next thing I know, my life is being flipped upside down and I was being driven to Fort Wayne for my parents to basically take custody of me until I was fixed. I hate that things ended up this way, but have accepted that it was probably needed. Doing this all on my own would have been much harder than doing it with support. Since then, I’ve come clean with my friends and family. Everyone was fairly stunned, but some were kind of just finally getting a confirmation that there was something going on when they thought they saw something weird. Arthur was one of them. He has had this plague a cousin of his and has saw the damage it can do. Beyond that, I practically trained him in safe drug use in college. He isn’t an idiot. He saw it in my eyes. He didn’t call me out, but even if he did, I probably would have denied it at that point.

Liz has decided to work on herself and become more confident and independent. I think that is great for her. I am without doubt scared of the idea of not being able to reconcile and losing her, but these are the consequences. I’m luckily still talking to her and we are civil, but she has drawn a line that she can’t fully trust me right now, and that if we were to ever get back together - it would be a long path of proving myself to her that I have changed. I wouldn’t want it any other way.

I feel at one of the lowest points of my life. Second half of my 20′s, and am living at home, crying daily, scared, and accepting I fucked a lot of shit up. I don’t know if I could have avoided this in any way beyond never doing it that first time. One time is enough to suck you in. 

I’m doing a lot to address this moving forwards. I’m identifying my vices, reviewing my coping mechanisms with stress, rewiring my brain so that I’m 100% honest always (whether that hurts me or not), letting my friends know of what has happened so that they can support me, push me, and watch me. I’ve removed contacts and cut ties with negative influences. And now I’m starting a blog to externalize any struggles I have. I will be inviting a small number of my friends to this to be able to see this as part of my open and honesty portion of change. 

Since I feel like I’m typing to myself, I’ll be putting it all out here. Cravings, feelings of weakness, failures, accomplishments, all of it. I invite everyone to comment and join me on this journey.

First post of many to come.