DIETARY CHANGE
Faced with a relapse of stage 4 HGSOC, I decided to try a dietary change. After reading Jane McClelland's book How to Starve Cancer, I started cutting out all sugars, dairy, and meats (except fish). It was a sudden change without much in-depth understanding on my part. A straw to clutch at. We all know that a relapse is bad news, facing a battle-hardened cancer that may prove resistant to chemo.
I had the first of 6 Caelyx/carboplatin treatments at the end of March.
My pretreatment PA125 reading was 175.
The second pretreatment reading was 150 (result of chemo 1)
After chemo 2, I started the dietary change for 4 weeks.
The third pretreatment reading was 25 (Result of chemo 2? Result of dieting? Combination of both?).
FASTING
After reading about an Italian study (link below), I decided to try fasting during chemotherapy. I told my oncologist that I was going to fast during the 3rd chemotherapy. He wasn't on board, but did not contest. He arranged for me to meet the oncology nutritionist. A blood test showed that I was not nutritionally deficient. The main deficit seems to be calories, because my weight is slowly going down.
After a 48-hour fast during chemo 3, the fourth pretreatment reading was 9 (Result of chemo 3? Result of dieting? Result of fasting? Combination of all?).
On July 3, I finished fasting for 60 hours (per the number of hours in the Italian study) during chemo 4. Wonder what my 5th pretreatment reading will be before chemo 5 at the end of the month.
Just wanted to share this straw-clutching venture.
Italian study
Effects of short-term fasting compared to free diet in ovarian cancer patients: Results from a two-arm pilot randomized trial: Short-term fasting (STF) may enhance chemotherapy efficacy by suppressing insulin-driven pro-survival signaling.
(https://www.asco.org/abstracts-presentations/258047)