A Correction, And A New, Natural Way To Boost Daily Energy Levels
Can someone with a double mastectomy still get breast cancer? Click to find out.
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small 😎
First: a correction and expansion!
After yesterday’s issue of 10almonds covering breast cancer risks and checks, a subscriber wrote to say, with regard to our opening statement, which was:
“Anyone (who has not had a double mastectomy, anyway) can get breast cancer”
❝I have been enjoying your newsletter. This statement is misleading and should have a disclaimer that says even someone who has had a double mastectomy can get breast cancer, again. It is true and nothing…nothing is 100% including a mastectomy. I am a 12 year “thriver” (I don’t like to use the term survivor) who has had a double mastectomy. I work with a local hospital to help newly diagnosed patients deal with their cancer diagnosis and the many decisions that follow. A double mastectomy can help keep recurrence from happening but there are no guarantees. I tried to just delete this and let it go but it doesn’t feel right. Thank you!❞
Thank you for writing in about this! We wouldn’t want to mislead, and we’re always glad to hear from people who have been living with conditions for a long time, as (assuming they are a person inclined to learning) they will generally know topics far more deeply than someone who has researched it for a short period of time.
Regards a double mastectomy (we’re sure you know this already, but noting here for greater awareness, prompted by your message), a lot of circumstances can vary. For example, how far did a given cancer spread, and especially, did it spread to the lymph nodes at the armpits? And what tissue was (and wasn’t) removed?
Sometimes a bilateral prophylactic mastectomy will leave the lymph nodes partially or entirely intact, and a cancer could indeed come back, if not every last cancerous cell was removed.
A total double mastectomy, by definition, should have removed all tissue that could qualify as breast tissue for a breast cancer, including those lymph nodes. However, if the cancer spread unnoticed somewhere else in the body, then again, you’re quite correct, it could come back.
Some people have a double mastectomy without having got cancer first. Either because of a fear of cancer due to a genetic risk (like Angelina Jolie), or for other reasons (like Elliot Page).
This makes a difference, because doing it for reasons of cancer risk may mean surgeons remove the lymph nodes too, while if that wasn’t a factor, surgeons will tend to leave them in place.
In principle, if there is no breast tissue, including lymph nodes, and there was no cancer to spread, then it can be argued that the risk of breast cancer should now be the same “zero” as the risk of getting prostate cancer when one does not have a prostate.
But… Surgeries are not perfect, and everyone’s anatomy and physiology can differ enough from “textbook standard” that surprises can happen, and there’s almost always a non-zero chance of certain health outcomes.
For any unfamiliar, here’s a good starting point for learning about the many types of mastectomy, that we didn’t go into in yesterday’s edition. It’s from the UK’s National Health Service:
NHS: Mastectomy | Types of Mastectomy
And for the more sciency-inclined, here’s a paper about the recurrence rate of cancer after a prophylactic double mastectomy, after a young cancer was found in one breast.
The short version is that the measured incidence rate of breast cancer after prophylactic bilateral mastectomy was zero, but the discussion (including notes about the limitations of the study) is well worth reading:
Breast Cancer after Prophylactic Bilateral Mastectomy in Women with a BRCA1 or BRCA2 Mutation
❝[Can you write about] the availability of geriatric doctors???? Sometimes I feel my primary isn’t really up on my 70 year old health issues. I would love to find a doctor that understands my issues and is able to explain them to me. Ie; my worsening arthritis in regards to food I eat; in regards to meds vs homeopathic solutions.! Thanks!❞
That’s a great topic, worthy of a main feature! Because in many cases, it’s not just about specialization of skills, but also about empathy, and the gap between studying a condition and living with a condition.
About arthritis, we’re going to do a main feature specifically on that quite soon, but meanwhile, you might like our previous article:
Keep Inflammation At Bay (arthritis being an inflammatory condition)
As for homeopathy, your question prompts our poll today!
(and then we’ll write about that tomorrow)
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Stop Cancer 20 Years Ago
Dr. Jenn Simmons shares vital tips on preventing cancer and inflammation, advocating for lifestyle changes and proactive health management at any age.
Get Abreast And Keep Abreast
This is Dr. Jenn Simmons. Her specialization is integrative oncology, as she—then a breast cancer surgeon—got breast cancer, decided the system wasn’t nearly as good from the patients’ side of things as from the doctors’ side, and took to educate herself, and now others, on how things can be better.
What does she want us to know?
Start now
If you have breast cancer, the best time to start adjusting your lifestyle might be 20 years ago, but the second-best time is now. We realize our readers with breast cancer (or a history thereof) probably have indeed started already—all strength to you.
What this means for those of us without breast cancer (or a history therof) is: start now
Even if you don’t have a genetic risk factor, even if there’s no history of it in your family, there’s just no reason not to start now.
Start what, you ask? Taking away its roots. And how?
Inflammation as the root of cancer
To oversimplify: cancer occurs because an accidentally immortal cell replicates and replicates and replicates and takes any nearby resources to keep on going. While science doesn’t know all the details of how this happens, it is a factor of genetic mutation (itself a normal process, without which evolution would be impossible), something which in turn is accelerated by damage to the DNA. The damage to the DNA? That occurs (often as not) as a result of cellular oxidation. Cellular oxidation is far from the only genotoxic thing out there, and a lot of non-food “this thing causes cancer” warnings are usually about other kinds of genotoxicity. But cellular oxidation is a big one, and it’s one that we can fight vigorously with our lifestyle.
Because cellular oxidation and inflammation go hand-in-hand, reducing one tends to reduce the other. That’s why so often you’ll see in our Research Review Monday features, a line that goes something like:
“and now for those things that usually come together: antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anticancer, and anti-aging”
So, fight inflammation now, and have a reduced risk of a lot of other woes later.
See: How to Prevent (or Reduce) Inflammation
Don’t settle for “normal”
People are told, correctly but not always helpfully, such things as:
- It’s normal to have less energy at your age
- It’s normal to have a weaker immune system at your age
- It’s normal to be at a higher risk of diabetes, heart disease, etc
…and many more. And these things are true! But that doesn’t mean we have to settle for them.
We can be all the way over on the healthy end of the distribution curve. We can do that!
(so can everyone else, given sufficient opportunity and resources, because health is not a zero-sum game)
If we’re going to get a cancer diagnosis, then our 60s are the decade where we’re most likely to get it. Earlier than that and the risk is extant but lower; later than that and technically the risk increases, but we probably got it already in our 60s.
So, if we be younger than 60, then now’s a good time to prepare to hit the ground running when we get there. And if we missed that chance, then again, the second-best time is now:
See: Focusing On Health In Our Sixties
Fast to live
Of course, anything can happen to anyone at any age (alas), but this is about the benefits of living a fasting lifestyle—that is to say, not just fasting for a 4-week health kick or something, but making it one’s “new normal” and just continuing it for life.
This doesn’t mean “never eat”, of course, but it does mean “practice intermittent fasting, if you can”—something that Dr. Simmons strongly advocates.
See: Intermittent Fasting: We Sort The Science From The Hype
While this calls back to the previous “fight inflammation”, it deserves its own mention here as a very specific way of fighting it.
It’s never too late
All of the advices that go before a cancer diagnosis, continue to stand afterwards too. There is no point of “well, I already have cancer, so what’s the harm in…?”
The harm in it after a diagnosis will be the same as the harm before. When it comes to lifestyle, preventing a cancer and preventing it from spreading are very much the same thing, which is also the same as shrinking it. Basically, if it’s anticancer, it’s anticancer, no matter whether it’s before, during, or after.
Dr. Simmons has seen too many patients get a diagnosis, and place their lives squarely in the hands of doctors, when doctors can only do so much.
Instead, Dr. Simmons recommends taking charge of your health as best you are able, today and onwards, no matter what. And that means two things:
- Knowing stuff
- Doing stuff
So it becomes our responsibility (and our lifeline) to educate ourselves, and take action accordingly.
Want to know more?
We recently reviewed her book, and heartily recommend it:
The Smart Woman’s Guide to Breast Cancer – by Dr. Jenn Simmons
Enjoy!