Life After Cancer: Angela’s Story

To tell my story of life after cancer, I must begin with the story of my cancer.

When I was only 33 years old, I was in the shower and found a lump under my arm that would change my life forever. Weeks later I was diagnosed with stage III invasive ductal carcinoma, breast cancer. My daughter was turning three a few days later and my son was almost five.

How could I have cancer?

I was a health nut. I made my kids baby food from scratch and grew my organic vegetables. I was a personal chef, nutrition consultant, and a food blogger.

I had done everything right and I was let down by my body.

I was to undergo bilateral mastectomies, 6-months of aggressive chemo, three more surgeries, radiation, and hormone treatment. The treatments made me violently ill. I spent many nights with my head in the toilet and feeling like I had been poisoned.  The cocktails of prescription meds to counteract the chemo side effects made everything worse. The steroids made me emotionally crash into a dark hole a few days after treatment and the chemical-induced menopause left me up all night with hot flashes.

It was the hardest thing I have ever had to do just to get through that time. This was all happening while I was wondering if I would survive to see my kids finish elementary school.

Surviving Cancer Only to Continue the Battle

Eventually, I made it through all of the treatments and surgeries and to the other side.

While it should’ve been a relief to be done with treatments, post-treatment brought about a terrible crash that I never could’ve expected.

Life after cancer left me feeling anxious, depressed, could not sleep and my brain felt like I was operating through a fog. I couldn’t remember anything and couldn’t focus. I didn’t know how to move on with living because I physically and mentally could not function.

I was desperate to feel better and willing to try anything.

I scrambled for any prescription drug that would help me sleep or offer any relief. I tried anxiety meds, antidepressants, and more. Nothing seemed to help but only make things worse. Some of the prescription medications made me feel like I was losing my mind.

A Suggestion that Changed Everything: Neurofeedback

Noticing I wasn’t improving, my aunt suggested that I try something called neurofeedback.  Years before she had had a brain tumor and Dr. Dan Amen recommended neurofeedback for recovery.  She tried many types of neurofeedback without great success and finally found NeurOptimal Neurofeedback and loved it so much she had purchased a system.

On her suggestion, I found a local NeurOptimal® provider and did some sessions in their office before taking a system home to train.  Despite not noticing anything right away I continued to train out of desperation and hope.  After about 10 sessions the fog lifted and my brain was able to function again. I wasn’t having anxiety attacks and feeling nauseous when I drove by the hospital anymore. I realized that the PTSD that I had been experiencing was gone.

I started to sleep, the anxiety settled and I was starting to feel like myself again.  It was completely life-changing.

I Wasn’t the Only One Western Medicine Left in the Trenches

A few months after starting neurofeedback, I was on a retreat for young cancer survivors in the Bay Area and I realized that other young women were also struggling to find normalcy with life after cancer. We were all standing around after dinner one night chatting and people mentioned needing to go take their Ativan and Xanax. This was a huge AHA moment for me.

Listening to these women felt like I was looking at a reflection of myself prior to neurofeedback.

The changes that I experienced had been so subtle and seamless I didn’t even realize how much I had improved. I was sleeping well and my anxiety was gone.

That was the moment that I realized that I needed to share NeurOptimal® with the young breast cancer community. The western medical system had let them down. These women were given a handful of prescription meds for sleep, hot flashes, anxiety, depression and medications for the side effects of those medications. Why weren’t doctors interested in restoring health in the body? or investigating why they had cancer to begin with? or how to prevent it again?

You survive your battle with cancer and they send you away with nobody there to catch you and help put the pieces back together.

Western medicine is not supportive of patients in terms of healing and helping support the body during and after cancer treatments. I have discovered through my work with the cancer community that many people go through a post-treatment crash. It is common to jump into fight or flight and just get through the terrible treatments and surgeries.

For so many years the treatment protocol for cancer has been “cut, burn, poison” which has not much has improved over the years.  Billions of dollars are raised every year for breast cancer awareness but they don’t seem to be making advances in extending the lives of patients who have stage IV cancer. We need to find a better way to treat this disease and better support people during the process. We need more cancer care that is focused on restoring the health and wellbeing of the whole person so they can enjoy life after cancer, not just survive.

Not Only Relief But a New Life Path

From the time of diagnosis, I felt very deeply like there was a reason that I was going through the experience of having cancer. After finding NeurOptimal® and experiencing such a tremendous improvement in my health and wellbeing, I destined to bring this life-changing technology to others.

I decided to purchase a NeurOptimal system and get trained to share the benefits with others.

The next time I met with my oncologist he was blown away by how much better I was doing and was so happy that the prescription meds had helped. I was thrilled to share with him that I had thrown away the meds and that I was doing this new thing called NeurOptimal® neurofeedback. He was so excited by this that he offered me a space in his integrative oncology center in San Francisco to offer neurofeedback to his patients.

Since 2012, I have provided neurofeedback to countless young cancer survivors who have experienced relief from chemo brain, PTSD, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and more.

While NeurOptimal® is not a treatment for anything, training the brain and optimizing it can create profound changes for those who are suffering in a myriad of ways as well as improving life and performance for others.

Life After Cancer

Wellness After Cancer

 

I have tremendous gratitude my cancer journey and for finding NeurOptimal®. It has given me a different outlook on life and set me on mission to help others. Not only did neurofeedback help me to feel better and resolve the issues that I was dealing with but it allowed me to overcome debilitating shyness and social anxiety which has opened many doors in my life. My children have benefited tremendously from neurofeedback in school and sports. I have been able to travel to beautiful locations all over the world to educate people about the life-changing benefits of NeurOptimal® and work with executives and professional athletes. I have met incredible friends in the health and wellness community while working events and studying to be a peak performance coach. My path to finding wellness for myself has allowed to me to find other profound healing modalities that I have become passionate about. Through all of my exciting adventures over the past few years, I always return to expanding on my mission of helping people in the cancer community.

Most recently, I was able to expand on the goal of helping the cancer community with a curated wellness approach when I partnered with Carleigh Rochon to open the Bay Area Brain Spa. Carleigh shares a background in holistic health and NeuOptimal® neurofeedback. We decided to bring our businesses together to make neurofeedback more accessible to community. Over the years of working in the peak performance and biohacking space, we have discovered many incredible technologies and have curated a program specifically for cancer survivors.

Whether someone is in cancer treatments or on the road to recovery after treatments, we are able to help support the mind and body through the process.

Our curated approach to restoring wellness for the cancer community includes neurofeedback, cellular repair, and lymphatic drainage massage. 

Neurofeedback is our core offering and we believe that everyone should train their brain. Neurofeedback during or after cancer treatments is supportive of emotional wellbeing and keeping the nervous system calm and regulated which allows for better healing.

Our Biohacking Tools for Life After Breast Cancer include:

NeurOptimal Neurofeedback is an effortless brain training tool.  It helps with:

• Chemo Brain
• Anxiety
• Feeling down or depressed
• Sleep 
• Focus
• PTSD
• Productivity
• Stress resilience

Ballancer Pro Lymphatic Drainage Massage is an FDA cleared Lymphedema treatment.  It helps with:

• Edema
• Detox from chemo
• Increase circulation
• Pre and Post Surgery
• Weight loss

NanoVi helps you bring your systems back into a more balanced state.  It helps with: 

NanoVi produces the same biological signal that our body produces to repair cellular damage. The technology has been used in cancer centers for cellular repair and reducing oxidative damage. Chemotherapy and radiation treatments dramatically increase the body’s need to repair oxidative damage to the cells. 

• Repair oxidative damage
• Cellular repair
• Supports Detox
• Increased energy
• Expedite healing process

Are you a cancer survivor looking for wellness?  Please reach out, we’d love to help you on your journey and share these amazing tools with you.