By Christos Apostolakos

The gift of cancer? What is he saying? Is he crazy? Someone could say. Especially if he has been attacked by the damned one or is, in great pain, taking care of someone who is suffering or crying for one of their own… what a gift this curse, this transfusion of horror…

But please let me explain, after first introducing myself.

My name is Christos; I am 65, a retired teacher (I had a M.E. tutoring school for years), a writer and perfectly healthy until August 2021, when I was diagnosed with adenocarcinoma in my left lung. I did not want to have surgery then, as I was urgently told by the doctors, perhaps I wasn not correct, but I was afraid of the scalpel. At that time my nodule was still small, but in three months, it grew larger, spreaded to the liver, went to the lymph nodes, and small brain tumours were also shown by the MRI later on.

December 2021. Stage four and terminal cancer, Doctor said. Lung cancer with distant metastases, the world’s most fatal; I must admit my knees buckled when I heard that.

Yet instinctively, despite the shock, while I accepted the diagnosis, I did not accept the prognosis. That means, I didn’t ask the doctors how much time I was given (although I searched it on the internet, of course). And I was right, as I later found out, not to ask them, since prognosis can be a self-verifying prophecy.

But it wasn’t out of fear that I didn’t ask. I just didn’t want to, couldn’t believe for a moment that I would let this “crab” kille me or mutilate me.

So I decided, when I recovered from the shock, to fight as best I could, until the end. Since then I have been doing everything I can, not only to survive, but also to avoid becoming a hibakusha (name given to the crippled Hiroshima survivors).

In addition to the traditional treatments, I also apply other techniques that help me (diet, yoga, fasting, prayer, exercise, visualization and more…)

The goal is not only to get rid of cancer completely (something many have achieved so far even in its final stage, as I read) but also to discover gifts that the disease can hide.

What do I mean?

The French have an expression: “un cadeau empoisonne” meaning “a poisoned gift”. I believe that this is what cancer can be for some people, a gift, horrible of course, that no one wants. A Trojan horse, it works in reverse of that of the ancients, from the outside you see death, a terrifying threat, but in its interior it can hide exquisite gifts.

Of course, if you manage to escape the claws of this capricious “crab”, and escape the side effects of chemotherapy, radiation therapy, etc., then you may emerge from the valley of the shadow back into the light, stronger and more blessed. And it is something many have achieved and they all say one thing”

That if one wants to cure cancer radically, will need to see everything differently, to change life, to become another, to wake up, to find substance, the soul to remember. Since the soul can do everything.

So, I want to share here with homeopaths and caregivers and anyone else who cares, how I am striving to turn this poison from a harbinger of death to a breath of life, so far with success.

What I write, I emphasize, are simply my personal opinions. I am not a scientist, a doctor. I am one of the, sadly, thousands of cancer patients who are also fighting a daily battle, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, brain radiotherapy, etc. A battle that is now entering its second year and, despite the ups and downs, has gone hopelessly well so far.

Of course I have losses, of course it’s not simple, nausea, loss of appetite, terrible dizziness, burnt veins, fatigue, ten kilos less. Fortunately, the situation improved a lot when, before Easter, the doctors stopped my chemotherapy, judging that I no longer needed it.

Since then, I have continued immunotherapy at Alexandra Hospital every three weeks. The last PET, which I had after Easter, was very good, fortunately.

The disease is under control, said my doctor, Professor Dimopoulos. “Your progress is good”, he added, and I was not just pleased, I felt myself rising from the grave.

And of course, I continue the fight, thanking the doctors, especially the oncologist Angeliki Andrikopoulou from Professor Dimopoulos’ staff, for her special empathy.

Thanking my wife and guardian angel, Natalia. My two brave daughters, Danae and Vassia. Some friends who pray for me. The “Sacred Path” meditation group, and the Supreme Power above all, who pulls the strings, as I believe.

And since I am a writer, I thought I would write down my experiences, and if what I write can benefit someone, I will be very happy. That is why I write them, to become a breath of life, a breath of hope, an attempt to shed light on this relentless slaughterhouse that like a sickle chariot reaps lives all around us, spreads pain, signals that we are not living well.

I conclude with a phrase, food for healing. It’s Nietzsche’s and it’s has turned into a song, you may know it:

“What doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger”.

Definition

My cancer threatens to kill me – cripple me, it has upset me terribly, it has made me feel down (physically, psychologically, etc.) but it has not killed me.

So, I am still alive, but deep in the labyrinth. But I do not give up. I turn fear into a prayer and look for a way to escape, to kill the Minotaur, to go up to the upper world in triumph.

What do I need to achieve these things?

Three things. What the legend says:  “A lot of courage and an Ariadne and a thread, so I don’t get lost on the way”.

Ariadne, who represents the sacred feminine, but also the woman in us, is the one who will provide me with the thread – a guide to not get lost in the labyrinth of cancerous mutations, recurrences, etc.

They call this thread “Sign”. A Sign that may have fallen from my hands. Essence. Who am I and what am I doing here on earth? Essence. Which we might never have searched for if Mr. K hadn’t knocked on our door.

Not to punish us, but to transform us, to draw out of us the sleeping hero or heroine.

As Joseph Campbell writes in “The power of the myth”:

…The Labyrinth is all too familiar. All we have to do is follow the thread of the hero’s path,and where we thought we would find something abominable, we find a God. And where we thought we’d kill someone else, we’ll kill our (evil) selves. Where we thought we would travel outwards, we will reach the centre of our being…and where we thought we would be alone, we will find ourselves together with the whole world.

Bless you! Check out our blog if you like www.cancerfree.club

20/05/2022