Dealing with the challenges of health and wellness after cancer treatment is tricky enough, but managing it in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic is an even bigger obstacle. One survivor details how she tries to take it one wellness win at a time.
PUBLISHED MAY 28, 2020
A native New Yorker, Shira Kallus Zwebner is a communications consultant and writer living with her husband and three children in Jerusalem, Israel. Diagnosed in 2017 with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, she's fighting her cancer battle and blogging about the journey at hipstermomblog.com
When my hematologist-oncologist suggested that we have a telemedicine appointment last month, I breathed a huge sigh of relief. I couldn't bear to face him, to see his expression when he noticed just how much weight I've put on since the start of coronavirus quarantine. It's funny, not once during treatment for stage 4 non-Hodgkin's lymphoma did he even broach the topic of my weight. Even though my cancer was discovered during pre-op testing for bariatric surgery, we never discussed what I saw as the elephant in the room. Me. When I asked him what I should be eating, or avoiding, during treatment he told me to eat whatever I wanted. I pressed him about sugar, how the internet told me that sugar would feed the cancer cells and send me to my death. But he ignored it and told me that I should eat whenever I felt hungry and, well, I could eat whatever I wanted.
I put myself on a strict diet during chemo though, working with a naturopath I had never met, following a meal plan created for a male cancer patient fighting leukemia. I made myself vegan protein shakes and cut out all sugars and complex carbohydrates, opting for quinoa and oatmeal to replace pasta and rice. I soaked all of my fruits and vegetables, and when my blood count was too low and I was neutropenic, I would instead eat cooked vegetables only. I made bone broths and signed up to take the course offered by the Cancer-Fighting Kitchen, to learn how to fuel my body properly during treatment. I discovered that fasting on chemo days helped me with nausea and so I began a cycle of fasting for 24 hours at a time to ensure that I wouldn't vomit or feel sick after treatment. Steroids, fasting and chemo made my body weak, my metabolism sluggish, and my weight loss stalled.
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