Specially seasoned, cooked well done

Sometimes it helps me to give funny or offbeat names to the things they do to me – never to the really serious things, of course – but more to procedures at the maintenance level.

For example, I call therapeutic phlebotomy "blood letting," which is what happens when I go every other month to have about a pint of blood removed to reduce the iron overload that resulted from multiple transfusions.

The name game has come to mind because tomorrow I go to Boston for my annual face fry.

The term is actually photodynamic therapy, or PDT, and my dermatologist uses it to treat my face for spots that might turn into cancer. It is definitely better than getting more skin cancers, and by the way  I think I have another squamous cell, this one on the side of my hand, so I will be surprised if she does not biopsy it.

Marinating last year

Here is how the American Cancer Society describes PDT when used to kill cancer cells:

Photodynamic therapy or PDT is a treatment that uses special drugs, called photosensitizing agents, along with light to kill cancer cells. The drugs only work after they have been activated or “turned on” by certain kinds of light. PDT may also be called photoradiation therapy, phototherapy, or photochemotherapy.

Depending on the part of the body being treated, the photosensitizing agent is either put into the bloodstream through a vein or put on the skin. Over a certain amount of time the drug is absorbed by the cancer cells. Then light is applied to the area to be treated. The light causes the drug to react with oxygen, which forms a chemical that kills the cells. PDT might also help by destroying the blood vessels that feed the cancer cells and by alerting the immune system to attack the cancer.

The period of time between when the drug is given and when the light is applied is called the drug-to-light interval.

After a nurse covers my face with the chemical, I sit for about an hour and a half, reading a little through the slits in the foil that covers my face. Then the covering comes off and you sit under the light. That part takes 15 minutes and hurts more than the worst sunburn you can imagine. Moving a cold air blower around with your hand helps somewhat in each area that you target.

She is also going to do my lips, woo hoo!

Afterwards your skin is red, blotchy and painful. You're supposed to avoid the sun, so this is a good time of year to do it.

In the past I have had to take something for the pain, but I'll see how I feel. I'll be going to Margaret's afterwards, and maybe the good company and good food will take my mind off of it.

 I'll drive back Friday morning, well done.

No longer an empty-nester

Things have changed since I embarked on my new life as an empty-nester this time last year.

Last year, Katie had just started college, Joe was returning for his senior year, and Ben was out in the working world. After a busy summer with two kids around, it was suddenly just me and the dog. I stood in the quiet house and cried. But pretty quickly, I adjusted to the rhythm of life on my own, just as people said I would.

This year, as I drove Katie back to Brandeis (on Monday), she remarked on how it was so different from last year. She had been nervous, and I was, well, I was trying not to freak out. On Monday, she was so excited that she was practically jumping up and down in her seat. I shared her excitement – it felt like I was going back to school – and I also knew that I would not sink through a hole in the floor when I went home without her, although I already miss her.

People had also said – as I well knew – that they come back, sometimes to stay.

The two youngest did, of course, come back for the summer, and now it turns out I will have company for the whole year.

Having gotten a job as Youth Initiatives Coordinator at the American Cancer Society's regional office in nearby Holyoke, Joe will be living at home.

We all know how hard it is to find work, and I am so proud of him for finding this very meaningful job. He took the terrible experience he had with my illness and turned it around so that he can use what he learned to help others.

While he's home, I expect him to continue helping me with all of my stupid computer questions.

Relay for Life successful event

First, a medical update: The scan of my neck came back negative, meaning that the abnormal cells on my tongue are self-contained.

Now I just have to deal with removal of a small area on the surface of my tongue, or as someone near and dear to me calls it, my tongue removal, under general anesthesia on May 31. Speak now, or forever...

I also wanted to report that Joe organized a successful Relay for Life event that took place Friday at Bates College.

About 15 teams raised close to $17,000 to benefit the American Cancer Society. Joe captained the Bates Men's Hockey Team; donations are still being accepted through his personal fund-raising page.

Here's how the American Cancer Society describes its signature fund-raising event:

The American Cancer Society Relay For Life is a life-changing event that gives everyone in communities across the globe a chance to celebrate the lives of people who have battled cancer, remember loved ones lost, and fight back against the disease. At Relay, teams of people camp out at a local high school, park, or fairground and take turns walking or running around a track or path. Each team is asked to have a representative on the track at all times during the event. Because cancer never sleeps, Relays are overnight events up to 24 hours in length.

After dark, we honor people who have been touched by cancer and remember loved ones lost to the disease during the Luminaria Ceremony. Candles are lit inside bags filled with sand, each one bearing the name of a person touched by cancer, and participants often walk a lap in silence. As people take time to remember, those who have walked alongside others battling cancer can grieve and find healing.

Confusing reports on cancer causes

It was one of those reports that made you want to crawl under the covers.

On Thursday, The President's Cancer Panel released a report saying the number of cancer cases caused by environmental exposures has been "grossly underestimated." The panel advising the president said that Americans are facing "grievous harm" from chemicals in the air, food and water that have largely gone unregulated and ignored.

The report noted unexplained rising rates of some cancers in children, and it referred to recent studies that have found industrial chemicals in umbilical-cord blood, which supplies nutrients to fetuses. "To a disturbing extent, babies are born 'pre-polluted,' " the panel wrote.

It suggested filtering tap water and storing water in stainless steel or glass to avoid exposure to BPA and other plastics and also avoid microwaving in plastic; buying produce grown without pesticides or chemical fertilizers; buying meat free of antibiotics and added hormones and avoiding processed or well-done meat.

Some of this we already knew. Some of it rules out most of what is in the supermarket. And some goes against what doctors have told me. I'm supposed to have well-done meat, not avoid it.

The next day, the American Cancer Society criticized the government panel for overstating its case, writing online that the report was unbalanced "by its implication that pollution is the major cause of cancer" and had presented an unproven theory, that environmentally cased cases are grossly underestimated, as if it were a fact.

The author of the statement, Dr. Michael Thun, continued that there are much larger causes of cancer, such as smoking, poor nutrition, obesity and lack of exercise, although he agreed with the panel's concerns about people's exposure to so many chemicals.

But, but, but...

Someone like me had none of the risk factors, except, of course, a lifetime of exposure to a range of chemicals. When I asked my local hematologist upon diagnosis how I even got leukemia, he said, frankly, that if I had gotten massive exposure at a place like Love Canal, I could attribute it to environmental factors, but, otherwise, they just don't know.

No sense of course in looking back. But when these reports come out, you have to wonder. And then you wonder if you exposed yourself and kids, how you can stop doing it. Within reason, you can pick and choose and do what's possible. You could get everything organic (for a higher price). It's easier in summer, with the availability of local produce. Still, some things are hard to give up.

You could drive yourself crazy. Or you could do what my father, who lived to a nice old age, preached, "Everything in moderation."

Sugar and cancer: Is there really a connection?

It's well after dark on Halloween, and, as usual, we haven't gotten many trick-or-treaters, because we live on a busy road. As usual, I bought a couple of bags of candy (Snickers and Tootsie Rolls), and, as usual, I began eating them a few days ago.

I have a really big sweet tooth. I go through phases. A couple of months ago it was Peanut M&Ms (thanks Ellen and Mike). A while ago it was dark chocolate, which I know is actually good for you, but I lost my taste for it. Lately I've been into double-stuffed Oreos (thanks a lot Deb) and Nestles Crunch bars. (Are we still boycotting Nestles? Ooops. I just looked it up and found out that the boycott, due to Nestle's marketing campaign of baby formula around the world to the detriment of breast-feeding, was dropped but is now reinstated.)

Every now and then some new study or publication comes out to remind me that refined sugar is bad for me, and that I really should quit. For me it's not about weight, because I've always been thin, except for when I gained my Freshman Fifteen thanks to the boxes of soft chewy Freihoffer chocolate chip cookies that seemed to be a staple in every dorm room at Vassar.

Once I read that the only way to quit sugar is cold turkey, and that when you do it, and are freed from the sugar lows that follow the highs, you feel great.

But it is a hard habit to break, and right now I don't feel up to it. Sugar is one of my main comfort foods; I don't usually pull out the "after all I've been through" excuse, but it's an excuse I make for myself, as in, "After all I've been through, I deserve to eat sweets if I want to."

Plus, I balance the unhealthful part of my diet with many "good" foods.

I was reminded of the topic by the recent publication of David Servan-Schreiber's book "Anticancer". The author, a doctor and survivor of a brain tumor, ties refined sugar to increased cancer risk. Mike Hamel summarizes the book well on his blog, Cells Behaving Badly.

A google search for "sugar and cancer" turns up pages and pages of entries suggesting a link between the two. An article on the The American Cancer Society website points out that it is not, however, a matter of direct cause and effect: "Sugar increases calorie intake without providing any of the nutrients that reduce cancer risk. By promoting obesity and elevating insulin levels, high sugar intake may indirectly increase cancer risk. White (refined) sugar is no different from brown (unrefined) sugar or honey with regard to their effects on body weight or insulin. Limiting foods such as cakes, candy, cookies, sweetened cereals, and high-sugar beverages such as soda can help reduce sugar intake."

I will continue to live by one of my late father's favorite mottos: "Everything in moderation."

That is, until I finish working my way through the rest of the Halloween candy.

In the meantime, I wonder what comfort foods other people like.