Chemo brain

[Carol.hope]

A.A. - Hmm. It's good to think about possible benefits, but I can't think of any reason that not being able to make enough energy would keep cancer away. Also, people with ApoE4 have a harder time recovering from brain damage and more likelihood of other neurological problems (it's sometimes called the Alzheimer's gene, but that doesn't mean we'll necessarily get AD. I'm glad to know I have it, because now I know I need to go all out on eating well, exercising, avoiding toxins, etc. and not taking any shortcuts!)

I'm thinking that if we could process those free radicals better, we would be healthier, not more cancer-prone. But who knows. Luckily there's lots of research going on these days. I love finding out new info, right here on this site!

- Carol

[AlaskaAngel]

Carol,

I was thinking based on the way chemotherapy supposedly works on fast-dividing cells, with cancer cells being fast-dividing so they require lots of energy -- that if our mitochondria are kept in slo-mo as long as possible, that would slow down the development of the cancer cells. But unfortunately it also might be causing the severe problems like chemo brain, as well as slowing down our metabolism and resulting in the problem of weight gain of fat, which then seems to contribute to inflammation and recurrence.

Those are the kinds of unpredicted results that can happen when an extreme therapy is given in hopes that it will work -- it can end up very having hidden ways of contributing to the very things it is intended to prevent.

A.A.

[lyce]

This has been such a helpful and informative thread. It validates for so many of us what we knew intuitively. Thank you.