October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and so we have been focusing on this disease here at The YinOva Blog. Last week I wrote about breast cancer prevention and the week before I wrote about a new study that shows how helpful acupuncture can be to women who are undergoing breast cancer treatment. I thought it was about time you heard from a patient so I asked Suzanne Murphy Davison to write about her experiences. It has been my privilege to play a small role in Suzanne’s journey. She is an inspirational woman and I have watched her grow in response to the challenges life has thrown at her. I am so, so proud of her and thrilled to introduce her to you. It is my hope that she will continue to share what she has learned with the YinOva community. She has much to teach us. Here in her own words is her story.

Well, hello to you all!! My name is Suzanne, and as Jill mentioned in a previous blog I am a patient at the YinOva Center and five year survivor of breast cancer. I represent a demographic that is, unfortunately, becoming much more common – a young, pre-menopausal woman diagnosed with breast cancer. I was 32 at the time of my diagnosis… and a week away from my wedding! You can imagine how shocking it was to hear I had breast cancer, but I was even more stunned to find that I had a fairly advanced case of it. Continue reading…

Whenever I talk about breast cancer prevention I am very conscious of my patients who are currently dealing with this illness. I want to avoid making them feel as if they did something wrong. Too often cancer patients beat themselves up for things they did and things they wished they’d done. I don’t want to add to that burden. To a certain extent these things are random. We have all known couch potatoes who have eaten nothing but junk food and lived into their 90′s.

However there is plenty of evidence that a healthy lifestyle can really reduce your breast cancer risk and so today I want to talk to you about what you can do to help yourself. My interest in this is a personal one. My mother died of breast cancer when she was in her 50′s and so it is in her memory that I take care of myself and help my patients to live as healthily as possible. Continue reading…

I know that many of you saw the recent news reports about a new study that showed that acupuncture is remarkably helpful when it comes to relieving the side effects of breast cancer treatment. You can see an ABC news report on this by clicking here.

Doctors treating breast cancer give patients drugs that lower their estrogen levels in order to reduce the risk that breast cancer will return. Unfortunately these drugs also mimic the symptoms of menopause and can have some unpleasant side effects such as night sweats, insomnia and hot flashes. Continue reading…