No Bun in the Oven

Today I peed on a litmus strip. That's right, I took a pregnancy test this morning. I was 99.9% sure I had no bambina on the way, so why bother? The answer is, for those of you who have been reading for at least a month, because I decided not to get a biopsy done on that tiny calcification in my left breast.

I was all ready to let them cut me open, then decided to do my own research. Here are a few of my findings with a quick caveat - I am not a doctor, and many of these things were found online, which may make them either less or more valid. You have to be your own judge:

-Physicians are biopsy happy. They are naturally worried about malpractice. Even though my physician felt 98% certain that I do not have a malignancy, and even though breast cancer is considered to be relatively slow growing, she still felt biopsy was more prudent than waiting 6 months for another ultrasound.

-Certain states have laws which have physicians practically hogtied to biopsy, radiation and chemo. In fact they are gagged - alternative therapies, though often effective, are not to be mentioned

-Mammograms are dangerous to women, even though they are a potentially life-saving diagnostic. In fact, they may well contribute to breast cancer, and yet, there are other less threatening ways to determine cancer.

-Biopsies are dangerous - needle aspirations rupture the wall around the tumor, which the body has attempted to contain. Post biopsy, the cancer leaks, the cancer spreads, which is a reason why physicians immediately recommend aggressive treatments following the procedure.

-Calcifications are almost never cancer.

-Cultures with diets high in B17, aka Laetrile(I could not find a multivitamin or multi B supplement that contained it), are virtually cancer free. We used to get a fair amount of B17 when our bread contained millet, but we now rely primarily on wheat. It is also found in the pits of apricots, which used to be crushed into jam. I believe it is found in apple seeds, and it certainly exits in cassava.
http://www.karlloren.com/biopsy/p76.htm

-Finally, there are other types of tests for cancer. Here is one:

"In his brilliantly researched 1974 book "World Without Cancer," researcher and author G. Edward Griffin explains the trophoblastic theory of cancer proposed by Professor John Beard of Edinburgh University, which states that certain pre-embryonic cells in pregnancy differ in no discernible way from highly-malignant cancer cells.

All trophoblast cells produce a unique hormone called the chorionic gonadotrophic (CGH) which is easily detected in urine. Thus if a person is either pregnant or has cancer, a simple CGH pregnancy test should confirm either or both. It does, with an accuracy of better than 92% in all cases. If the urine sample shows positive it means either normal pregnancy or abnormal malignant cancer. Griffin notes: "If the patient is a woman, she either is pregnant or has cancer. If he is a man, cancer can be the only cause." So why all of the expensive, dangerous biopsies carried to 'detect' cancerous growths? One can only assume that medicare pays doctors a larger fee for biopsies than pregnancy tests."

All of which makes you wonder if this isn't some sort of set up for a George Carlin joke. Fetus = cancerous growth?

So, a couple of weeks ago, I told my soon to be full acupuncturist friend about the test. She hadn't heard of it, until two days later when they were taught it in school.

A few days after that, in a second moment of synchronicity, her husband brought one home in a bag of swag from some movie promotion.

Part of me breathed a sigh of relief this morning, it was negative. And a small part of me wished I were pregnant.