The Cause of Some Cancers: Not What You Think

Before we get into the general subject of cancer I want to expand on my previous article on Natural Killer cells (NK Cells). The research we did years ago showed enhanced NK production after one year of our therapy, and by that I assume better control of cancer; that is what these cells do—look out for developing cancer cells and attack and devour. But why would reliving those early imprints increase production of NK cells? Here I have to make an assumption: when we have traumas during womb-life there is a deregulation of many biochemicals, hormones and neurotransmitters. The whole system, in short, changes to accommodate the input; and what that does is alter set points. How do we know that? Because in all of our studies we have found that set points seem to change after therapy and “normalize”. Thus, for example, NK cells seem to change set points and come back to normal after one year of our therapy. As do the levels of the stress hormone, cortisol.


So once we go back to those generating sources, those early imprints, the system appears to re-regulate itself back to what it should have been before the trauma intruded itself. Our therapy seems to “erase” the input and allow the cells to normalize. It is as if the trauma never happened; which is why I maintain that we can go back and undo and redo our early lives. The mechanism for this may well be the pattern of methylation that “seals in” the trauma—cancer is characterized by “methylation imbalance” (Baylin, et al., 1998). There are other factors, as well, which are being sussed out anew each and every day by biochemists and other specialists. We will leave that to those experts. But it seems as though we are reversing those early changes that caused a detour of biochemical set points. Along with this was a rerouting of brain circuits as well. The neurotic system changed. I am painting in broad strokes for the moment, details can be found in my book Life Before Birth.


So what happens when the NK cells are increased? We have a stronger army to fight cancer, an army that was weakened by trauma occurring during our womb-life (and also possibly during the birth process). The system has a normal amount now and can amass a greater force to fight cellular anomaly. The cells seem to know when something is amiss and rush to correct it in the same way that repair cells rush in to stem the flow of blood and help in healing when we cut ourselves. We are a naturally healing system when given the chance; and what is wonderful is that we always have the chance in our lives to go back and restabilize the system. That is why when NK cells are extracted from tumor cells, processed and reintroduced to the system there is an increase in cancer fighting ability.


Here is the good news: when the NK army is bolstered there is less cancer. And when there are even metastasized cells the NK cells can fight each and every appearance of abnormal cells, no matter where they are, and stop them in their tracks. It is not like chemotherapy, a poison that destroys the malignant cells and also healthy cells along with them. Here, it is but a matter of increasing the health of the cells in order to combat the intruders: a much healthier way to go. In other words, the system now has a normal amount of NK cells, which it should have had early on but did not. And the same trauma that may have lowered the set points of NK cells could have also increased the likelihood of cancer; for example, it can epigenetically affect the tumor-suppression genes, leaving the system open to later cancer. The problem is that the distance between the early trauma and the appearance of cancer at forty is so vast as to be incomprehensible. It is only when we allow patients to back and relive early trauma that we see the connection. And for now, it still it has to be an assumption.

This can never happen with a cognitive therapy that never touches deep-lying imprints that deviated and deviate the system. Intellectual therapies never operate on the levels that set off deviations. They operate on the derivatives, the effluvia of the early imprints such as deviations in perception or thought patterns or learning. Treating all that never makes a profound change. And who suffers? The patient.

Baylin, S.B., Herman, J.G., Graff, J.R., Vertino, P.M., Issa, J.P. 1998 Alterations in DNA methylation: a fundamental aspect of neoplasia. Adv. Cancer Res. 72:141–96.

The Nuts and Bolts of Sobriety

I kid you not when I say that the august journal Scientific American Mind, publishes some strange articles. This one, the “Nuts and Bolts of Emotional Sobriety” by Herbert Wray (March 2012), is about being sober. Persons must attain “emotional sobriety” before they get too far along; and that means—hold on!—you must learn to regulate negative feelings that can lead to discomfort, craving and ultimate relapse. The maxim is “Don’t think and don’t drink.”

What the article goes on to say is that this is a lifelong effort and requires new ways of thinking. There are so many loose intervening variables involved, so many ill-defined notions that I hardly know where to start, except that this appears in an important scientific journal. But if we suss out the hidden text it is “thinking will make you well”. Oh yes, that is not exactly what they are saying but it really is. You need a new way of thinking and where does that come from? And by the way, where does thinking come from, in any case? Thinking is not so deep, not deep enough to change deeply embedded feelings that drive cravings. You can only agree with that notion if you do not understand where addiction comes from, and it is not, not, not from faulty logic, where you just need to change your attitudes, and voila. Ideas and attitudes are late arrivals in the brain and are never strong enough to combat feelings, instincts and sensations, which preceded them by millions of years in evolution. There was this life going on a long time before ideas came along. This is true in antiquity and in our personal development. And we hurt and imprint that hurt long before we have ideas to describe it.

They go on to say “take it one day at a time,” because there is nothing else you can do, and you are always susceptible to falling back into drinking and drugs again. There is this rock-hard belief in all these booga booga approaches that there is nothing you can do about addiction except beat it back every day—hence, one day at a time. But suppose we know what causes it and can eradicate that cause?

Then you don’t need one day at a time. You can get your whole life back. The answer lies within us, not with some self-styled guru who assures you he has the answers. No one has a single answer about your life; only you do. We want to lean on the all-knowing savant but, unfortunately, he does not exist and never will.

This is denial at its zenith; don’t pay attention to those negative ideas! What? Those ideas arise from early life trauma that makes them painful, not pesky. And addressing those feelings, integrating and resolving them, means liberation from addiction. Our bodies cannot ignore them; they are there for a good biologic reason—to warn us of trouble inside that must be dealt with. They have it backwards; it is not thinking about those feelings that produces discomfort; it is that we are not at all comfortable and the only way to get comfortable is to plunge into those feelings. Instead, they recommend distraction as a way of dealing with it all; my mother could teach them about distraction, every time I whimpered she would start raising her voice and saying look over here, look at that dog, etc. Forget your real feelings and look somewhere else. My god! That ploy is a hundred years old. Their idea is that distraction helps you not focus on alcohol and drugs. But the craving is real! It is telling us the truth; there is pain and suffering that we must address and experience. We must definitely focus on it and not look away. That is the way to health. Does anyone think that when we ignore pain it just goes away? No, no. It buries itself deeper and becomes unreachable. This for the scientists is called a “strategy.” I call it neurotic acting-out; not facing reality. Can anyone get well not facing reality? What happened to “you shall know the truth and it shall set you free”? The whole idea, they say, is not to ever let those negative feelings gain force over you. What they believe is that once we can identify our “processing” style we will do better. Pure cognitive therapy.

And so they go on to say that recovery programs teach this method of self-regulation. This is the old wives tales raised to the level of a scientific principle…but faulty as hell. Do I sound angry? Yes. It is a continuation of nonsense masquerading as some kind of psychological science. And whom does it hurt? Those who suffer.