⏳ 00:00 Inspiring Stories of Cancer Survivors
⏳ 00:20 Meet Suzy Griswold: Founder of HealingStrong
⏳ 01:35 The Birth of HealingStrong | Mission and Activities
⏳ 05:34 The Importance of Mental Health in Healing
⏳ 07:42 Joining and Participating in HealingStrong Groups
⏳ 15:45 Support and Resources for Group Leaders
⏳ 19:33 Funding and Partnerships
⏳ 19:41 Ad: Womabel®
⏳ 20:45 Funding and Partnerships (continuation)
⏳ 25:44 Final Thoughts and Encouragement

Inspiring Stories of Cancer Survivors

Suzy Griswold: We have stage three and four cancer patients that are leading their groups and they’re living it out. They’re beyond 10 years of stage four cancer. There is always hope.

Meet Suzy Griswold: Founder of HealingStrong

Victor Dwyer: Hey, everyone! Welcome to today’s episode of The Beljanski Cancer Talk Show. We’re thrilled to welcome Suzy Griswold, the founder and president of HealingStrong, a global network dedicated to supporting cancer patients and those seeking preventative care. What began as a personal mission in 2013 has grown into a grassroots movement, offering support and resources to families around the world, completely free of charge.

Get ready to be inspired by Suzy’s incredible journey and power of community and healing. 

Sylvie Beljanski: Hello, Suzy! I’m delighted having you at The Beljanski Cancer Talk Show. Thank you for being here with us. I’m especially pleased having you because we often have a lot of doctors and health professionals on this podcast, but very few caregivers and people who care for the caregivers.

I think having you today is a treat and I am sure that everybody listening to us will appreciate this perspective. 

The Birth of HealingStrong | Mission and Activities

Sylvie Beljanski: How did you create HealingStrong, and can you tell us exactly what it is doing?

Suzy Griswold: Sure. Thank you for, thank you first for having me, Sylvie. It was so good to meet you at our conference and just make a connection with you, so thank you for having us. 

I like to just share with people how HealingStrong came about first by, if you look at a cancer diagnosis, really any diagnosis or a life challenge, it’s almost like climbing a mountain, isn’t it? And mountains have different paths, we were just at a mountain last weekend and scaling the mountain is sometimes hard and sometimes it’s easy and there are different ways to go.

There are different things that will come in the way and a cancer diagnosis is very much a rocky path for most anyone. And when you choose to go a route that is not conventional or maybe integrative or holistic, that path is gonna be even rockier. It’s lonely.

When I was diagnosed 16 years ago, there was not anything on the internet. Very rarely could I find something on the internet about healing differently than what all of my family members had healed. So, really after I walked through my own healing and I did choose to do, in the beginning, I did conventional treatments, and when that failed and it was showing up in my lymph nodes, then I chose the Gerson therapy, and that is a very off the wall therapy.

It’s actually coming, there’s a lot of talk about it right now because I think the King of England is choosing to do it. So, I’m glad that it’s getting some headline time right now because it’s a very powerful therapy.

But as nutritional based therapies, especially 16 years ago, were not easy to get information on. And so after I walked through my own path and people wanted to know more and they wanted to cheer me on, but they didn’t know how to go about doing it because it was so foreign that we, a group of us, got together and said, “You know what? We need to share with others, peer to peer-to-peer support and education and help people make informed decisions.” Because when they are healing this way. It is so very difficult in the alone moments to be strong in their decisions, and that’s what HealingStrong does. It really empowers and strengthens people on a level that being in a doctor’s office or even a counselor’s office can’t do for them.

Sylvie Beljanski: So, how do you share exactly, what’s the actions here you are taking?

Suzy Griswold: So we, so HealingStrong is a peer-to-peer support group and they meet in various ways. It’s free to anyone. We actually have a curriculum that we provide to the group leaders and we also have additional support materials.

We encourage our group leaders to connect on a deeper level. We partner with other nonprofits because emotional healing, of course, is one area that needs to be addressed. Trauma, people who have walked through trauma. So, we actually connect and support with other nonprofits that very much wanna be a part of our groups and a part of the participants. So, we help them to find the support that they need with other nonprofits and other individuals as well.

And these groups, Sylvie, they meet weekly, sometimes they meet biweekly, monthly, and they meet in various locations and they go through a curriculum or they will watch videos and other resources that we provide for them. And they learn and they grow, and they encourage one another if, if, I love it. If somebody’s doing the Gerson therapy and they’re having a real hard time doing the coffee enema, for instance, where are you gonna go to talk about coffee enemas besides a a group of people that, that understand and want to chat about things like, detox methods like coffee enemas. So, it’s a safe place to come. 

The Importance of Mental Health in Healing

Victor Dwyer: One thing I wanna add on that is we’ve had so many doctors on this podcast and, we ask them a lot, what are the top three reasons that may be causing cancer?

And the number one, for almost every single doctor, has been mental health. Yes. And it’s so fascinating, like stress and mental health, and if not number one, it’s always like the top three. And so I think addressing that is the biggest thing, especially today where there’s more stress, there’s more complexity in everyone’s lives.

And I think that’s awesome that you’re doing, helping that mental aspect of things because that seems like, from everyone we talk to, that is one of the biggest sources of cancer from what we’ve talked to. I think that’s amazing. 

Suzy Griswold: Yeah, for sure. We see it too.

Victor Dwyer: Yeah.

Suzy Griswold: Especially today, there’s so much stress going on, things being thrown at people.

Anxiety is at an all time high. And we can look at things like EMF and just the world that we live in, but definitely we see that as being a number one thing that needs to be addressed as people walk through their own healing journey.

It was huge for me. It was huge for me. The power of forgiveness is huge, and how do you address that if you’re not talking about it? So we really do, we really dig down, Victor, into the minutiae and help people address those things. We bring them up, we provide them tools and we believe that, here’s another thing, we believe that no matter what the diagnosis or the prognosis is, there is always hope. It doesn’t matter.

We have stage three and four cancer patients that are leading their groups and they’re living it out. They’re beyond 10 years of stage four cancer and they’re leading a group and doing well and when, and they may step back into healing and need to step back from their group and become the participant in the group.

So it’s just this be, it’s a beautiful ebb and flow of community that HealingStrong has become. 

Sylvie Beljanski: Yeah, and I’m sure that leading a group and helping others to heal is part of the therapy itself. Absolutely. 

Joining and Participating in Healing Strong Groups

Sylvie Beljanski: So, if I am interested in joining one of those groups, how do I proceed? How do I know if there is a group near me?

Is it meeting online? Is it meeting in person? In somebody’s home. How does it work? 

Suzy Griswold: Yes. All of it. It really is dependent on the group leader. So, we have groups that actually meet in person. That’s how we started, was we were just in person groups and you would go on our website and you would search and you would find a group and contact the group leader and things would go from there.

Then, the world shut down five years ago and we did not wanna stop meeting, so we have brought in online groups and now we have both online and in-person groups. Even people are doing both now to reach more people. So, we have people from all over the world that are doing these HealingStrong groups.

And people from all over the world are participating in our online groups. We may have a group in Washington that has somebody in Africa or over in Europe that’s meeting with them.

Sylvie Beljanski: Absolutely

Suzy Griswold: Yes. 

Sylvie Beljanski: Absolutely. So, can you give us the website and the details on how to join, if… 

Suzy Griswold: So, if you go to healingstrong.org and you, you can go under the groups tab or you can do group dash directory, so healingstrong.org/group-directory. And on that ,you can search for the in-person groups, but then you can also look at the calendar and those are the posted groups.

We do have groups that are private. They’re not posting their meetings, but for the most part the online groups are posted on the calendar and the in-person groups, you just would find a group in your area and reach out to the group leaders. So, all the information is there. It’s super easy. And then if someone needs help, all they need to do is to email help@healingstrong.org. And we are so happy to help guide them.

We have groups, Sylvie, that are led by breast cancer patients that the majority of the people that they’re meeting with are breast cancer. I think it’s been two years now that our band of brothers is a prostate cancer group, has been meeting.

I think that’s pretty close now. It’s such a big group. I don’t know that they’re taking new people, but we can help people find a group that is right for them if they just need the help. They just need to email us and we’ll put ’em in touch with one of our mentors. 

Sylvie Beljanski: That’s for people with all kind of cancers? 

Suzy Griswold: All kinds. And not cancer. Even people come that just wanna prevent cancer. So, we have caregivers that come because they are taking care of their patients, and maybe it’s a wife who just wants to learn good cooking strategies for her husband who’s dealing with cancer, or we’ve had mothers.

Sweet mamas start groups because their daughters have been diagnosed and they wanted to support their daughters that way. So it’s just a, gosh, it is just a really beautiful community of people committed in every way to help people who are dealing with chronic diseases, who’re wanting to prevent disease.

And we don’t talk about it. So when you come into, we’re not talking about like a traditional support group. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to a traditional cancer support group, but they talk about, and there’s nothing wrong with this, let me preface this by saying there’s nothing wrong because it’s meaningful for people to share the side effects they’re having and things like that. But our groups don’t focus on that. They come in, we usually have a snack or something. We have a structured rhythm that we have to our program. We have speakers or, we focus on nutrition or emotional healing, or the spiritual health, which is as important, if not the most important. So, all three of those are combined into these groups.

And very rarely does the group take a turn where they’re talking more about their cancer than the hope that they have in healing. So, that’s the difference of HealingStrong in traditional cancer groups is the hope that they walk away with, you know, when they’re there. 

Sylvie Beljanski: Yeah, I’ve been invited a few times to some, for example, prostate support groups, and it was only elderly gentlemen and only speaking about prostate cancer.

Suzy Griswold: Yeah.

Sylvie Beljanski: It was extremely specific and indeed, although I believe it was a safe space for them to speak about their emotions and about their mental health, I don’t think they were opening so much about that there.

Suzy Griswold: Yeah.

Sylvie Beljanski: They were more inviting speakers from the outside, asking questions. Thank you, next month we’ll have another speaker. And that’s all they were offering. So I’m… 

Suzy Griswold: Yeah, our groups actually get together. They are, they’re on the phone with each other during the week.

They’ll, they’ll get WhatsApp going if they have international people who are part of their group. So, they ask questions during the week. If someone gets stuck on something or they have a question about a strategy that they’re learning about, let’s say, they, they recently learned about laetrile or B17. Is anyone in the group taking this? And where can I get the laetrile?

And, these are que, it’s very much this really beautiful peer-to-peer support that they offer to each other. And we provide, we get to provide the structure to them, for the group. But what happens in the meetings and beyond the meetings is the relationship that comes from supporting one another and really, just being a part of one another’s lives.

We’ve had, just, I’ll give you an example of what happened last year if I can. Is that okay? Can I share a story with you. Would that be okay? Okay

Sylvie Beljanski: Sure.

Victor Dwyer: Yeah, please.

Suzy Griswold: So last year or couple years ago, we had the prostate cancer group come off. It was a split from one of our, really, two groups. That was a group in Arizona and a group in California. And one of the guys, the gentleman that helped start that group, he ended up not making it, he passed away, and the group leaders from that group who lived in California are still supporting the widow, who’s very much a part of HealingStrong today.

So, that group of men are still calling her and checking in on her and making sure that she’s doing okay. It’s just, there’s stories like that over and over again. 

Sylvie Beljanski: That’s so sweet

Suzy Griswold: We’ve had people do their, we had a group leader get married and afterwards take a group of people, like a post honeymoon on a trip, and it was a retreat and they brought their kids and they taught their kids how to eat healthy at a campsite.

And these are the things that happen when you organize, right? When you organize in group and you get them focused on healing strong instead of healing wrong, you know, and that’s, those are just some of the really fun stories that are happening beyond the group meetings. 

Victor Dwyer: Yeah. Sorry if I missed this part.

So, when it comes down to joining the group, like how is the group, sorry if you already said this, but how is it organized? Is it a group of five? Like how do you, how do typical new members, is there a group, like a hundred people on the call? How is it like? How many people are typically on these calls?

Suzy Griswold: Yeah.

Victor Dwyer: Like, when you, you do get associated, how do you pick that? 

Suzy Griswold: So we don’t, we’re fine if they have two. So, we encourage at least one other that you get together. That’s a HealingStrong group. We have group meetings that go beyond a hundred but mainly they’re, mostly, they’re about 20 online in-person. The average is 10 to 20 in-person. It’s a, tt’s a very manageable group.

So they go, really, they go from all different numbers, very small groups of a little old woman. I think our oldest volunteer is 92 years old. 92!

Victor Dwyer: Wow.

Suzy Griswold: Yes. And so they go from a small group to, our largest is in Rancho Cucamonga, California, and they often have over a hundred in their group meetings, and anywhere in between, yeah.

Support and Resources for Group Leaders

Sylvie Beljanski: So, you told us what happens in the group, but you said also that HealingStrong is providing the structure. Can you tell us a little bit more about the structure and what is a part of HealingStrong in organizing those groups? 

Suzy Griswold: Sure. For a group you want, so we do everything for them.

We have all of their curriculum. I’m trying to see if I have a book here I can show you. So, this is the participant guide that we offer. This is free online, but this comes with the, the group leader curriculum. So all of our, they have a 12-month curriculum. They have additional videos that they can do. They have lessons that they share with each other. Group leaders will share their lessons through the HealingStrong sites so they can download them. We put structure to the lessons. So, we give the goals and the objectives and if we encourage a video that maybe we’ve done at a different conference or something like that, we’ll accompany the lesson.

And then, as a group leader, you want to market, you wanna have flyers and brochures and business cards and all the things as a leader, a group leader, you wanna have that. We provide all of that to them at cost, so they get all of the additional marketing materials and things like that for them.

We offer a mentor for them, so once they do sign up, we do training for them. They have a mentor that is assigned to them, or a group of mentors that they have access to. We have trained chaplains that are there because inevitably there’s always gonna be somebody in their group that is not gonna make it.

And so, we wanna make sure that they’re supported, the wraparound support for the emotional support for them as well. We partner with people. A good example is Cherie Calbom, who’s the juice lady, does juice retreats, and she will offer them up, oftentimes, at no charge, she has offered to our group leaders.

And then the nonprofits that we partner with, if you’re a group leader, they will also work with our group leaders to help them walk their own route of healing through the emotional healing that happens because we all have it. And, oftentimes, group leaders will come in and they’re still in the middle of their healing, so we see the opportunity to work with the group leaders as well that they are their own healing, community group for us, and so we really take care and concern for our group leaders.

I think you probably saw that at the Annie Apple Seed Conference when we have events like that. We very much prioritize getting our group leaders together and just sharing, fellowshipping with them while we do these events and activities and just building community around the group leaders as well. So, that’s important to us as the organization to support these groups. And we feel like when our groups are strong, then their groups are gonna be strong as well.

Sylvie, anybody can come in and be a group leader. They can apply. It’s a very small fee that they pay and then a monthly $5 fee to keep the group leader platform on the backend active for them, or we scholarship them.

We don’t, there’s never anyone who can’t, we don’t ever look at finances. If that’s an issue, then, we certainly are gonna support them, but anyone can be a group leader. It takes very little to sign up and we just walk you through the process. So, you can be as, you can punch, play, and we have videos for you to play if you don’t feel like you are a well qualified speaking group leader, we have videos that you can do and you can just facilitate it. So, we’ve really taken the guesswork out of the whole process, 

Sylvie Beljanski: All those things, all this support material, all this training. It’s costly. 

Funding and Partnerships

Sylvie Beljanski: So how does the organization gets properly funded to carry on and as it has been carrying on for several years now.

Suzy Griswold: Yeah.

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Funding and Partnerships

Suzy Griswold: We have a makeup of about 250 volunteers, and if you look at our tax forms, much of what we do is volun, is given to us.

So vol, so volunteer is so critical and important for what we do. My husband happens to be a pretty cool video editor, so he does a lot of our videos for us. And we just, we have a great membership community where people are donors that have paid, individual donors. Most of our support comes from the small $20 to $50, a hundred dollars a month donors that wanna support our mission.

And then our group leaders who, of course, they provide support through the curriculum and our purchase of their materials in the beginning. And we have a lot of really amazing corporate partners that believe in us as well.

And those corporate partners are coming alongside the groups. We prioritize them and it’s just again, we’re just one big community and we couldn’t do it without the volunteers and the small donations that come through HealingStrong and all of the, my goodness, our attorneys are donated. There’s so many things that we are very blessed to have because people believe in the mission and they wanna support what we’re doing. They see the value of it.

Sylvie Beljanski: So, for companies interested in supporting your mission, what kind of partners are you looking to attract and how do you work with them? 

Suzy Griswold: So we, we have a corporate partnership program set up and usually how it happens, they will indicate an interest in supporting us or partnering with us.

And we’ll, we will reach out to them and have a conversation and make sure it aligns with both that this is a good fit. Because we don’t, Sylvie, we don’t look at our partners as this. It’s a relationship. So, we put them in front of our community. They are, they’re a part of us, so they’re a part of the HealingStrong community.

So, once we meet with our corporate partners, we go through the corporate partnership program with them and see if they’re interested at all in supporting us. And if they are, there are several levels that they can join us. One is a small monthly fee that they can or donation that they can join HealingStrong with.

And they’re all very reasonable. We just, we really want this to be a very reasonable, grassroots effort. And we have a lot, we’ve had a lot of growth this year, so we are definitely seeking partners at this point because of the growth that we’ve experienced this year.

So, the first thing they need to do is just reach out to us at help@healingstrong.org and we’ll get the ball rolling and meet with them.

Sylvie Beljanski: I hope you will attract a lot of right people and we’ll get, you will get a lot of good support to continue this amazing mission.

There is something you mentioned quickly. You said it’s better to heal strong than heal wrong.

Suzy Griswold: Yeah.

Sylvie Beljanski: Is that, I am quoting you properly?

Suzy Griswold: You are.

Sylvie Beljanski: So what do you, how do you define healing wrong?

Because I assume a lot of people will take healing as a good thing and there is nothing like, anything like healing wrongly. So can you explain it to me?

Suzy Griswold: I love that. Every day we have to make choices, right, for healing? Every day when we are home, and we are alone, we have to make that choice if we are on a healing journey for cancer, if we are on a protocol for cancer.

For me, I did the Gerson protocol, so you know, I did 10 juices a day and, I could have chosen to, to heal wrong. My heal strong, and that, for my physical was Gerson and making those choices every day to, to do what I felt I was supposed to do by detoxing and drinking the juice I was supposed to drink.

And there were other things that I did as well. I have to make that choice. To either eat this or drink this, to put this in my mind, to watch the news, which is screaming at you all the time, or turn it off. And, for me, read scripture. I’ve gotta make a choice for the emo, to forgive the people that have hurt me in my past, or I can make the choice to not work on that and do something else, get back at ’em.

So healing wrong, if I, so healing strong, I don’t believe we ever really arrive at the place we need to be for healing. And I want our community and for myself, I want to be healing strong. But I’ve also recognized over the years that it really is those individual choices that you make day in and day out when nobody’s looking and when you’re at home alone and you believe, you’ve gotta believe, that this is either gonna contribute to my healing or it’s not. And that’s where the choice comes into play. And so we really help people make those choices to heal strong.

Victor Dwyer: That’s awesome. That’s awesome. 

Final Thoughts and Encouragement

Victor Dwyer: Is there anything else that you think our audience should know about the program or anything related about cancer that, people doing wrong or anything that can help other people with on their healing journey? 

Suzy Griswold: That’s a great question. Victor. Thanks for letting me talk about HealingStrong.

I  do a lot of podcasts and oftentimes we’re not talking about it, so thank you. I really appreciate that. I think that, what I, our message for HealingStrong is that we don’t tell people what they need to do to heal. We have lots of people that come in that are doing conventional therapies, but they wanna make those wise choices at home to be strong and do what they can do at home.

And there are simple things that we can do. Your work that you’re doing in the nutrition area there, that makes such a huge impact and, going outside and putting our feet in the dirt and going to bed early and shutting off the EMF that are all around you.

And, there’s so many things. Drinking good water, fasting is good. There are great supplements out there. Like I mentioned, B17 laetrile, that’s a powerful, supplement that you can add to your routine. And there’s Essiac tea and herbs and things that we can be adding that are not costly.

So, healing doesn’t have to break the bank is my point. And oftentimes people are not, they don’t have what they need to know to make those kinds of choices. It just, they go into a healing crisis like cancer and they don’t have that information and that’s what the groups can bring for them. The groups are very well-informed people. These group leaders are very well-informed people, and so we just wanna encourage people.

This is a resource and it’s free. You don’t pay a thing to come to a HealingStrong group, and so get connected. I just wanna encourage people, if you’re hearing this, you know somebody that has cancer, get connected because it is that free resource that we really wanna see people empowered and equipped with the wisdom and the knowledge they need to make those decisions so that they can walk their healing out and be vibrant and live on purpose because they have a purpose.

And, cancer is just a, it’s just a roadblock for many people. 

Victor Dwyer: Yeah. And is there anything else that, materials or anything else that you wanna promote within HealingStrong. Any other books, events or anything else you wanna promote?

Suzy Griswold: We do give away our participant guide, and I think I had given you guys the link for two books. And this is one of them. And so we have a landing page that you can download these books for free. So, I just wanna encourage people to do that.

Our groups are expanding. If anyone’s listening and they wanna start a group, we would love to help you do that because it’s greatly needed.

Victor Dwyer: Yeah.

Sylvie Beljanski: Thank you.

Victor Dwyer: It really sounds like you’re making a difference, and that’s awesome. And especially with, like I said, to the emotional side of things. We really appreciate you coming on and joining. And yeah, I can’t tell you enough. Thank you for all you’re doing. It sounds like you’re making a big difference, especially in that cancer space, which is awesome.

Suzy Griswold: Thank you. Thanks for having me. I really appreciate you guys. 

Sylvie Beljanski: Thank you. And I hope this podcast will help you to receive all those opportunities there. 

Suzy Griswold: Thank you. Thank you, Sylvie.

Victor Dwyer: And thank you for everyone, and the audience that has listened up to this point. This is The Beljanski Cancer Talk Show, and we’ll catch you next time. Thanks.

Suzy Griswold’s life has been filled with love and joy, having been married to Jeff for 37 years and raising two amazing sons. However, her most cherished role is being a Mimi to her first grandchild. As the Founder and President of HealingStrong, a global network of community groups that offer support to cancer patients and those seeking preventative measures, Suzy’s journey to holistic healing began after traditional treatments fell short. Witnessing other survivors embracing a natural approach ignited her passion to create a space for individuals to connect, share encouragement, and empower each other with valuable information for healing, believing that no matter the prognosis, healing is always possible.

What started as a personal mission in 2013 has blossomed into a true grassroots movement. Today, HealingStrong continues to uplift and inspire participants, guiding them to lead lives filled with hope through mindful choices that significantly impact their well-being. These volunteer-led HealingStrong groups, accessible to families worldwide, remain steadfast in their commitment to providing support and resources free of charge.