Episode 18 - A Holistic Approach to Healing Beyond Breast Cancer with Dr. Carol Lourie

1:17 – Introduction and Dr. Lourie’s Background
3:14 – The Importance of a Second Opinion
7:33 – Understanding Breast Cancer
11:35 – Integrative Oncology and Treatment Strategies
20:29 – Preparing for Chemotherapy and Lifestyle Changes
30:10 – The Role of Stress and Emotional Health
33:52 – Dr. Lourie’s Coaching Program
40:32 – Conclusion and Contact Information

Dr. Carol Lourie: You’re not a victim to breast cancer or to any disease. This is an unfortunate medical diagnosis, but it can be a chronic metabolic disease that you learn to manage.

Victor Dwyer: Welcome to today’s episode of The Beljanski Cancer Talk Show. Today, we’re diving into a holistic approach to healing beyond breast cancer with a special guest who brings decades of experience and a unique perspective to the table, Dr. Carol Laurie.

After supporting a friend through breast cancer treatment, Dr. Laurie saw gaps in standard care and develop holistic science-based strategies to address them. Her integrative protocols focus on metabolic, lifestyle, and emotional factors, aiming to reduce the treatment side effects and lower reoccurrence risk. Stay tuned as we explore Dr. Lourie’s holistic approach to healing beyond breast cancer and discover how her methods can transform the journey to health for many women.

Let’s get started.

Introduction and Dr. Lourie’s Background

Victor Dwyer: Dr. Lourie, thank you so much for joining today. Please tell the audience a little bit who you are and how you got here.

Dr. Carol Lourie: Thank you so much for having me. I’m Carol Lourie. I am a naturopath, an acupuncturist to a homeopath. I’ve been in practice for more than 35 years and I had a generalized naturopathic Chinese medicine practice in Berkeley, California.

And then one day I received a phone call, I thought it was a crank call, and it turns out it was my dear friend hysterically upset and crying, saying they found a lump. That was the beginning of my focus on breast cancer. I attended 18 months of treatment with her helping her not only through the medical treatments but afterwards using my skill set to reduce the side effects of treatments and help her recover her health after treatment was completed.

And her oncologist was so impressed with how she was doing that she started referring all of her patients to me. And, thus, began the focus of my clinical practice on supplying women with breast cancer, the integrative and holistic science-based strategies they need to optimize their health. And the need grew larger than I could see one-to one.

So over the last few years, I’ve developed an online live coaching program to provide women with this necessary and life-saving and-life changing information.

Sylvie Beljanski: Indeed, I am sure this is helping a lot of women because, unfortunately, breast cancer is the first cancer when it comes to women and it’s not going anywhere.

So, I’m sure that you have the ability with your knowledge and your experience to help a lot of them. And based on your experience, what is first and most overlooked step after diagnosis.

 

The Importance of a Second Opinion

Dr. Carol Lourie: Thank you, Sylvie. I think there’s this tendency to feel rushed and pressured by the medical system.

You have a lump, you have to go for a biopsy right today. You have to start treatment immediately. And breast cancer doesn’t develop overnight. Breast cancer is a chronic metabolic disease. It doesn’t develop overnight. And, unless, there is a huge tumor that’s pressing on a vital organ, which doesn’t really happen very often, you have, the woman has time to gather her healing team to think about how treatment is going to impact her, the management of her work, of her family, and to even possibly get a second opinion.

Because my experience has been too often women are having mastectomies when they may not have to have one. It’s very important in my opinion to gather the healing team, not just your medical oncologist and surgeon, but also your acupuncturist, your naturopath, people who are oncology-based, and also gather a second opinion because that can make a huge difference in your treatment outcome and options.

Sylvie Beljanski: Every time that, breast cancer, as we said, is a very common actually disease, unfortunately, and, but for each one going through this terrible diagnosis, it’s like the first time and the sky is falling on her head and she doesn’t know where to turn. You are saying, recommending, and it’s very wise to get a second opinion to see a naturopath, an acupuncturist, but many women do not have all those resources because they have been busy.

They have their careers. They are, and they’re very often, they do not have a medical team around her. They just have, they’re going for an annual mammography. That’s it. And then they hear about the bad news.

How do people, how do women in need find confirmation that it is important to get second opinions and that even that there are second opinions available. There are other ways than really being rushed to cutting.

Dr. Carol Lourie: I think that’s the beauty of the Internet, as you and I were just speaking. There is a lot to be gathered. There is a lot of misinformation in the Internet, but there is a lot of real helpful information in the Internet.

And one of the things that I always do is empower women. First of all, you’re not a victim to breast cancer or to any disease. This is an unfortunate medical diagnosis, but it can be a chronic metabolic disease that you learn to manage. And you definitely need the help of your medical oncology team, but you want to make sure you’re getting the right treatment.

So that’s where I think if you Google naturopathic physicians in where you, in your area, or naturopathic oncology physicians or integrative and holistic care for breast cancer, there are people all over the United States who consult to provide this guidance and this information that is needed.

And you definitely have a legal and medical right to save your oncologist after the treatment is recommended. That’s great. I need a second opinion. And they are then required to refer you to one of their colleagues either within their hospital or without of the hospital. And this is especially important for women who are in the middle of the country or in, who are in a more rural area where there isn’t a medical university facility that I think it’s very important to request a second opinion from a university medical hospital, which is more up to date on the latest research.

And with the Internet these days, you can have that appointment through telemedicine or Zoom. You definitely don’t necessarily need to travel hundreds of miles for a second opinion. They can send over your records and you can meet. Through telemedicine for the doctor’s second opinion.

 

Understanding Breast Cancer

Victor Dwyer: And I want to take a step back for a second on what exactly, for the audience that doesn’t know yet, what exactly is breast cancer and how is it a little bit different than other types of cancer that may form?

Dr. Carol Lourie: Great question. Breast cancer is cancer that is located in the breast just as colon cancer is located in the colon. Now, there is this top-level diagnosis of breast cancer, but then when there is a biopsy, the biopsy takes a sample from the tumor and sends it to the pathology lab, and the clinical parameters of your disease, of the disease, is, are then verified.

So, it could be estrogen and progesterone positive or negative. And then there is the HER2 new protein. So, that’s the top level. Is it hormonally driven or is it triple negative? There is, there are breast cancers which appear and they are not hormonally driven. There’s a big debate within the medical oncology and the integrative oncology world of “Is estrogen harmful? And is it acceptable to take estrogen after you’ve had breast cancer?”

And there are split camps. I’m not going to get into that conversation right now, but, so, the medical treatment wants to address the fact that you have had breast cancer. They want to remove the tumor. Sometimes there’s multiple tumors inside of a breast and they may recommend something called neoadjuvant chemotherapy, which is chemotherapy before surgery to see if the tumors can shrink and then they may recommend a mastectomy.

So, it’s very important. The statistics about “Is there a better outcome if the breast is removed or not?” vary and it really depends on the health of the woman and the type of cancer involved. So, I hope that explains a little bit. Breast cancer is a disease where the cells have stopped paying attention to the regular rules of start and stop.

Usually cells get to a certain point and then they multiply and then they die, but with breast cancer cells, because estrogen is like gas for the cancer cells, as is sugar, the cells keep dividing. And not only do they continue to divide, but they think they want to call over across the street and the next neighbors and the neighboring town, and they want to gather together and form a tumor.

That’s called cell signaling and metastasis and proliferation. But the job of medical oncology and Science-based integrative strategies and herbs and botanical medicine, such as some of what Sylvie supplies through The Beljanski Foundation, our job is to get these cells healthy and to start paying attention to the rules of stop and go.

And also to really begin to connect in a healthier way with the woman’s body.

Sylvie Beljanski: I would like to go back to something you just said before answering Victor’s questions. You mentioned the importance of going, getting a second opinion, and you said that it is a duty of the doctor to refer you to a colleague.

But when you are in a hospital environment and you see a conventional doctor, chances are he’s going to refer you to another conventional doctor and you are going to have two very similar actually opinions. I think if you want to have something a different, really a different opinion, you have to search for an integrative doctor who will have another kind of perspective and offer other solutions to the table.

 

Integrative Oncology and Treatment Strategies

Sylvie Beljanski: Can you tell us how integrative care can benefit a woman who is going through breast cancer and how is that going to be a different experience compared to conventional only medicine, environment?

Dr. Carol Lourie: First of all, I think it’s very important that you there are functional medicine doctors, there are naturopathic physicians and there are medical doctors and osteopaths who specialize in integrative oncology. And there’s a very big difference between a regular functional medicine physician and somebody who has integrative oncology training.

So, I think it’s very important to find somebody who is trained in integrative oncology. There are different types of practitioners. I’m a practitioner that believes in taking the best of both worlds, using what medical oncology research has shown and employing what I apply. I’m, there are people who say never do regular treatment. That’s not the kind of practitioner that I am.

I think it’s important to follow the Science and statistics and take the best of both worlds. That being said, medical treatments can be and often are very damaging to the healthy cells. They create a lot of inflammation. They create a very specific form of inflammation called oxidative stress, specifically with radiation.

And, unfortunately, my experience has been that when you’re meeting with your oncology team regarding chemotherapy and especially radiation, these intense possibly harmful side effects are not often discussed. So, that’s where education is very important. And if you know about them through working with an integrated practitioner, and this is one of the things I provide in my online coaching program, you can then talk to the doctor about it and then you can safely use within the parameters of what is safe when you’re in the middle of medical treatments, integrative tools to reduce these side effects.

For example, let’s take chemotherapy. There is a lot of research that provides the benefit of intermittent fasting before you go into your infusion. And what happens when you fast and you want to fast for, I’d say 14 to 16 hours before your infusion is your healthy cells go into protective mode and shut down.

And your cancer cells need glucose or sugar all the time. They’re ravenous. They’re looking for food. So, when you get that infusion, first you’re given steroids and then you’re given the medication, your healthy cells put up a barrier and your cancer cells go, “Oh great, food!” and they open up and they uptake the chemotherapy at a higher percentage rate.

That’s very beneficial. If you’re receiving treatment, you want it to work. And then so the cancer cells are receiving more of the chemotherapy and the healthy cells are being protected. Then, there are specific strategies you can use. A lot of the oncologists say absolutely no supplements ever during treatment.

Unfortunately, that’s not based on Science. There’s a lot of research that has shown the benefit of using certain supplements during treatment. However, you want to be very respectful of chemotherapy. This is very easy. Three days before your infusion, and for two days after, you stop your supplements.

So, you’re not interfering with the chemotherapy, but the rest of the two and a half weeks when you’re, if you’re on a three-week infusion schedule, you are able to provide your body with the nutrients she needs and recover your, the health of your intestines. Just doing a few simple things can make a really big difference in the outcome of how you feel and also the outcome of the treatment.

That’s chemotherapy. Radiation. Radiation is every day. Radiation creates an enormous amount of oxidative stress. It can create more aggressive cancer in the opposite breast that can show up years later. And this is never on, in my experience, I’ve never had a woman have an oncolo, a radiation oncologist discuss this with her.

I think this is very important knowledge. There are certain supplements you absolutely do not want to take during radiation, vitamin E being one of them. However, you can safely take probiotics. You can safely do my proprietary healing smoothie, which has a certain type of P Isolate protein in it with some blueberries and some other natural ingredients.

And then, as soon as you’re done with radiation, you want to take a very specific form of vitamin E. Never take vitamin E during radiation, but you can take it as soon as you’re done. The annatto E, the annatto plant, it’s known as the lipstick plant, has been very well-researched and there’s the delta and the gamma and there’s the tocopherols and tocotrienols.

And the beauty of science and research is they found that the tocotrienols have very powerful antioxidant ability for breast cancer, specifically the delta and the gamma form. So it’s very easy to take supplements made to Science-based pharmaceutical quality if you know this information and you want to start that as soon as you’re done radiation.

This is using the best of both worlds. It’s employing. medical knowledge and Science-based studies of botanical medicine and herbs and how you can really benefit from utilizing both in your health optimization during and after treatment.

Sylvie Beljanski: Yeah. Thank you for that. And I think a lot of women do not know about all those details and indeed, individualized coaching like what you are able to provide can be of a extremely valuable resource when, once again, the sky is falling upon you and you don’t know where to turn.

I would add to what you said about, and this is very wise to just, do your usual beneficial, take your usual beneficial supplements, and make a little window for the time of the chemotherapy–I would add that as a, research and especially the research we have been doing at The Beljaanski Foundation has been shown, showing that there are some plant extracts like Pao Pereira or Rauwolfia Vomitoria, which actually benefit when taken in synergy with chemotherapies.

This has been already documented and those studies are available on the website of the foundation and can be shared with a doctor. So, I just wanted to add that. Do you have any specific thoughts on that topic?

Dr. Carol Lourie: Oh, I think it’s very important to share references with medical oncology physicians and you need to find a physician who will respect and listen to you. And that is the first.

I often hear unfortunate stories of women being disrespective and, disrespected and poo-pooed by their physicians and sometimes even treated rudely, unfortunately. And I’ve had women tell me where physicians are shown research and said, “I don’t believe this.” I think it’s very important that a woman not feel like she has no choice.

If you’re working with a physician and you bring in medical research that’s been published in PubMed, that is valid research and the doctor says, “I don’t believe this, and I think there’s a Science problem here.” It shouldn’t be like that. I want to remind women that you are employing the physician.

So, if the basis of healing is you need to be working with somebody who respects and cares, and listens to you. And I, sometimes that doesn’t happen. doctors get burned out and they lose that. Just make sure that when you are, as Sylvie has said, often you feel like the world is collapsing, the sky is falling–and after that initial shock wears off, it’s very important to move slowly and with intention through this treatment to make sure you’re working with a team that respects and will listen to you.

And that if you are, gather research and, Sylvie’s products are phenomenal and they are very well referenced and researched. If you bring that into your medical team and they go, “I don’t believe this,” then there’s a problem. And depending where you are, you can find new physicians. I often encourage women to find new physicians to work with who will be more respectful of science. It’s not a matter of opinion. It’s a science fact here.

 

Preparing for Chemotherapy and Lifestyle Changes

Sylvie Beljanski: How do you prepare your body and your mind for treatment? Let’s suppose somebody has, find you and wants to follow your protocol to address chemotherapy and radiotherapy. What is your approach, generally?

I know we cannot enter into, everybody’s individual, but what are the…

Dr. Carol Lourie: In general, there is a preparing for chemotherapy method that we use. Really, the lifestyle of how a woman has been prior to the diagnosis of breast cancer. It’s a very big clue that what has been happening in the past is not working for your body and your health. So, I think there needs to be a little bit of an unpacking moment of conversations about what were the stresses that contributed to this disease and sometimes a woman has said to me I don’t have any stresses now, which I mean, we all have stresses.

That’s like we’re out of touch. And I’ve said okay, what happened 25 or 30 years ago? And she goes, “Oh yeah I had some upsetting experiences then.” And she starts to tell me what they were and they were actually quite traumatic, but she, in protecting herself through them, she decided that they weren’t traumatic.

They were quote unquote upsetting. And here we are, 30 years later, she had a lot of stress at work or in her family. And then her cells decided I can’t keep up with this stress. And here we have this chronic metabolic disease of diagnosis of breast cancer. It’s very important, I think, to unravel and unpack what happened in the past that contributed to this.

And then really take apart every aspect of the lifestyle. The Standard American Diet and the Standard American Lifestyle are research-proven to create chronic disease. Either diabetes, hypertension, obesity, autoimmune illness, all forms of cancer. So, the standard American diet is, has got to go. And when you look at the Japanese culture in the early 1800s, before it became Westernized, They had, they were a soy-based, they were plant, and they were fish.

They had almost no breast cancer, like a 2 to 3%. And you can see their breast cancer rate increase as their society became more Westernized. Western foods are not helpful. There’s an enormous amount of research about the Blue Zones and the Blue Zone diet, and the Blue Zone is not just about eating healthy, it’s about where the people live.

They’re walking up these hills all the time. And the standard American lifestyle, we’re all sitting on our, in our chairs too much, too often. I purposely go out of my house, I have these big hills, and I make sure five times a week I’m up those hills at a very quick pace. We have to go out of our comfort zone to pay attention to what helps people live healthy and long lives because the standard American diet and lifestyle is not part of it.

Preparing for chemotherapy involves these conversations–looking at the lifestyle, looking at a woman’s emotional landscape. What are you happy about? What are you not happy about? What, in an deal world, would you change? It’s very interesting when you talk to a woman, she would say, “Oh, I hate my job.”

And here you are going to work every day at a job where maybe the woman is being, not treated well. And she feels she has to stay there because she’s one of the bread earners for the family. What are the options? Creating options for more happiness is very important because it’s, this is where, the beauty of working with somebody who understands the complexity of disease.

It’s not just one thing. It’s not like when there was the Chernobyl accident, people ended up with, thyroid cancer and leukemia, and that was one plus one equals two. They were exposed to high levels of radioactivity. But breast cancer is a more complicated and complex disease, so we need to take into consideration everything that went into that. And that’s part of preparing for treatment. And mindset is critical.

When you show up for chemotherapy or radiation, you’re not a victim to this treatment. And a woman starts out by working with me, “Oh, I have to do this, or the doctor told me I need to do this, or I’m going to do this.” So, that’s a woman saying that she’s not in charge.

So I work with, okay, so the doctor made a suggestion and you are choosing to do it. So, when you show up for chemotherapy, you’re choosing to receive this treatment and visualization is very important. The chemotherapy is getting in, you want to visualize the healthy cells being protected and the chemo, and the cancer cells going, “Oh great, here’s treatment, I’m going to go away.”

Visualization is critical. And the same for radiation. And the same for every single thing that is involved in healing your body and your mind after the diagnosis of breast cancer.

Sylvie Beljanski: Yeah, to be at peace with the choices that you make both for choices of treatments and choices of, lifestyle choices that you make on a everyday, everyday basis.

I feel that the conventional approach is very often trying to blame people for their genes, for example, saying first thing is to do to terrorize people to see if they have some gene mutation. In fact, gene mutation, mutations are like 7 percent of all cancer.

Dr. Carol Lourie: Yeah, very small percent, very small.

Sylvie Beljanski: And that let people avoid looking at the big picture, which is all the choices that we make every day and all the emotions indeed that we are, have to go through, how we deal with those emotions on a daily basis. And it feels normal if you are, you were speaking of a woman going to work that she hates on a daily basis.

If you force yourself to do something, then the emotions have to express themselves in another way. You don’t want, you don’t want to go to this job. If you get sick and you end up in the hospital, you are not going to go to the job. But that’s not the exit vision that you, the exit that you envisioned.

Dr. Carol Lourie: But it’s your body saying, “You can’t do this anymore.”

Sylvie Beljanski: Exactly.

Dr. Carol Lourie: And women endure a lot of hardship. It’s the stress I hear and the tragedies and the sadness and the trauma of women over the years is great. And one of the things that I believe is healing is always possible and healing can be just finding somebody to talk to about it and who isn’t judgmental and doesn’t say “You should have done this or why didn’t you do that?”

Or, “That wasn’t really a big deal. Why are you upset about it?” That doesn’t work. Acknowledging that you’ve had an upsetting or traumatic experience in the past, and that it has then influenced your choices and your ability and your health is the beginning of healing. And as you begin to rid yourself of that shame or guilt or whatever anger, it’s really appropriate. All of these emotions are very appropriate.

Every time you do a little bit of inner work and you let that go you’re a step closer to recovering yourself. And as you recover yourself, there’s less inflammation. And inflammation is the foundation of all disease, autoimmune disease, migraine headaches, polycystic ovarian syndrome, endometriosis, infertility, cancer. It is in the foundation of all disease.

So, when you look at your life through that lens of “What is inflaming me. What is agitating me? What am I doing that I don’t really want to do?” Now we all have to do things we really don’t want to do, like the laundry and folding the clothes–that’s being an adult, but I’m talking about going to a job every day where the boss is abusive or, you’re mistreated or you’re underpaid or you don’t like it and you’d feel like you have no options.

That’s very distressing. And having somebody help you figure out what your options are. can make a huge difference in a woman’s health.

 

The Role of Stress and Emotional Health

Victor Dwyer: Isn’t it stress like one of the biggest factors of causing like almost all cancers, but also known as like breast cancer as well. So, like stress is probably one very high up there when it comes down to potentially causing cancer.

So, I would assume that these stressful events are not only hurting you emotionally, but also physically by increasing your chance of cancer, right?

Dr. Carol Lourie: There’s a lot of research on the impact of stress on the body. The impact of stress raises the cortisol level, raises the inflammatory markers, impacts sleep, impacts digestion, impacts cardiovascular health.

And so stress is involved in the, just as inflammation is the foundation of all chronic disease, stress contributes to all chronic disease and as well as cancer. There’s a lot of research on the impact of stress and cardiovascular disease and migraine headaches, and infertility and cancer. And stress creates, it’s not, people say it’s just stress. There’s no, there’s meaning there’s no physical component to stress.

There actually is a physical component to stress and it has been well documented what those physical components are. There’s a higher rate of diabetes and obesity and leptin in people who are stressed. And when you have leptin, it is an inflammatory protein that then contributes more towards the development of blood sugar problems.

And if you have blood sugar problems, cancer loves sugar. So, you’re giving your cancer cells gas for the cancer gas tank. So, the fact that you’re, a woman is overweight and has pre-diabetes–this drives me crazy when a woman goes and gets her hemoglobin A1C, which is an average of two to three months of the blood sugar, and the normal is 5.6, and a woman’s will be 5. 8.

And the doctor will say “You’re pre-diabetic, let’s just wait and see.” There’s no just wait and see when you have cancer and, or even without cancer, you don’t want to wait and see because what you’ve been doing so far with your lifestyle and your eating is contributing to diabetes.

And adult-onset diabetes is a reversible and recoverable disease, a hundred percent. With lifestyle interventions, a few supplements and changing, divorcing the standard American diet. I love that phrase. You need to divorce the standard American diet because it’s not doing you any good. It’s contributing to your illness.

Women can, and men, can get their Hemoglobin A1C back down, if it’s beginning to be elevated. Look at what you’re eating, go to a nutritionist who is integratively-based because, unfortunately, I hear this from women with breast cancer–they go to the nutritionist at the oncology team and they’re told, and this is not okay, “Eat everything in moderation.”

That is one of the worst things that can be said to someone who’s had cancer. You don’t, you can’t do that anymore. You need to choose not to do that anymore. Now, I’m not talking about you’re on vacation, it’s a holiday, the holidays, it’s your anniversary or birthday. That’s a different experience. 99 percent of the time, you’re, you have to choose not to eat everything in moderation.

You change your perspective about food. And you’re saving money because you’re not spending money on boxed food that has red dye and chemicals in it. It’s, but it’s a process. These changes take time. It takes a hundred days to create new habits. This is not something that happens overnight.

 

Dr. Lourie’s Coaching Program

Sylvie Beljanski: So, for somebody who would join your coaching program, what are the big steps?

What to expect when you join your coaching program?

Dr. Carol Lourie: You can see that I’m very engaged with the women in my group. I’m very forthcoming. I’m in the process of changing how I operate this. So, we’re going now down to a four-week program instead of six weeks and there’s going to be other options involved and it’s going to be on demand.

The woman will watch the webinar where I explain about my approach and then she will join the program and I will be teaching the four weeks throughout, consistently, so she’ll be able to show up when her schedule allows, because I hear this all the time from women, “I really want to watch your webinar, but I’m working,” or “I have to take care of my parents,” or “I have to go to the doctors for an appointment.”

So, creating this on demand will allow a woman to watch it when she can. And then she can watch the, come to the live classes and hear me talk and ask me lots of questions. A couple of different, there’ll be different options throughout the month or so. So, that is one thing. And the class schedule will be flexible.

Right now, I go through the six weeks with nutrition and supplements and trauma. And then we talk about advanced integrative testing and lifestyle and stopping the, reducing the side effects of tamoxifen and aromatase inhibitors, which is very intense. But, you don’t have to do that with this new parameter that I’ll be sharing.

You can come in at any class that you want that’s most attractive to you and important. But I want to say that the foundation of where I always start when I work individually with women is “How are you eating?” And I think because if you’re eating, box cereal and English muffins for breakfast that’s not going to, you’re putting, you’re putting gas in the cancer gas tank.

So, there needs to be a lot of education about that because that’s never discussed. And I always look at weight. Now, I’m not thinking that everybody needs to be super skinny, but women need to understand that when there is extra weight, there’s extra fat and estrogen is very sneaky. It hides out in that extra fat.

And even though they might be on tamoxifen or aromatase inhibitor, it still makes more work to block that estrogen if there’s extra fat. And there is now a lot of research about the importance of replacing fat with muscle. As we get older, if, the more we can replace fat with muscle, the healthier we are.

And my daughter said to me, “Mom, I don’t want you to end up in a wheelchair like granny.” And I said, “That’s it. I’m walking up that hill four times a week.” I am, and whether you end up in a wheelchair when you’re in your nineties is determined by how you are, the health you have in your fifties, sixties and seventies.

So, it’s never too early to take charge of that. And it takes a while to develop the stamina to begin to build muscle. You need to find an exercise program where you’re not in a class with 20-year-olds. You need to find an exercise class with women your own age who, and if you’re deconditioned, I have this philosophy of five minutes out and five minutes back, which is, I was working with a woman and she had what I call the couch potato syndrome, meaning, she was so debilitated after being on tamoxifen for 10 years that she couldn’t do nothing other than be on the couch.

So, she started with my healing smoothie and changing how she ate. And then after two months, she said “I have a little bit more energy now, I’m going to start to exercise.”

And she had a machine in her garage and I said, “Great, go on it for five minutes.” She said, “Oh no, that’s going to be too little.” And I said, “No, it’s just the right amount of time.” So, she went on it for five minutes and she said I only did five minutes and I’m tired. It’s not worth it.

And I said, “This is where mindset comes in. Two months ago, you couldn’t get off the couch and now you can do five minutes. I think that’s fantastic. Pat yourself on the back, congratulate yourself. Let’s stay at five minutes for four days and then on day five, go up to six minutes.” And so this is how we built her up. And eventually, after another two months, she was able to do 20 minutes, which was huge.

And then she says to me, “I have a secret. I love to ride bikes.” Now, if you ask me to ride a bike or go swimming, it’s never happening. This is why it’s very important to find a form of exercise that works for you. And I said, “It’s great. It’s your birthday coming up, go to the local bookstore, bookstore, bike store, and buy yourself a really good bike.”

And she brought her husband and her 14-year-old son and the three of them bought great bikes and they started to bike together as a family, which getting her 14-year-old son away from his phone was a major accomplishment. And their first weekend, they biked five miles and she said, “Oh, it’s only five miles.”

Here’s the only thing again. Notice the mindset. I said, “Are you kidding? Five months ago, you couldn’t get off the couch. This is huge.” They kept at it, and they eventually were biking 50 miles a day. Her husband developed muscle, she developed muscle, her son developed muscle, and his self-esteem improved.

And then she said “I really want to do this bike ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles.” And she biked, from the couch potato syndrome, nine months later, she biked 25 miles a day for four days in a row to raise money for breast cancer. So, this is the result of starting with five minutes and it’s the result of start, it’s a true story, starting with the right attitude.

You’re deconditioned, of course you can’t do more than five minutes. You need to go slow and you need to understand that when you see things on television or some, in-shape person who’s never exercised before, it’s not real. We have to be real and we need to be proud of ourselves more too. Too often women don’t pat themselves on their back.

Every time you say no to eating something that is made with regular sugar and is so sweet, you’re, it’s an achievement. So, there’s little things that add up to create a whole and that whole is healing your body and your mind.

Sylvie Beljanski: What a great story and thank you. Thank you for sharing that.

 

Conclusion and Contact Information

Sylvie Beljanski: So people, if people want, been moved by this story and they can relate to that and they feel that you really, it would make a huge difference to have somebody in their corner saying, yes, this, try to do this push them to achieve, make little achievements and little by little.

Every big journey starts with one step. Where can people find you and sign up for your program?

Dr. Carol Lourie: Right now my program, my new program is in the middle of being redeveloped, but you can find me at my name, Carol, C A R O L, Lourie, L O U R I E dot com. There’s a Contact Me page there, and I respond personally to every, everyone I hear from, and we can have a little bit of a conversation.

If it turns out you want to be on my new group life-coaching program, I’ll add you to the waitlist. And I also do private consultations.

Sylvie Beljanski: Very good.

Victor Dwyer: Awesome. Thank you so much, Dr. Lourie, for joining. It’s been great having you. And thank you everyone for the audience that has watched up to this point as well.

This is The Beljanski Cancer Talk Show, and we’ll catch you next time. Thanks for watching.

Dr. Carol Lourie: Thank you so much.

Dr. Carol Lourie is a dedicated practitioner with over three decades of experience as a Naturopath, Acupuncturist, and Homeopath. Her journey into specialized breast cancer care began after accompanying a friend through 18-months of treatments and recovery.

This experience highlighted the gaps in standard oncology care, inspiring her to develop science-based, holistic strategies for women with breast cancer.
Now, Dr. Lourie’s integrative protocols address the metabolic, lifestyle, and emotional factors contributing to breast cancer. Her methods are designed to reduce treatment side effects, decrease the impact of hormonal therapy, and lower the risk of recurrence.

Her unique skills encourage the focus on emotional wellness and trauma recovery. Addressing past traumas is necessary for emotional well-being, and a positive mindset is vital for healing. Integrating strategies for emotional resilience and emotional wellness empowers women to establish a foundation for a healthier, more fulfilling life.

For over 20 years, Dr. Lourie has helped thousands of women through her online live group coaching program. This program offers integrative and complementary protocols, including the “best breast cancer diet,” targeted supplementation, and strategies for cultivating a healthy, joyful life with an empowered mindset.

Her mission is to help women focus on the emotional aspects and metabolic factors of breast cancer, guiding them to recover their health and emerge healthier, stronger, and better than ever.