Beating the Odds: Chronicles of a Survivor’s Battle with Cancer, Inadequate Healthcare and Social Injustice

By Andrew Glen

This is a passionate, emotionally charged, and poignant look into the trials and tribulations of a Stage IV Metastatic bladder cancer patient. Given the 16% survival rate and a best-case scenario of 2 to 5 years to live, Andrew Glen had to come to terms not only with his own mortality but also with the unexpected limitations of the Canadian healthcare system, and the cold indifference of his insurance provider and government agencies. Determined to beat the disease, he became an effective self-advocate in seeking the best care from an overburdened healthcare system and sought out alternative treatments, which he feels greatly contributed to his recovery from this dreaded disease. He offers hope for other cancer patients in his discussion of the role of Ayurveda medicine and complimentary therapies in his survival and shares some enlightenment about how his relationship with God changed during and after the course of his treatment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Andrew Glen
• Release date: Nov 22, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393890751

Andrew Glen

In 2008 I was diagnosed with bladder cancer and I underwent two years of treatment including chemotherapy, radiation and surgery. In January of 2010 I had my bladder removed and thankfully I have been cancer free since then.  In 2014 I self-published my memoir “Beating the Odds”, A Chronicle of a Cancer Survivor’s Battle with Cancer, Inadequate Healthcare and Social Injustice. Unlike most cancer survivor success stories, my book differs because it provides the reader with a poignant look into the trials and tribulations that all cancer patients have to deal with above and beyond their treatment. Since then I have gone on to publish: “The Reporter” a unique and poignant story given the current events and public sentiment. It is a fast-paced tale of a tormented woman reporter, who accidentally kills a man in self-defence on her way home from work one night. She soon discovers that the man was a war vet living on the street, facts that are shockingly similar to her own dad’s situation. “After The Sun Rises” a sequel to “The Reporter”. After a car accident leaves Jill and her family devastated they must deal with the aftermath with the help of an unsuspecting helper. The woman who caused the accident. “The Grotto and Other Stories” a collection of short stories based on real life events. “C-ancer-athartic poems” a book of poetry containing poems I wrote during and after my cancer treatment. “Eli and the Fisherman” a heartwarming children’s book that tells the story of a young boy and an old fisherman. “Sebastian’s Fish” a delightful children’s story about a boy who goes to buy his first fish. “Didi’s Demise” in “Sebastian’s Fish” Sebastian bought his first fish. Now the family are getting a cat-Charlie-. What will that mean for poor Didi? Read to find out. *Note: All children’s books were illustrated by the incredible Jonathan (JJ) Anderson.*

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Andrew Glen

Copyright © 2015 by Andrew Glen

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without prior written permission, except in the case of brief quotations for inclusion in reviews.

For Nan

(1937-2015)

Acknowledgements

I would like to dedicate this book to my parents, for having me. I wouldn’t be here without them literally and figuratively. For always being there when I needed them. For being loving, and kind, and supportive no matter if we agreed or disagreed. For instilling in me a fighting spirit and encouraging me to never give up no matter how dire the situation appeared. For teaching me to stand up for myself; to fight for what is right, for what you believe in and for justice for all. I love you both.

I am grateful to my wife Lana, who taught me it was okay to love and be loved again. For reigniting the flame in my broken heart. For being loving, kind, caring and supportive throughout all of this. Most of all, for always being there when I needed her to be, no matter what. I love you very much.

Thank you to my sons Eli and Sebastian for showing me what it was like to be a kid again. To see that there is still innocence in the world and how beautiful it all is. But most of all, thank you for giving me a reason to live: a reason to fight and to never give up. I love you both.

Special thanks to the Murray family: Glenn, Mary, Cameron, Dylan, and Justin. They were my adopted family whenever I needed to go to Toronto. Glenn and Mary literally gave up their bed to Lana and me whenever we went there. They always helped out with the kids and spending time at Camp Murray will always be a special memory for my boys. Thanks again, everyone: many blessings on your house.

Many thanks to Larry and Sean McGuire who initially read my book and helped with the editing. Bless you both.

Also Marc at Bright Quest Publishing (www.bright-quest.com) for believing in me, and my story and providing an immense help in getting it published. Bless him also.

To Jennifer O’Brien who read my book and did an amazing job of editing it for the print version. Many blessings upon her and her family.

Finally, to all of you who played a part in helping me and my family to get through all this. Your love and support made all of this possible. I would not be here without the contributions of so many people, too numerous to mention. Again thank you. You helped to save my life. I love you all

Table of Contents

PREFACE            7             

CHAPTER 1 -Background - Young and Reckless     10

CHAPTER 2 -Diagnosis and Surgery:

The Truth the Whole Truth       48   

CHAPTER 3 -Treatments: Slash, Burn and Poison    92

-Radiation        115

-Chemotherapy       117

-Surgery         137           

CHAPTER 4 -Dr. Sharma:

The Guru of Oakwood Avenue      145   

CHAPTER 5 -Cancer and Benefits:  

The Good the Bad the Ugly   169        -The Good                169  - The Bad           175       - The Ugly        227              CHAPTER 6–Cancer and God:

When All Hope is Lost       237 

CHAPTER 7 -Conclusion:

Is This the End or Is This the Beginning   246 

Suggested Reading         252   

Preface

Everything gives you cancer; there’s no cure; there’s no answer.  -Joe Jackson

On January 13th, 2008 a small drop of blood hit the rim of my toilet and from that moment forward my life changed in so many ways.

And so a new chapter of my life begins.

This is my story of my battle with bladder cancer and the subsequent struggles I would also have to endure. Struggles that may seem inconceivable in a country like Canada. This is an accurate account of my cancer journey although at times it’s still hard to believe, that all of this happened. This was/is my catharsis.

My other choice, other than writing this story of course, would’ve been to put out a heartfelt plea on You Tube. I am not trying to be insensitive to those who have, but it seems to be the only way to get noticed nowadays.

My illness had a profound effect on me.

It changed my relationship with God and made me appreciate even more those things that we sometimes take for granted, my family for example. I cannot imagine what it would have been like going through all this alone. My wife Lana was incredibly loving and supportive throughout and still is. I am truly blessed to be with her. And my sons were my inspiration to keep on fighting.

It allowed me to experience the care of a wonderful Ayurvedic doctor who, fortunately for me, followed his destiny and was right there when I needed him, like a guardian angel.

Then just as quickly as he came, he was gone, disappearing into thin air.

My illness also forced me come to terms with some stark realities.

How woefully inept and inadequate our healthcare system has become due to continuous government cutbacks. Anyone who thinks we still have the world’s best healthcare hasn’t had to use it recently.

I learned that doctors’ hands are tied because they can only administer drugs that have been approved by Health Canada and then by the hospital administrators.

I discovered that pharmaceutical and insurance companies only priority is to the shareholders and their profit margins and not the wellbeing of the people they are supposed to be or are claiming to be helping.

I found that government agencies fail to fulfill their mandate to look after the needs of vulnerable Canadians (especially cancer victims) by making it next to impossible for anyone to qualify for their benefits, namely, disability benefits or disability tax credits.

That despite laws to ensure job security during an illness an employer can still leave a cancer patient and his family out in the cold to fend for themselves. 

But most reassuring, I discovered that I could improve my health through complementary therapies and sound nutrition.

I also couldn’t get over the irony of how well off financially Lana and the boys would be if I had died. I am worth more to them dead than alive. Sure, they would be fatherless but they would have paid off the house and have money to spare. The boys would have adjusted as most kids do and I am sure Lana would have been fine without me. They would be lonely some days, but we all adjust; we have to. Don’t think I haven’t thought that over more than a few times; better off dead.

For those of you fighting cancer this is what worked for me, this is what I did. I hope it will work for you, and if not, well then I hope you will find something that will. I believe that cancer can be beaten.

But it is going to take a concerted effort from all sides; traditional, conventional, alternative or complementary. Pick one. Pick them all. It doesn’t really matter but don’t ever give up! This is life we are talking about and sometimes we have to fight damn hard to save it. .

Andrew Glen... Cancer Survivor, April 9th, 2015

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Background – Young and Reckless

Cause and effect?

Let me start by saying this, I never lived a model life and maybe I could have made other decisions or made better choices but couldn’t we all have? I have always tried to do my best but some of my actions could easily have contributed to my demise.

I come from a typical working-class family, the second oldest of seven kids. Ours too was a hard knock life, but without a Daddy Warbucks there at the end to ease our financial woes. Annie had nothing on us.

Despite this my parents were always loving and kind. They did the best they could with what they had to give us as normal an upbringing as one could expect.

They taught us to be honest, fair and thoughtful no matter what. They taught us also to always give an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay and that every man and woman deserved this.

They taught us to fight for justice and equality and to treat our fellow human beings with love, compassion and dignity, because everyone deserved this also.

We were also taught to cheer for the underdog (I have been a Toronto Maple Leaf fan all my life and you cannot be any more of an underdog than that).

Our door was always open to friends and neighbours alike and the kettle was always on for a ‘cuppa tea’ as many people will attest to. Many nights were spent around our kitchen table discussing the matters of the world and how we could all make it a better place. We didn’t always agree but we always agreed to disagree.

My cancer could have come from numerous sources. It could have been a fluke as some are. I could have been genetically predisposed as is the fashion these days.

It could have been unexplainable as many of them are. Pity the poor schmucks or children who get cancer and have never had a drink or smoked a cigarette or otherwise in their entire lives.

It could quite possibly have come from sucking in packs of second hand smoke at the parties my parents used to have when we were kids. My parents always enjoyed a good time especially at the holidays and our house was always packed with uncles and aunts and cousins especially around Christmas time for our annual Christmas party.

Nearly all of my uncles and aunts as well as my parents smoked and the living room quickly filled up with smoke. There was so much smoke you could hardly see across the room through the blue haze of second hand smoke.

My cancer could possibly have been self-induced, due to my rather reckless lifestyle that started in high school and continued into university and beyond.

I didn’t start drinking or smoking until I was at least seventeen because until then most of my time was spent playing soccer or road hockey. I played soccer seven days a week until I graduated from university at the age of twenty-one.

In our neighbourhood growing up we played road hockey whenever and wherever we could. Without dating myself too much here, there were no video games per se except for maybe Pong and Asteroids.

I am not sure how many channels were on T.V. Our family never had cable when we were growing up so we only got three or four channels depending on how good one was with the rabbit ears. Yes, it is hard to imagine that I am only fifty-three; some might be thinking that these things date back to the turn of the century but they don’t.

When I first started drinking and smoking it was only on weekends. Ironically, I could never tolerate alcohol when I first started drinking and I would almost always throw up. I don’t know why I bothered to keep on trying it; probably to look cool or to fit in like everybody else. Peer pressure as they say.

Eventually I built up a tolerance to it and these drinking sessions quickly turned into all-nighters and I soon became the first to arrive and the last to leave any party. Most parties in high school consisted of us trying to outdo each other as in how much we could drink and how wasted we could get.

It was the same with smoking. I hated smoking at first. I started smoking to look cool, or tough, or for an ‘image’ as most misinformed teens do.

Along with alcohol and smoking there were also drugs. Everyone I knew and I mean everyone was taking drugs. There was always plenty of pot to go around, as well as, hash or oil or lube.

I also dabbled in pills. Blues black beauties yellow jackets or purple hearts colourful names for speed. I took them because I liked the body buzz. I also took them because I liked how I could stay up all night and, of course, drink even more.

But I was young and invincible, or so I thought. I also thought I would live forever, which of course no one ever does. I never paid any attention to the consequences of my actions. Moderation is the key a wise man once said. But I never adhered to this advice, I didn’t care; I was living by another adage: I was living in the moment, to the nth degree.

I blame Leonard Cohen. He was the first to encourage me with the old if it feels good do it credo. I remember seeing a documentary on him in high school English class. He was writing poetry and vacationing on the Greek Islands. Looked like a pretty good lifestyle to me. In the movie I remember him saying that if you are in the moment and the moment feels good then why change it? I believe now maybe I took him a little too literal. Let’s be honest. I had become a full blown addict.

(I hope my kids never read this until I can properly explain the dangers of all this.) Looking back I don’t know if I would do anything differently. I mean if I knew I would eventually get cancer I would have toned it down a bit that’s for sure. I had a blast in high school and university, but I have since learned that every action has a reaction or a consequence. 

So should everyone else.

Unfortunately, I didn’t settle down until I met my wife, Lana, who has been an immensely loving, caring and supportive wife and friend throughout all of this. I couldn’t imagine having to go through all this with anybody else. I am very fortunate to be with her.

Another contributing factor to my cancer may have been the time I spent working on a local golf course. It was just after I graduated from university. I was trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life and my Political Science and English degree. I never really have figured out what to do with my life or my degree, I’m fifty-three now and running out of time.

Actually, I’ve stopped trying to figure out what to do with my degree. As for my life, I just live one day at a time now always hoping to see tomorrow; or as I prefer the day after tomorrow. Near death experiences have a way of changing people.

My position at the golf course was to spray. Spray. Spray. Spray. I sprayed pesticides, insecticides, herbicides or fungicides every day for five years. It was a very private and very exclusive club and they expected the golf course to look a certain way. This involved a lot of spraying to ward off turf diseases and such.

In fact, the club spent more money on chemicals in a year to keep the grass looking green than they paid me to spray them. Every second weekend I cut greens, usually hung over. I and everyone else I worked with there used to joke that I sprayed so much that my kids would have square heads. Well, who’s laughing now? By the way my kids’ heads are round. Thank God.

At the time no government or environmental agency linked pesticide use with cancer, but that is slowly changing. None of my doctors would give credence to pesticide use and cancer either. They all asked if I ever smoked and when I said yes they said that was the culprit. Whenever I mentioned the pesticides they always said there was no link.

Dr. Sharma (whom I discuss later) disagreed, however. He said that my type of cancer, bladder cancer, was directly attributed to my exposure to the pesticides.

He said they probably entered into my body through my skin as this is the body’s biggest organ. My body was constantly trying to flush out the toxins as they went through my body’s filtration system, i.e. the liver, kidneys and bladder. Something must have got stuck in my bladder. Smoking is usually associated with respiratory diseases he said.

Research is now finding that the toxins found in cigarettes are contributing to all sorts of cancers. It’s a wonder governments haven’t outlawed them. But then where would they get all that revenue from the taxes?

There are a lot of other causes of cancer too. Cancer is reaching epidemic proportions! There isn’t a day goes by that I don’t hear of someone affected by cancer. Part of this has to do with better detection methods but a lot of it has to do with how we live and the environment we live in. The food we eat and the air we breathe. I mean what do the doctors tell their patients, who never smoked?

It amazes me that we are not more concerned about these issues. Sure there are a chosen few environmentalists and such trying to make a difference but they are labeled as being crazy. Meanwhile the corporations who are continuing to make millions of dollars at the expense of the environment and our health are not! I wonder some days, who really are the crazy ones.

Ironically, just as I was finishing writing this most municipalities across the country banned the use of pesticides for residential use. Farmers and golf courses can still use and spray them however. I pity the poor souls who are responsible for that job. More than likely they will die from exposure to these pesticides and cancer rates will continue to rise the more we keep putting it on our food. But of course that is conspiratorial or crazy talk. Yeah right!

The third contributing factor to my cancer I would say was life itself and the stress and fatigue that goes along with it. Now I know everyone has their trials and tribulations in life but hear me out...I will try to be brief.

My wife, Lana, and I got married shortly after we met and since then it seems like bad luck is the only luck we’ve had. We met in February of 1999. I had just got back from working in England and she was still trying to decide whether or not she wanted to return to Vancouver B.C. It is rather ironic that she and I had been at the same wedding only a year before. Her cousin whom I also knew was getting married. She was in the wedding party and as soon as she entered the church I immediately fell in love.

Unfortunately, for me she was living in Vancouver at the time and had a boyfriend. She had just flown in for the wedding. I never talked to her at the wedding I figured she was already taken so why bother.

A year and a few days later we saw each other again. Another cousin of hers (my wife comes a very big family, her mother is one of seventeen kids) was playing at a local bar and we both just happened to be there. We talked casually as people do in a crowd. Later that night I gave her, her sister, and my brothers, a ride home.

I was the designated driver as I had given up drinking for Lent; it’s a Catholic thing. Besides, my hangovers were getting a lot worse so I really needed to cut back on my drinking or stop altogether. When I dropped them off that night we only exchanged pleasantries. A few days later as I was driving home from work I took a different way home to avoid a red light and as I entered my neighbourhood I saw her crossing the street ahead of me. She was carrying some groceries and I stopped to offer her a ride. (We call this our Sliding Door moment. Coincidence or not we might not be together if not for that fateful moment or that red light).

She reluctantly agreed to a ride because her house was only two blocks away. When we got there she asked me what I was doing that night because her brother was playing at a bar and she needed someone to go with. (We both come from musical families although neither one of us plays an instrument. I did play drums for a punk band in high school, but I