Breast Cancer Healed with Natural Therapies (Doris Sokosh)

“A healthy body, with a healthy immune system, will automatically reject any foreign materials such as cancer from the body’s system.” Ruth Sackman, from the documentary film ‘Rethinking Cancer.’

Doris Sokosh heals from stage 4 breast cancer with diet and detoxing protocols

Back in 1975, Doris Sokosh (then 38) was on her death bed. Her doctors had diagnosed her with breast cancer back in 1971, and now they were telling her there was nothing more that they could do for her. Doris had endured multiple operations which included a radical mastectomy, a hysterectomy, and then she had four skin grafts as her doctors removed some skin from her thighs to patch the open wounds upon her chest. Sokosh said. “The skin was unreal, the way they took the skin from my leg and it would burn, and at the same time my chest would bleed and I was in such pain. I lived on pills that helped with the pain.” She also had radiation, but she was not prescribed chemotherapy because her doctors felt that she would not survive the treatments.

Several months later, Doris found a painful lump in her neck and then several more developed on the right side of her abdomen. Because of this discovery, her doctor admitted her into the hospital for a gastrointestinal series. She reports that these tests were much more difficult than all the previous operations and they left her feeling very weak. In the following months her weight dropped from 135 pounds down to only 80 pounds and she became so sick that she was unable to walk, speak, or even to recognize her loved ones. “I couldn’t swallow; I couldn’t urinate,” she said. “My whole body was closing down.” Doris’s sister, Norma Forcellina, remembers her as being as fragile as glass. “She couldn’t move, you couldn’t touch her and she wouldn’t eat. All she wanted was coffee — coffee and her pain pills.” Eventually Doris reached the point where she could no longer care for herself so she moved into her mother’s home and her husband would come to visit her there.

The cancer was spread throughout her body and her family was told to make the necessary funeral arrangements and prepare to say their goodbyes. It was at this point that Doris’s husband made one last attempt to save her life. He had heard about a woman in a similar situation who had gone to Germany for cancer treatments. When he asked the woman what treatments she had received there, she said that the main protocol consisted of a diet of fresh fruit and vegetable juices. Doris’s husband found it inconceivable that a diet program could save his wife. The woman instructed him to contact The Foundation for Advancement in Cancer Therapy, which was a nonprofit organization founded by Ruth Sackman that is dedicated to providing information to the public about the use of nutrition and detoxification-based methods to treat cancer rather than using the standard protocols of chemotherapy, radiation and surgery which can often harm the body. He called and spoke directly to Ruth who sent him information about diet, supplementation, and detoxification protocols that Doris could follow from home.

Following the FACT guidelines, Doris’s husband bought a juicer and began to make a fresh juice blend of carrots, apples and celery to nourish her body. He also crushed and dissolved a variety of supplements into the fresh juice and then spoon-fed her until she was able to drink the mixture with a straw. He also made her a nutritional smoothie from yogurt, bananas, frozen pineapples, digestive enzymes, Bone Meal Powder, Kelp Powder, Brewers Yeast, raw organic honey, and vanilla bean extract. After a month of drinking the fresh juices and the smoothies she became more coherent. Doris was also given enemas twice per day, and reports that she had several detoxification episodes which included an increase in pain that was accompanied by a fever, headaches, skin rashes, along with the release of a strong bodily odor. Ruth had warned them that all of these symptoms were to be expected, as Doris’s body was releasing all of the toxins that it had accumulated over the years.

Eventually Doris reports that her eyes got stronger, she began gaining weight again and was able to come off of all of her medications. As her appetite increased she began to add raw vegetable salads to her daily meals. Just one year after sticking to a strict all-natural diet and using the detoxifying enemas, Doris tested negative for cancer. She adds that it took about two years before she could handle doing her normal routines again. 37 years later, Doris was still healthy and cancer-free. “When I first told my doctors, they couldn’t believe I was still alive,” she said. “They said to me, you should have died. I can’t believe you’re still here.” She also says that one of her doctors had been diagnosed with cancer and began asking her for information about the program.

Ruth Sackman, founder of the Foundation for the Advancement of Cancer Treatment (FACT)

Doris Sokosh shares her diagnosis and healing, part 1

Doris part 2

Doris attributes her healing to her supportive family and friends, along with her strong faith, and the nourishment that she received from her new diet. In 2012, she published a book about her healing experience titled, Triumph Over Cancer-My Recipes for Recovery. This book is a compilation of recipes based on the nourishment plan that helped to cure her body of cancer. Doris said that she wrote the book for cancer patients and for people who are interested in cancer prevention. The cookbook contains recipes and preparation techniques that Doris discovered after she regained her strength and was able to cook for herself. She says that putting the good stuff into your body, like natural foods and juices, and keeping out the bad things like processed foods with additives, and eliminating stress is the best way to help your body fend off disease.

She says that the idea for the book came about while hosting a dinner for FACT founder Ruth Sackman at her home in New Canaan, CT. She says that “Ruth loved the meal that she was served and insisted that I had to write this cookbook and she encouraged me throughout the process.”

Update- Doris passed away on January 27, 2014 at the age of 82. This was 39 years after being told that she needed to get her affairs in order.

Ruth Sackman- began working with alternative therapies after her daughter Arlene passed away following conventional treatments for acute leukemia. Just one year after her diagnosis, Arlene died after undergoing traditional chemotherapy treatments. The loss of her daughter set Sackman on a lifelong quest to find effective, non-toxic alternative methods to treat cancer. Sackman and her husband Leon co-founded the organization together back in 1971 from their home in New York. Although she was not medically trained, she worked with thousands of cancer patients and investigated and consulted with hundreds of practitioners and medical clinics around the globe. Sackman’s non-toxic, biological therapies have helped numerous cancer patients overcome serious illnesses like cancer and Lyme disease. The book Rethinking Cancer: Non-Traditional Approaches to the Theories, Treatments and Preventions of Cancer and the companion DVD Rethinking Cancer explore the holistic treatments that Ruth and the FACT organization shared with their clients. Ruth Sackman passed away in 2008, at the age of 93, but the organization has continued on in her absence.

Ruth Sackman, the F.A.C.T. Diet, and Alternative Therapies

The recommended diet– the rebuilding blocks begin with a raw, (preferably) meals of organic vegetables and fruits, such as carrots, beets and celery juices as well as vegetable soups and salads. High quality proteins are the body’s major cell-building materials and should be uncontaminated by chemical additives, hormones or antibiotics. The protein in the diet comes from nuts, sprouts, legumes and avocados, as well as animal proteins that comes from minimally processed, organic meats, fish, and poached or soft-boiled eggs. The diet also includes fermented foods like whole yogurt and raw cheeses, homemade nut cheese and sauerkraut. Grains are considered a rich source of vital, nutrients and are consumed in whole, unprocessed, uncooked forms. These include rye, brown rice, barley, millet and more. The recommended method for preparing the grains is with the “thermos cooking process” which keeps the enzymes intact. Spouts such as alfalfa and radishes are some of the finest sources of vitamins, minerals and enzymes (read more about sprouting), as is glucose in the form of raw, unprocessed honey and maple syrup. Certain supplements can also play a role in the rebuilding process.

Detoxification– All of us, without exception, are exposed to toxins from the day we are born. They are found in food additives, drugs, household chemicals, cosmetics, x-ray exposure, and a host of environmental pollutants. The World Health Organization estimates that more than 85% of cancers are environmentally produced, and the product of such exposures. To utilize biological therapies to reverse illness, it is imperative to assist the body in the removal of these toxins to restore the immune system, which is known to play an active role in preventing and fighting cancer. The FACT advocated protocol works to restore and strengthen function of the colon, kidney and liver, the prime organs of toxic elimination via the use of colonics, roughage and other detoxification procedures. The largest and most overlooked organ of elimination, the skin, is also cared for with body brushing and warm baths in Epsom salts. Also included are breathing techniques to optimize the function of the lungs and exercises for the lymphatic system, as well as fasting, such as found with water and juice fasting.

Psychological healing- There is no doubt that a patient’s psychological attitude plays a profound role in the recovery program. The FACT approach advocates a host of techniques to establish the psychological framework to support healing, including stress management, meditation, biofeedback along with counseling to optimize the patient-family/caregiver relationship

Physical -The goal is to strengthen host resistance. Attention must be paid to normalize, as much as possible, all of the systems of the body – endocrine, circulatory, lymphatic, nerve, etc. – as well as to correct hormonal imbalances. The physical state of the body plays a great role in facilitating the healing process. Practitioners who are involved with biological therapies are aware that a misaligned spine can greatly impede bio-repair, as various organs and systems such as bowel movements, circulation and the endocrine system are signaled into activity by means of the nerve network. Physical exercise, breathing exercises, light therapy, and proper rest are also considerations in the implementation of an effective bio-repair protocol.

Therapies– Over the years, FACT has had considerable experience with cancer patients who have utilized a number of supplementary procedures and substances to help battle disease and restore and strengthen their immune system. These include Immunotherapy, Whole-Body Hyperthermia (Fever Therapy), Cellular and Stem Cell Therapy, and Botanicals such as Hoxsey Herbal Therapy, and Essiac Tea, which is an old herbal formula discovered by Canadian nurse Rene Caisse which includes four primary herbs (slippery elm inner bark, burdock root, sheep sorrel and Indian rhubarb root) that is said to aid in re-balancing the body chemistry and in the elimination of toxins.