Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips from Kris Carr
Kris Carr reveals her top tips for cancer survivors from her book, Crazy Sexy Cancer.
Tip #1 Breathe
KRIS CARR: Oh I’d say number one is breathe because there’s a lot of stuff that’s going to be flying at you and you have to be grounded and centered and you can only do that if you’re breathing deeply.
Tip #2 Call Yourself a Survivor
KRIS: Calling yourself a survivor immediately can really just completely change how you perceive your journey. It’s not something that you have to wait until you get a stamp of approval for. Doing it right now…
Tip#3 Be the CEO at Your Office of Healing
KRIS: For me again, it was really important to create my Office of Healing and I was the CEO and when I went to see a doctor, I was hiring them for a position in my company and if they worked and they didn’t have the bedside manner of Dog the Bounty Hunter, and they knew the most about my disease, and hopefully their diploma was from a country that I’d heard of, then they would be hired in my company. Part of that company is also creating a staff. Maybe it’s your mom who helps you with the insurance and the paperwork. Is it a friend who can be a medical advocate for you who will go to the hospital with you on your appointment dates because you will hear blah-blah-blah, you’re going to die, blah-blah-blah, you have cancer, even if that’s not what they’re saying. So getting ready for this whole thing, it’s a whole new world and you are in charge of it.
Tip #4 Integrate and Complement
KRIS: Thinking outside of the box to become that, what I call, empowered participant in healing, creating a plan that includes integrative and complementary medicine and care that you can boost your immune system so that you can sleep, so that you can de-stress. You can do all these things that will help your body.
Tip #5 Diet and Nutrition
KRIS: I think that there’s an incredible amount that you can do with nutrition just to raise the pH of your body. Eating more alkaline foods – and stress causes your alkalinity and the pH to lower.
Tip #6 Create a Cancer Posse
KRIS: One of the other things is what I write about in the book, which is creating your cancer posse and this is a group of people your age who can be your best friends, your shoulders, you can swap tips and tricks and secrets and heck yeah’s and how to’s and really support each other.
Tip #7 Boundaries
KRIS: Boundaries are another really big and important part of the new you, as I say, and though I love clichés I often ask myself, “Does this tire you or does this inspire you?” And if that thing or person that tires you is a big part of taking up your healing energy and space, they have to go.
Tip #8 Put Yourself First
KRIS: I think it’s important that cancer patients and people who are going through any kind of pain or adversity put themselves first and that’s not selfish. Too often in this society we are told that that’s a selfish thing to do. Get rid of that, you know. It’s important to speak up and voice your needs.
Tip #9 Set the Tone
KRIS: Cancer patients set the tone for how other people are going to perceive you and deal with you and you can ask for what you need. If it’s…maybe you don’t even want to talk about cancer that day or you just want someone to listen or you want to be lighthearted and humorous and that shouldn’t put people off. Certainly, one of the worst things that can happen is when a civilian or a co-survivor says, “I think you’re not taking this serious enough.” Do you want to get a head-butt? What do you want me to do? I might die. How serious do I have to take it? So again, you set the tone.
Tip #10 Plan for the future.
KRIS: I think that it’s really important for people to plan for the future. We are entitled to a future and for however long that is we can plan for it. And maybe that involves dating, maybe – and it should – involve sex. You’re not damaged goods or something to be shelved like a pumped up banana. It’s still happening and if that’s the case and you maybe, like I am, I just got married, – fertility options. What do you need to know? What do you need to know before you have that surgery, before you have chemo and radiation? Freezing your eggs… So it’s just forward thinking that you will have a future beyond cancer.
*Bonus Tip* Turn Fear Into Change
KRIS: Fear is the great thief of time in a lot of ways and cancer patients, the one thing they want more of is time and fear can devour that. And so for me this comes to, cancer is not a gift, this is not something I would give to anybody I know, not even my enemies… but it can certainly be a great catalyst for change in your life if you let it and I just choose to let it.
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