Originally published in Issue 1 2005 icon
When It Comes To My Own Health, I Don’t Think About It Too Much
Oxford Don Michael Gearin-Tosh has just celebrated his 65th birthday, 10½ years after he was first diagnosed with multiple myeloma. His stable condition is a testament to the power of several "alternative" treatments, plus his own self belief and natural energy. When we spoke to him, in August 2002, his book, Living Proof - a Medical Mutiny, was stirring up medical debate at its often controversial content. After his diagnosis in June 1994, following a bout of pneumonia, five separate consultants urged him to have chemotherapy or he would be "dead in a year". He was told that if he had the treatment he might live for two to three years. But then a professor of cancer advised him, via a friend, to avoid chemotherapy. When Gearin-Tosh asked for the odds on him surviving for 20 or more years without conventional treatment, he was told he had a .005 per cent chance. Undeterred, he decided to follow that route rather than "damage the body’s immune system" with chemotherapy.
His book, and friend Carmen Wheatley’s website www.canceraction.org.gg, are a fantastic source of information on myeloma and his diet. He started with the Gerson Therapy (12 vegetable and fruit juices a day, vitamins and coffee enemas), soon added the Hoffer-Pauling daily prescription of more vitamins, including C, B3, B6, Folic acid, Beta Carotene, Selenium and then added more including Co-Enzyme Q10 and Aspirin. By February 1995 he was doing well and his bone density was stable, but he still remained at risk of fractures so he went on bisphosphonates for a while, with other supplements detailed on the website. By 1999, five years after diagnosis - and four longer than he should have survived untreated - his stability was a fact. Michael Gearin-Tosh is a great believer that mind and body are closely linked. Acupuncture is one of the therapies that have changed his life, also a Chinese breathing exercise followed by visualisation that he was taught by Dr Jan de Vries. Still living in Oxford, where he is a Fellow of St Catherine’s College, Michael brings us up to date on his fascinating story.
My life is so interesting that I’ve always been doing what I wanted so, as I recovered, I went back to that life
"It is 10½ years since I was diagnosed with myeloma. The odds against me surviving were very considerable, so a group of friends helped me celebrate that 10th anniversary last summer. We went to the theatre, to see Judi Dench, and then had dinner afterwards. I’ve never felt the urge to rush off and visit Timbuktu or something like that. My life is so interesting that I’ve always been doing what I wanted so, as I recovered, I went back to that life. I have taken particular pleasure in writing theatrical essays about Shakespeare over the last couple of years, including one for the National Theatre programme and one for the Barbican.
Like everybody, I have my ups and downs, healthwise, but have had no serious illnesses. I did have one nasty bout of pneumonia, in December 2002, when I was so excited to be enjoying my life that I was overworking. My spine fractured, but it mended again. I was urged tremendously by the orthodox practitioners to take morphine and have radiotherapy. When I asked if it was "end game" one told me I wouldn’t make the summer. ’I’ll probably get a Christmas card from you this year,’ he said, ’but I’d be very surprised to get one next year.’ Then I saw my acupuncturist and he said, ’Dead by the summer? Not a chance!’ The fracture took about four weeks to mend. The oncologist did write to me at one point and said, ’I have to tell you that by temperament I’m depressive...’
I go for acupuncture once a month, practise visualisation, whenever I need to, and am on a maintenance diet of everything else (see website). I do three or four juices a day which are no harder to prepare than anything else, unless you’re used to eating out in restaurants all the time. In addition to everything I was doing before, I have also taken nutritional advice from a lady in Cheshire called Nicola J. Bradbury, and have become very interested in the Russian approach to cancer. I have arranged for a couple of doctors specialising in bio-resonance, Drs Myrnyy and Koval, to stay with me three times and treat me, and I will continue with that.
I enjoy talking to them, and other doctors from around the world, and am working on a new book, Conversations with Doctors, which will be mainly to do with cancer. I’ll also be giving my view on cancer on May 17, when I’ve been asked to lecture by the Royal Society of Medicine at their Bicentenary conference. I talk about cancer, but when it comes to my own health I don’t think about it too much. I take things as they come. Having been brought up on a farm in the Highlands of Scotland, I have this ’getting-on-with-things’ attitude.
Of course anyone given a diagnosis and told they have up to three or four years to live feels they have a sword hanging over them, but I believe that if one can live and be of use to other people and enjoy oneself, one does one’s best to go on."
Living Proof - a Medical Mutiny is published by Simon & Schuster
Update
Unfortunately, Micheal Gearin-Tosh passed away on 29th July 2005, over 10 years after he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma.
He was, quite simply, an inspiration to us all. He showed everyone with cancer that you do not have to accept the status quo of orthodox medicine and its gloomy statistics. And that by being open-minded, doing your ’homework’ and then being disciplined on a course of action you can give yourself seven, eight times more life expectancy than the medical world alone can offer.
But let us be clear. Here was an exceptional man, who was charming, intellegent and with a wonderful command of the English language. He chose to undertake the Gerson Therapy but not to the total exclusion of orthodox medicine, although he saw little point in taking ’poisonous drugs’ that would probably only extend his life by a year or so at a cost to both his general well-being and his life style. He became a founding patron of CANCERactive and believed fervently in an integrated approach to treating cancer: The best of all that is available.