Maya (dog) failed fast this week and she is now at peace. We were all with her and she was calm. The look in her eyes was one of knowing... Knowing that we were going to help her so that she could be at peace. The white blood cells had taken over at such a rapid pace knocking out the red blood cells. And, because of this, her breathing was very labored. She was in great discomfort and last night developed incontinence. She carried herself with such dignity. Such a prim and proper girl... she did not "walk." She "Pranced." So much pain for us... and, no more pain for my sweet girl. Her 11 year old sister, Maddie (dog) is trying to figure this all out....

I never went through Chemo but after fine needle aspiration (in Aug of 2000) of an ovarian cyst during a Lap, I was Dx. positive for malignant cells consistent with Papillary Adenocarcinoma. It was confimed during a subseqent hysterectomy that the cyst was epithelial in origin for the cells and excluded origin of a corpus luteum cyst.  However, during the hysterectomy (Sept. 2000) no additional cancer was found, and so even though the surgery was warranted, I was left Without a final Dx.of Ovarian Cancer.

I am not sure why this all happened. But, it is one reason I found this site (MedHelp) back in 2004 was because I wanted to belong to a group of people who "got it".... I needed a safe place to process what happened to me... the "could have beens" and the advocacy I try to promote to all regarding their health care (I know this is easier said than done at times, too...). I also stay because I luckily found an awesome way of getting rid of surgical adhesions that just involves rolling a little ball (I know... I know...Health Pages.... I promise :))  and then there is the occasional hormonal comment from me....

The following infomation has been gathered from the resouce books I name on my profile. The information also came from speaking with various experts in the field of Bioidentical hormones, and the experience I have had with these hormones comes from first hand experience. It is my opinion that the quality of life I experience would be unatainable if not for the use of these products. I will add that I also strive to live a healthy lifestyle which includes watching my diet, exercising on a regular schedule, positive thinking, deep breathing, and trying to advocate for myself when necessary.


The difference between the bioidentical hormones ..... they enter/act in our body the exact way as the hormones they are replacing molecule for molecule...much like Insulin, which is a bioidentical...and, Armour thyroid and Synthroid (all bioidentical much to the surprise of many especially since Armour is made from pigs!) Sorry..I digress.

Anyway, the difference between the Synthetics and the bioidentical hormones is One Molecule. The pharmaceutical Co. that makes Premarin and Provera made sure that their version of "Hormones" (Drugs) is not bioidentical because you cannot patent a bio product, thus this would not be a big money-making adventure. So they made their own drugs that they said were similar to the bioidentical hormones (some of the synthetics are made from female horse's urine and some from plant products that once synthesized in the lab do actually have a different forumlation than what our body used to produce...then this way they can patent the product).

The synthetic HRT was developed in response to the bio's way back when (back in the 60's particularly)... because women were turning to the bioidentical hormones. More recently, the big pharm. companies are starting to make bioidentical items such as the vaginal ring in response to demand from women not wanting to take HRT. It gets confusing because the bioidentical hormones are not HRT. Some people call them BHRT for Bio, but they used to be called 'Natural' then this got confusing because heck, if you were a horse, then taking premarin would be natural. GOSH this is a huge subject and cannot be answered with just one or two lines.

I encourage everyone going through all of this to pick up some good resources on bioidentical hormoes (Northrup, Schwartz ...great books and great website for both these doctors, and Reiss) and research your heart out...your benefits will double. There is so much confusion out there regarding all of this.

One question comes up frequently...is this.....essentially can you get into trouble using the bio hormones? Sometimes to add to the confusion people will add....just as you can with HRT?  Frankly, I am not a fan of HRT ...Premarin, Provera, Prempro, which is Premarin and Provera together, and many women have had problems with these drugs. The list of side effects alone on the flyer that comes with these drugs is enough to scare anyone away from using them, in my opinion.  As far as the bioidentical hormones are concerned, when you are out of balance (estrogen and Progesterone in balance is key) you can run into problems...I ran into many problems because of this while making my own hormones and it led me to cervical dysplasias and a pathology report of malignant cells in a cyst that was drained which led to my hysterectomy in 2000. The theory is that I had too much estrogen in my body and not enough Progesterone. If only I'd known back then....on top of this because of the imbalance, I had horrible headaches, weight gain, bloating, mood swings...These darn hormones.