The Tools That Helped Me Heal

When you hear the word cancer, your mind jumps straight to the medical side: radiation, chemo, feeding tubes. But no one really talks about what comes after. About the rebuilding.

Because healing — real healing — isn’t just about getting through treatment. It’s about learning how to live again.

During my recovery, I learned that medicine alone wasn’t enough. I needed structure, peace, nourishment, and honesty. I needed tools — and these five became my anchors.

Mindset: Finding Control in the Chaos

Cancer can make you feel like you’ve lost everything — your strength, your energy, your independence.

But I realized early on that there were still things I could control. I started tracking how I felt every day in a small notebook. Pain levels, energy, emotions, weight — everything went in there. It gave me patterns, clarity, and most of all, a sense of control.

If you’re in the middle of treatment, own what’s still yours. Your routine. Your thoughts. Your reactions. Even one small thing can become a lifeline.

Nutrition: Feeding My Body with Purpose

When I got my feeding tube, I made a decision. I wasn’t going to survive on canned formulas filled with sugar and preservatives.

Instead, I created my own superfood blend. With the help of a nutritionist, I designed mixtures full of spirulina, krill oil, bee pollen, green powders, and high-quality protein. I knew my body was in a war, and I wanted to give it the best weapons I could.

I truly believe that food was one of the biggest reasons I stayed strong through treatment.

🥄 Cancer-fighting nutrition isn’t just about calories. It’s about giving your body the fuel it needs to rebuild.

Movement: Even the Small Kind Counts

Some days, just standing was a struggle. But I refused to let my body forget what movement felt like.

Some mornings I’d walk to the mailbox. Others, I just stretched in bed. Letting the goats out became my daily “exercise.” And it reminded me that I was still here. Still moving. Still alive.

Movement — no matter how small — matters. It’s not about fitness. It’s about presence.

Faith, Stillness, and Listening

I’ve shared before that I’ve had a few moments in life where I felt the presence of something bigger. During cancer, I leaned on that more than ever.

There were days I sat in silence, staring out the window. Not meditating. Not praying out loud. Just listening — to my body, to God, to the fear I had kept buried.

In those still moments, I found peace. And I realized healing doesn’t always look like progress. Sometimes, it looks like pausing.

Honesty and Asking for Help

Before cancer, I was proud of being the guy who had it all together. But treatment shattered that illusion.

I needed help. Rides to appointments. Emotional support. Even help cleaning the site around my PEG tube. And at first, it embarrassed me. Then, it freed me.

Once I let go of pretending to be okay all the time, I started to actually feel okay more often.

💬 Honesty became one of the strongest tools I had.

Healing Is More Than Surviving

I’m sharing this now because I know there’s someone out there feeling overwhelmed. Someone quietly thinking, “Is it always going to be this hard?”

And to that person, I say: No. It won’t always be this hard.

But give yourself what you need. Tools. Space. Support. Stillness.

In the next post, I’ll talk about what happens after the treatment ends — when the world thinks you’re “better,” but you’re still figuring out what comes next.

Until then, hold on to whatever keeps you going. Even if it’s just one thing.

You’re healing — even if it doesn’t look like it yet.

And I’m rooting for you.

– Ken