Help Nicola become a Naturopathic Therapist

Hello there,

My Name is Nicola, 36 year old wife & mother of three beautiful children and a fur baby.

I’m fundraising for the tuition fee to study at the College of Naturopathic Medicine in London, it’s a 3 year course costing £11350, plus additional travel & childcare costs. 

And this is why… 

In October 2019 I was diagnosed with adenocarcinoma cervical cancer stage 1b following a routine smear test after the birth of my 3rd child. I had only been back at work for 6 weeks before my whole world as I knew came cashing down around me. I didn’t even understand what cancer was and was frightened although felt positive that I would be ok as my consultant had said this was curable. I was booked in for a radical hysterectomy in December 2019 where they took 12 lymph nodes for testing, the results came back with 4/12 lymph nodes positive of cancer putting me at stage 3b.

I then did x5 cisplatin x28 radiotherapy & x2 brachytherapy.

I experienced every side effect of the chemo and radiotherapy I was sick multi times a day, had awful diarrhoea, suffered migraines, cystitis, loss of taste. I made the decision to move in with my mum with my daughter and left my boys with my husband as the children struggled to cope seeing me so poorly. And then COVID hit, everything around us shut down, all supporting services, I couldn’t see family or friends. We were alone.

those 6 weeks of treatment felt like months every day was a battle to get up and go to the hospital for treatment, I would have to drink x2 pints of fluid to make sure my bladder was full enough to scan and then throw up in the car park as we arrived at hospital. A 15 minute appointment would take 2 hours it was exhausting and incredibly traumatic but all we could do was take one day at a time.

Once treatment finally finished I was able to rest and recover and slowly started to feel like myself again and return home to my children. I had three blissful months of recovery before my first progress scan with my consultant which was over the phone, he insisted on a rescan to in 2 months time but told me not to worry. When I was rescanned in September 2020 I received the devastating news that I was chemo and radiotherapy resistant and I had metastasis to my abdomen, lung, hysterectomy scar site as well as lymph nodes.

I went from stage 1b to stage 4 in 9 months.

In October 2020 I started Avastin/ pacitaxol/ carboplatin chemotherapy cocktail and also was introduced to CBD as well as a range of supplements. ( selenium, magnesium oxide, turmeric, vitamin C, vitamin D3, pro biotic ) by a friend.

After 3 cycles on 15th January 2021 I had a progress scan which revealed slight reduction in one lymph node and no further spread.

I was absolutely gutted, heartbroken devastated Terrified and this lead to an almighty panic attack, it was a result of the diagnosis, the fear, the loss of my life as knew it, my job, my hair, my body, ability to care for myself and my young children and staring my own mortality directly in the face. I was starting to think I might not beat this.

After this attack I had had enough, I had trusted my consultant but we weren’t getting any where fast, I felt I was wasting time and I knew I could do better and do more. So I took back control of my diet it was the only thing I could still control.

I cut out dairy / sugar / red meat / alcohol / processed foods.

we researched every food that was anti cancer, anti inflammatory, antioxidant.

I increased fruit and vegetables tenfold and started to add more superfoods such as Turkey tail powder, a blend of 7 mushroom powder, I started doing a wheatgrass and spirulina shot every day.

I had heard about a dog worming protocol through a friend and began researching and added to the regime.

I also had in my cupboard but not used Essiac Tea which we researched and started in April.

I also added berberine, sodium bicarbonate to my supplements.

I also needed to treat my anxiety and mental health as I truly believe in order to heal my body I needed to be relaxed and calm and believe in my body’s ability to heal itself. So I started having counselling, I began doing sleep meditation, healing meditation, positive affirmations, relaxation and reiki healing.

I bought a diary to record everything.

I had no side effects from any of the above however, I noticed that I had lost 10kg in 3 weeks, the side effects from the chemotherapy reduced, no sickness or nausea. ( previously I was really sick even though I was on anti sickness)

And generally felt well and healthy.

People began commenting on how well I looked as my skin was in amazing condition.

I had a CT Scan after my 6th chemo and had the results on 6th may. My consultant was very cagey and hardly gave us any details about the scan all he said was significant tumour reduction on my abdomen, he said the scan pics where not available and the report did not say anything about my lung, tumour in my hysterectomy scar site or lymph nodes. He said two more chemo cycles and another CT and MRI.

So that’s what we did, we continued with the protocol and I had another scan 8 weeks later and the results on Thursday 8th July which showed hardly anything!!!!! lymph nodes clear on the scan, lung clear, hysterectomy scar clear only a small shadow showing up on the abdomen where the tumour was.

My consultant was shocked and said if he was brutally honest he did not expect me to respond to chemotherapy AT ALL!

The plan was to continue with x3 more chemotherapy for now and see what happens.

so we kept going until I couldn’t take anymore I did two more chemotherapy cycles and then had another huge anxiety attack which I honestly felt was my body telling me no more and if this journey has taught me anything it’s that I need to listen to my body, so I asked my consultant for a break on the chemotherapy, during this time I had also had a scan and was awaiting the results.

I had an appointment with my oncology consultant who gave me the news in October 2021 that my latest MRI scan showed NO EVIDENCE of DISEASE!!! I was finally in remission!!!

No more chemo and PICC Line can be removed.

I’ll have follow up scans and a check up every 3 months but for now we are clear, cautious but CLEAR

There were times when I never thought I would get here but my family and I are absolutely on top of the world.

I’m so grateful to my husband, family, Friends and everyone in the support Facebook groups for all the knowledge and advice and for being brave enough to try something quiet frankly bizarre and share their stories of alternative and naturopathic medicine because without these groups it could of been a very different outcome!

Feeling grateful, feeling blessed, feeling alive.

What amazes me about all of this is it was almost easy I had to have huge self discipline but I have 3 children and so I thought it would be hard to change my diet when cooking family meals but it’s been easy and the kids have not missed the red meat at all and the all love the fish and salads and haven’t even noticed the mushroom powder in their dinners.

I hope this inspires other to be open to alternative options and to never ever give up but to get up and take control and responsibility of your own health and to trust yourself and your body because it’s amazing.

During this journey I was made redundant from a job that I absolutely love and now I want to retrain in naturopathic medicine so that I can help others to regain their own health using holistic approach in healing body, mind and spirit, using kind, gentle and natural methods.

So that’s me, my story and my journey and I am asking for help and financial support to get me into college so I can help and guide others on their healing journey.