BC-059 Intro To A Coach: Jodie Lin Learned The Value of Nutrition and Stress Management To Manage Her Breast Cancer, IDC

Jodie Lin is a mom of five beautiful children, a breast cancer survivor, a runner, an attorney, a musician, a personal trainer, a health coach, and a cancer coach. As a breast cancer survivor, she spent the past five years really delving into the impact food has on the body, which foods will benefit each individual, and which can cause harm. After realizing her own diet lacked the essential nutrients her body needed to heal from cancer, she became passionate about helping people to understand the inflammatory process that food can create as well as the impact of proper nutrition so that they can learn to make the best nutrition and exercise choices that will keep their individual body in optimal health.

Listen to this podcast to learn about Jodie’s journey from “pastatarian” to cancer coach as she navigates invasive ductal carcinoma and her passion to help others heal holistically from cancer.

1:25 It all started when I was a child and had to go on a lot of antibiotics for ear infections.

1:29 I became a vegetarian at the age of 10 purely by choice.

1:55 I was eating as a vegetarian later in life but was known as a “pastatarian” because I ate more pasta than vegetables. I ate iceberg lettuce. There was not a lot of the darker greens and color in my diet and fruit.

2:47 I had 5 kids and they opened my eyes to being able to be allergic to food and having inflammatory reactions to food and gut dysbiosis because of it.

3:31 Just before my 5th pregnancy I started a pain in my right breast.

4:00 I had a mammogram that showed micro calcifications and I was just to be monitored.

4:30 With the pregnancy of my 5th Child there was definitely telltale signs of something being wrong.

5:19 I went back to the Dr. 5 weeks after my son was born and had a follow up mammogram and I was told I had cancer.

5:38 80% of micro calcifications are benign.

6:00 There’s no breast cancer in my history. I was a runner and a mom of five and everything that I had read suggested that the more children you have the lower your likelihood of having breast cancer and I nursed them all which lowers your risk and I was very fit and healthy and at a healthy weight. So there was nothing in the literature to suggest that someone in my position we get breast cancer.

6:45 I had DCIS, ductile cell carcinoma in situ. I had a mastectomy and 7 weeks of radiation.

7:09 I really wanted to get to the root cause. I started to do research and learned about the impact of nutrition and that the sugar and soy I was eating, as well as white flour and processed foods was damaging my body.

8:02 I went to the Institute of Integrative Nutrition and became a health coach.

8:08 Eight years later I was doing great and I had put this all behind me until I started having pain in my right breast again, where I had an implant.

8:54 During the year prior to my diagnosis I experienced a lot of stress and trauma. My sister was diagnosed with cancer and my brother-in-law’s sister had been diagnosed with her 3rd round of metastatic breast cancer and passed away and my father passed away unexpectedly.

10:50 Through faulty testing with an MRI without contrast dye they decided my implant ruptured.

11:20 I went in for what was supposed to be a three hour surgery and they removed a lump that was tested and came back as invasive ductal cell carcinoma.

12:00 The piece I was missing was managing my stress. They caused inflammation and weakened my immune system.

12:22-13:50 I came to BeatCancer.org to understand my situation and to help others.

16:48 I've been trying yoga to quiet my mind. I’ve been journaling to help me cope. We are practicing gratitude as a family.

17:34 Everyone has to find the stress management mechanism that will work for them. Could be yoga, gratification, journaling or breathing.

18:15 JKL Well Health Coaching stands for Just Clean Living.

18:44 I like to do food testing to make sure the foods that people are eating or not causing them inflammation.

19:20 Symptoms are not always just gas and bloating. They can be eczema, psoriasis, joint inflammation, arthritis, hair loss etc.