​

Our First Conversation with our Oncologist

Three days after receiving the cancer diagnosis that rocked our world, we met the oncologist with one simple request from Carli:

“I don’t want to lose my soul to save my body. I don’t want to feel like my soul doesn’t matter.”

The oncologist nodded, his tone warm and reassuring.

“Of course your soul matters, Carli," he said. "That’s the most important thing I do.”

But within a week of her first infusion, the bubbly cheerleader who was always everyone’s best friend was gone.

When we went in for her second round of treatment a week later, the nurse smiled and amicably asked, “How are you feeling today, Carli?”

Carli’s eyes sliced through her.

“I’m fucking horrible.”

The words hung in the air. Carli had never said the “F-word” out loud before. Not to me. Not to anyone. And definitely not to a stranger who was just trying to help.

“Since you haven’t taken this shit you’re giving me, I don’t want to hear your opinion on anything.”

I was stunned. The girl who usually told me "you attract more bees with honey than vinegar" had become completely unhinged. Our descent into hell was just beginning.

With each injection of the "Red Devil" (Doxorubicin) to kill her cancer and Lupron to kill her estrogen production, Carli was morphing into a She-Devil (her words, not mine...but she ain't wrong).

Two months into treatment, at 2:30 AM, I found myself with a bleeding arm, searching for a hotel room to escape the suffocating townhouse that had become our nightly battleground.

The doctors had warned us about the physical side effects of chemotherapy—fatigue, nausea, and hair loss. But no one had told us about this.

I had expected to take care of a frail, bald-headed version of the woman I loved. I thought I'd help her pick up knitting and make her enough chicken noodle soup to feed a small village. That's what I had prepared for. What caught me completely off-guard was the rage, paranoia, and 2 a.m. jolting wake-ups of her anxiety-ridden question: Are you going to abandon me?

I had woken up in the middle of the night to check on our crying 4-year-old in the spare bedroom. I tried laying down by him, but all he wanted was his mommy. I picked him up and walked back to the master bedroom. But the door was locked.

After knocking and calling through the door, Carli responded coldly, "I'm sorry, I'm not available right now."

Our son became inconsolable.

In a strange mix of desperation and exhaustion, I punched through the hollow-core townhouse door, reached my arm through the hole and unlocked it from the inside.

Carli stared back at me, eyes wide, then curled back into a ball on our bed, shutting me out again. Neither of us could name what was happening.

Desperate for answers, I called the oncologist. I needed to know if Carli's reaction to the medication was typical. I was met with a cold, clinical response.

“The treatment she’s receiving is standard protocol. I have dozens of patients on the exact same cocktail, and I’ve never seen a response like Carli’s.”

And that’s when I realized: We were on our own. We'd have to figure out how to take care of both Car's body and her spirit by ourselves, because the doctors sure as hell weren't going to.

The Cost of Truth

In 1633, Galileo stood before the Spanish Inquisition. The subject of the trial was straightforward. Galileo could either reject his recently published work that documented irrefutable evidence that the Earth orbited the Sun (in direct contradiction to the Church's interpretation of Genesis) or die for heresy.

Ever the pragmatist, Galileo bent the knee and publicly denied the truth that had consumed his life's work.

“I, Galileo, being in my seventieth year, on my knees before your Eminences, having before my eyes the Holy Gospels, which I touch with my own hands, abjure, curse, and detest the errors and heresies…”

Legend has it that after recanting, Galileo muttered under his breath:

"E pur si muove" (And yet, it moves).

Though he bowed to the Church outwardly, inwardly he knew the truth. His trial sent a chilling message: pursuing scientific truth was risky business.

Splitting the Body from the Soul

Enter René Descartes. Descartes saw Galileo retract his life's work and he knew something had to change if scientific progress were to continue.

He proposed a revolutionary idea called Dualism—splitting the soul and body as two separate and distinct types of matter. The thinking soul (res cogitans) was governed by the laws of the Church, while the mechanical body (res extensa) and physical world could be studied scientifically without religious interference.

This division saved science from the constant oversight of the Church but it transformed the practice of medicine from a holistic practice that combined the body and soul to a mechanistic one focused on fixing physical "parts."

The scalpel and syringe evicted the soul and relegated it to the world of the quack and the easily exploited—only worth paying attention to if you are poor or unserious about true "science-based healing."

While dualism protected scientific inquiry in a dangerous era, it created a medical paradigm that separates physical treatment from spiritual wellbeing—the unintended consequence we face in every doctor's office today.

Reuniting Descartes' Divide

I wish Carli and I understood at that first oncology appointment what we know now: Modern medicine is stellar at fixing acute and observable problems. If you break your arm, you're in great hands. But when a problem in our body's machine requires highly toxic therapies, modern medicine is deaf to the collateral damage caused to the soul of an individual.

It's simply not their job. It's ours.

We cannot outsource our intuition. We can’t let a stethoscope around someone’s neck make us forget the still, small voice inside that tells us when something deeper is happening.

Last November, Carli got her second diagnosis of cancer, stage IV terminal this time. When the oncologist delivered the results that the cancer had returned, he gave a familiar spiel. It was time for chemotherapy and the drugs that made our lives a living hell to begin again. He ordered the drugs and opened an appointment for us at his office the following morning.

Round one, he said jump, and we said "how high?"

Round two, we said we were going to hold off on the chemo and do our own research on alternatives first. (One such tidbit of interesting research is a study, linked here, showing how mindful-based practices like meditation and participation in a community led to healthier cells after chemotherapy.)

The oncologist hemmed and hawed about how we were being reckless, but we remained unperturbed.

Carli skipped the recommended oncology and opted to radiate the cancer spots that were present while we researched our own protocol.​

As of March 30, 2025, her most recent PET scan shows no current evidence of disease.

Real healing happened when her body and soul were brought back together.

And yet, it moves.

Galileo whispered it under his breath when the world told him to deny the truth.

And maybe, if we listen closely enough, we can hear something else moving now.

The soul.

Quietly. Steadily. Finding its way back. Unifying what Descartes divided all those centuries ago.

As a Practical Matter

We would’ve never had the courage to ask the hard questions or trust our intuition if we hadn’t found a small group of people who were fighting their own health battles—navigating their own cancer journeys, making bold decisions, and refusing to cower from asking the tough questions.

Seeing their bravery helped us find our own.

For months, Carli and I have been talking about how we could recreate that kind of space for people who are a few steps behind us.

A place where intuition matters.

A place where no question is off limits.

A place where you don’t have to walk this road alone.

We’re building exactly what we wish we had.

If you or someone you love is facing cancer, keep an eye out for the next few emails. Or just hit reply and say “Tell me more,” and we’ll let you in on what we've been working on.

To your healing,

Ra and Car