Sound Healing with Sandy Duarte

What if sound could help you heal?

Sandy Duarte is an award-winning actress, author,  Stage IV non-Hodgkin lymphoma survivor, registered yoga instructor, and one of OncoDaily's 2026 Top 100 Most Influential Cancer Survivors. While undergoing aggressive chemotherapy, she turned to crystal singing bowls to calm her nervous system. Her practice has expanded into sound baths, women’s retreats, and community healing, bringing the singing bowls to hospitals, corporate settings, and museum installations. In this interview, Sandy describes her personal experience using Peter Hess® therapy singing bowls, which are placed on the body specifically for Sound Massage. Sandy also talks about her book, Cancer Ramblings, a real-time reflection of her experience with cancer treatment.

What is your experience with sound therapy? Leave a comment below!

Visit Sandy’s website: cancerramblings.com

Follow Sandy on social media:
https://www.instagram.com/sandy__duarte
https://x.com/sandyduarte
https://www.tiktok.com/@cancer.ramblings

Find her on IMDB. 

Buy her book on Amazon.

Subscribe to her YouTube channel.

Learn more about Peter Hess® Singing Bowls.

Transcript

Sound Healing with Sandy Duarte

Sandy Duarte: We’re all affected by sound. Whether you sit by the beach, you hear the birds, you hear soothing music, good words, people saying something beautiful to you. It all affects your nervous system. So, I really believe it supported my journey with the medicine of the West. It was like this marriage of East and West coming together. 

Intro Music: (Funkorama by Kevin McLeod) Welcome to The Cancer Pod. 

Leah Sherman: In this episode, we’re exploring the healing power of sound and how creativity emerges in unexpected places. I am joined by Sandy Duarte, a stage four non-Hodgkin lymphoma survivor, creator of Cancer Ramblings, a registered yoga instructor and one of OncoDaily’s 2026 Top 100 Most Influential Cancer Survivors. During chemotherapy, Sandy turned to crystal singing bowls to give her overwhelmed nervous system a place to rest. What began as a personal sanctuary during treatment has since grown into a practice of sound baths, retreats and community healing. Welcome to The Cancer Pod. 

Sandy: Thank you. Leah, what a beautiful introduction and such a joy to be here with you, honestly. 

Leah: Thank you. Well, thank you for reaching out. I have some familiarity with singing bowls, but I’m excited to kind of get more into understanding them with you. 

Sandy: Oh, I’m happy to share. My gosh, where to even begin? It was a modality that kind of fell into my life, uh, through my chemotherapy journey. Um, it kind of like the book just divinely inspired. I mean, I’m in, uh, wellness, so I’m exposed to things, you know, I’ve experienced a little bit of sound here and there, uh, in the middle of chemotherapy. Something told me to just order these bowls, you know, exposed to them, seen them get them for yourself. And, uh, I started to play in between my rounds when I was at home from. From the chemotherapy I would. I was in the hospital five days, five, five days, five nights. Non-stop aggressive chemotherapy and two weeks at home was why rebuild phase to just rebuild your body for the next round, to pummel you down. And so I would just play my bowls, you know, overlooking the garden. And it gave me a place of peace without words. It was just the vibrations, the tuning in, the healing sounds, aligning my chakras. You know, we’re all affected by sound. Whether you sit by the beach, you hear the birds, you hear soothing music, good words, people saying something beautiful to you. It all affects your nervous system. So I really believe it supported my journey with the the medicine of the West, so to speak. You know, it was like this marriage of East and West coming together. 

Leah: Had you experienced them in previous yoga classes or training or anything like that? 

Sandy: It felt kind of for me to pick them up very much out of the blue, but I’ve had experience with, um, with the, you know, I’ve, I’ve witnessed bowls. I’ve, um, in my training, we had kirtan and so instruments and, and, you know, I had some, some experiences in that sense of understanding what sound healing is. Um, but never thought it would be something in my life. I was very much into wellness as in yoga and breathwork and um, creative expression that way. So it was like this deepening into this whole other tentacle of, of healing and wellness. 

Leah: And I can imagine that you, actually creating the sound creates another level as opposed to being in a room where someone else is, is working with the bowls. 

Sandy: Yes. I mean, it’s one thing to be on the receiving end. I had some really great training at an incredible school for for yoga and all of that. The breathwork and one thing that was part of their program is that several times a week in the evening, you had to go and join kirtan. And it was all about the vocals, the chanting, picking up an instrument and gosh, you slept like a dream after those sessions. You didn’t realize that what seemed so light is actually so profound on your body and your mind. And there was like no words required. It was just being in this positive vibration. So, I really believe like the crystal singing bowl supported my body in a way that I couldn’t even understand at the time. There’s so much to be learned about this ancient modality of, you know, sound and Tibetan bowls and all of it. Um, but boy, whether I knew very little or nothing at all, I knew that I was feeling good from what I was doing. 

Leah: And there is some research that from my understanding, looking at these sound frequencies and their effect on, on us and with the singing bowls from what I was reading, it’s kind of replicates or brings you to the same brainwaves as, um, like a deep meditation. 

Sandy: Mhm. Yes. It’s wonderful because it’s, there’s so many ways to meditate. You know, sometimes people get intimidated by meditation. Oh, but I can’t sit still and not think meditation is not necessarily about. Oh, I’m not gonna think it’s about observing what is coming through your lens and being kind and compassionate and noticing when you do have a busy mind, like, well, okay, I see you, you know, and rather than being daunted by it, just compassion, I see you. And then just returning to it as a practice. Um, so what I love as well is that there’s so many ways to meditate, whether you’re just observing nature, staring at the ocean, observing your thoughts, your breath, also with sound healing, um, allowing your mind to get out of thoughts and just follow the sound, just follow the sound rather than the, the thoughts that can create a lot of noise in your mind. So, um, yeah, it’s a supportive way to meditate. 

Leah: One of the many ways, One of the things that you have created since picking up your very first crystal singing bowl is, is, um, retreats that you do. Mhm. You have retreats. And are these specifically for cancer people or are they for anybody? 

Sandy: These are for anybody. Um, Leah I started doing, uh, creating retreats out in Joshua Tree. I live in California and, uh, this was before my diagnosis and it’s all women. I’ve done some co-ed day retreats, but my focus is very much like, you know, all women a weekend in the desert and it’s yoga, it’s sound. It’s walking through the desert in a walking meditation, no talking, just being together in energy, but observing. Um, yeah. And then now, um, I just came back from a retreat in Costa Rica where we infused a lot of sound healing every night before bed, uh, getting washed by the crystal bowls and other elements of koshi chimes and, um, ocean drums and and all of that. So it’s a joy. I also have a, a retreat that is all weekend sound so very much sound heavy. Um, yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s a real joy to see people light up from something that sometimes they’ve never experienced and go, wow, I did that. I was able to sit back and, and dream in a different way without the busy mind. You know, meditation is like a magical dream. It’s how I feel it feeling time. Stop and finding your timelessness in it, away from the suffering that sometimes thoughts can give you of wondering what’s tomorrow? What’s my plans this weekend? What’s next month when you start thinking so ahead you. Oh, rather than just let life show me, sit back and then all of a sudden, guess what? You get a call, you get an invitation, you get an opportunity. You know, if that makes sense. It’s the surrender that’s very powerful in the all the beautiful doing that we gotta do in life. 

Leah: And I feel like your book is kind of on that same level, like reading through your book. It is almost, and I don’t want to tell you what your book is, but, it was, it was like it was a meditation in a way. Just your thoughts came and you released them on the page. 

Sandy: Yes. I love how you said that. I have my book always near me. Um, my Cancer Ramblings. This book, I tell you, it was just like the bowls. I didn’t plan on writing. I’m not a writer. I don’t consider myself a writer. I’m walking around the hospital walls with my chemo friend on wheels, taking my getting my steps. She’s always attached to me. I get these downloads for titles, and I’m like, what? Arguing with the divine? I’m not writing a book. What? And all these terrible titles. I’m like, oh, and if so, I wouldn’t use that title. That’s duh. Finally, I’m pinged with Cancer Ramblings and I knew at that moment, fine. We’re writing a book. From there, I just started to free flow and whenever I felt called to it, it was written in real time, whether it’s three a m in the hospital, whether it’s at home, whatever. I just start writing and I swear to you, I don’t know what I would do without the writing. The writing was my saving grace. It was my meditation. It was my my breath and my prayer through the darkest things I’ve ever experienced. I don’t know, Leah, you know, we all go through some dark things, but you know, when you go through one where you’re like, whew, that really took me for a turn. So, um, the digesting those emotions, thoughts, feelings held me. I felt less alone being able to write because as I was writing, it was, uh, getting it out of the entrapped mind of fear and really darkness. Putting it on the page was almost like you’re calling out to the universe and writing in support to the people that are going to come behind you in the cancer journey. So it was this whole thing of supporting yourself and also finding service. How can these words help somebody feel less alone to combat such a darkness that I’m feeling. Um, I hope that answers it, but it is a very free flow inside their ramblings. They’re just, they’re free flowing. The book is very much. You can read it through once, beginning to end. It’s great to get the idea, but then you can pick it up any time. Sometimes I’ll just pick it up and be like, what do I need today? And I grab it and I’m like, okay, Rambling 19, what is it saying to me? Oh, it’s saying right now, literally all I know is that I am love. Is that knowledge enough? So it’s yeah, I love how you said that. 

Leah: So by picking it up, I always think of that as like one of those, like a daily inspiration. Like, yeah, for that moment when you kind of need a little guidance or, um, an affirmation. 

Sandy: Yeah. Like sometimes we don’t have someone around, you know, whether you’re single, married, have family or anybody in your house or not. Sometimes you don’t have that person to reach out to in your darkest or questioning our, you know, at four o’clock in the morning, eleven o’clock at night, whenever. So it’s it’s how do you reach out to something so that you’re not alone? And in all truth, we’re not alone. Like, I really believe, um, just leaning on love. Love is a huge source of my work, my sound healing. Um, my practice is called love wrapped in sound because it’s love first before the sound. Love channeling through sound. Love held me through the dark. And the book is very much, um, a message of love, you know, lean on love, you know, repeat love. It’ll, it’ll help you through anything cancer and beyond. I truly believe it. As simple as that sounds. Uh, it’s powerful. Love is powerful. 

Leah: Do you continue to write to this day? Are you still writing? 

Sandy: Yes. Yeah, I just started my second book. To be honest, I don’t know when it’s going to be done. I’ll tell you why I tell you. I, I said this before to someone, death has a sense of urgency. Going through cancer. Death. Sense of urgency. I crunched out a book so fast just straight boop boop boop boop boop. Just boom. I wrote it. I started writing in the end of March, and I finished it. It got published in January. Uh, life has a sense of timelessness now. I’m like, ah, you feel like there’s forever love and life is eternal in a way beyond the physical, you know? And so it’s a slower process to writing this book because I’m in the, the feeling love and life phase. So it’s a slower process, but you’re not having that urgency of, I’m in a hospital room and there’s this machine attached to me. Yeah. So it’s slower. I’m like, whoa. But it’s kind of nice. You’re like, okay. And, and so it should be life and love. And this whole thing that we’re getting to experience for a moment should give us the magic that really, in a way, we are timeless. 

Leah: As I mentioned, you were named one of the top one hundred influencers, cancer survivor influencers. How did how did that happen? How did that come to be? 

Sandy: I don’t know, it just came to you. It just came. You know, it was when I saw that, uh, that they, they sent me this, this, I was like, wow, what? It really struck me. It was a real joy and honor to be mentioned among some really great people on that list, uh, including, gosh, um, is it Kate Middleton is also she was mentioned in there to having her battle with cancer. So, it was quite an interesting from names or not, it doesn’t matter, but it was beautiful to be around, uh, to be on that list. It was a beautiful surprise. Um, I think honestly, I haven’t even thought about, uh, the sweetness of those accolades. I’ve just been constantly just trying to share my story to help people. And, uh, you know, whether it’s writing, uh, magazines, podcasts, like with you, I just keep turning things out, you know, on social media, on my newsletters. And I guess you just trust your work and somehow it’s landing in the right places and people notice, you know how it is. Yeah, I’m really grateful. I love OncoDaily. Um, I love Cancer World magazine. Um, I love all that they do and really, uh, a lot of integrity and heart because they’re not just looking for what is the medication they’re looking for? What is the solution through the heart space? What can be done emotionally as well? Um, so I’m really grateful. I, I love, I’m going to say OncoDaily and, and I’m so grateful for that. That was just like what I would have never imagined that going through cancer. Like what? So yeah, it’s a joy. 

Leah: And has it changed? Has it changed your, your direction in any way or it’s just amplified? 

Sandy: It just amplified just to keep going. It’s like the fuel to just keep going, keep sharing your message and just keep evolving. Keep trusting that your voice, your existence matters. Just like what you’re doing with the cancer pod, right? Uh, waking up to know that you’re doing something beyond serving yourself is, to me, the greatest purpose. And that’s why I started writing. I can’t imagine thinking I’m alone on this journey or just doing something for me. The idea that we can make the world a little bit brighter, whether it’s cancer, whether it’s environment, whether it’s whatever, it’s just it gives your life so much more meaning. So I feel really further fueled to be like, okay, what’s next? Universe, you know, like, what more can I, how more can I serve? Uh, through my, my work is how I see it. 

Leah: How would you recommend someone introducing themselves to that sort of sound therapy? 

Sandy: Oh my gosh, you it’s as easy as going on YouTube. There’s so much, uh, resource and people, you know, I even put my things up there and everything’s linked from my website. You can check it out. But outside of myself, there’s so many great people doing sound baths that are captured there that you can just play. As you relax, you can watch, look within your community yoga studios. A lot of times like wellness environments, see, is there a sound bath going on? Pay for a drop in, go in, see, see how you feel about it. Um, a lot of times I know for me, um, one of the communities that I serve at my yoga and my sound bath is one of my favorite communities in LA and it’s home studio hot yoga, um, under the, the beautiful direction of, uh, Bobby Javier. And so, I do my sound baths there Monday and Friday nights, but I combine it with yoga. So as people are doing yoga, holding their poses in a very restorative state, they’re getting washed by sound. And then on Wednesdays I bring sound, but in different ways using Peter Hess bowls that are very much put on the body. I love has sound, has bowls. A shout out to Emily. Um, Peter, uh, Jana, Jana Hess, who I know Jana personally. So these are bowls that you put on the body. And not only is the sound beautiful, but it’s also very healing. The resonance, the vibrations through your body. Um, I can go on and on about that, but um, so yeah, for example, I bring that to this, to this particular studio in Atwater in Los Angeles. Um, so there’s, there’s for your viewers, your listeners look out and see what’s out there in your city and just go take, take a little moment, go take a sound bath. If you’re curious, go on YouTube and see what it’s about. Um, and it’s demystified, you know, what is a sound bath? The way I say it is like this. How do you feel when you sit by the ocean? It’s you’re receiving an ocean of sound that’s very healing and calming, allowing you to be in your parasympathetic nervous system more than in the chronic fight or flight, you know, of stress. It’s supportive that way. I like I like that comparison because I do think there are a lot of people who find that ocean sound relaxing, which is why we have those little machines that make the rain sound or the ocean sound. 

Leah: I actually, um, I was going to ask you because I have used the sound bath videos on YouTube to fall asleep. Yes. And so I was going to ask you if there is that same effect through video? 

Sandy: Yes. 

Leah: Like, are you still getting the same sound frequencies? I wasn’t sure if there was some sort of disconnect once you go through video.

Sandy: Oh gosh, I don’t think so. I mean, it’s always wonderful to feel and to be in the space of the vibrations, but your brain is still picking up the frequencies. You know, your body is still reacting to the soothing sounds. Right. And, uh, so I, I really believe it all has a benefit. It’s all beneficial. You know, it’s like if you’re, um, listening to somebody singing or speaking kind words or affirmations, you’re receiving it, whether you’re the person is in front of you or not, you’re listening to it, you’re getting washed, you know, even if you have background music playing in your home or, you know, even if you’re listening to Beethoven, which is shown to be very healing. Um, it all has a beautiful effect on the body, on the mind. 

Leah: So I’m curious to know more about the Hess bowls. And so when you’re placing these on someone else’s body and playing or you’re placing them on yourself, how, how do they work? 

Sandy: This is a good question. They are incredible. I have a whole set. One of my favorite if anybody out there is like, oh my gosh, I want to get a Hess bowl, which one do I get? I, I’ve had several of my students order the universal bowl by Hess. Peter Hess the universal bowl is gorgeous. It’s the only bowl I would say if anyone’s curious that you would need. It’s for life. I use it on myself. I’ll tell you a personal story about that. But that bowl in particular is wonderful because it’s not just a particular frequency or like a heart bowl heart chakra. You place it or solar plexus or your head or your, you know, sacral, you know, and they change with size the universal bowls for your entire body. So it’s full body, and your body will have the wisdom to know what it needs from the bowl when you strike it. It’s brilliant and it just releases. It helps support any inflammation, any build up calcification. If that’s the if I’m saying that right. Stagnant energy, emotion. Uh, and I’ll tie it back to myself. But I place these on my students, you know, like on their back, back of their heart, on their solar plexus. I strike it and they can feel they’re like, wow, that clear things out for me. For me personally, I was like, I got to do this on myself. Um, for two weeks straight. I basically, Leah, I had trauma trapped in my ribs because my cancer was so big. It was ten by fifteen mass, it collapsed my left lung. And so I had a chest tube in my body for two weeks. I think it was so bad that I swear to you, the chest tube for me was worse than the cancer. It was so sensitive and awful. Anyway, my body has held that score for a while. I thought, what am I gonna do? This is terrible. It’s just just a monkey on my back there. So I’m like, I’m gonna do the Hess bowl every night. I put my legs up the wall or I’m laying down in Shavasana, and I put the bowl on my ribs and I strike it with the mallet. Just let it die off the sound and strike it again. It’s on my body. I’m feeling the vibrations. I am not even kidding you. Time passes a week, two weeks. I’m like, oh my gosh, why do I feel lighter? The sound bowl helped to clear out whatever stagnation, inflammation, trapped trauma, emotion, whatever was stuck there, you know? So it clears things out. If that’s I’m trying to break it down in the simplest way. So yeah, so it’s a physical vibration as well as a sound vibration. Yes. Yes. That they have both. But the bowls that I have, I have some that’s just for the sound you don’t put on the body, but the, the um the ones for the body, the therapeutic bowls, they’re wonderful. They’re meant to be placed on your body. So, your body gets the the vibration, but the sound is just beautiful as well. So, when I’m doing this in my sessions, in my yoga sound bath sessions, I love combining them both. I do everything myself. Um, it’s a joy for someone to be receiving the vibrations while the rest of the room can hear it. So, it’s all healing. 

Leah: Do you take your sound to places like hospitals or cancer centers? 

Sandy: Yes, yes, to my own hospital. I brought sound to cancer support LA. I bring sound to UCLA as well to the oncology board there as they’re training, their, their doctors, uh, bringing my patient point of view and also my sound, um, everywhere. What’s lovely. Leah I don’t, I’m sure maybe you find this as well. We’re living in such an amazing time where, gosh, you can go into corporate settings and people are like, huh, my accountants need some sound healing. Like people are becoming more open to being like, we can’t just be work, work, work, grind. What is the point? How can we enjoy and infuse more peace and positivity as the work has to happen? So, it’s been really cool. 

Leah: One of the cancer centers in Arizona actually had music therapy. 

Sandy: Mhm. 

Leah: So, they didn’t have the sound therapy other than, you know, there was somebody who played the piano. And then also there were, I can’t remember if there were multiple people or it was just him would go to a room and play for a patient, either go room to room and play for inpatients. So, I could imagine something like what you’re doing and bringing it to people who are maybe not on the same floor that you were on, because you’re supposed to be isolated. 

Sandy: Right. 

Leah: Going through your treatment. Um, but having an opportunity for someone who is isolated to be able to hear the sounds. 

Sandy: Mhm. So beautiful. That would be incredible. Mhm. And we’re seeing a lot more. There’s so many beautiful artists, uh, you know, that I get to share this, this landscape with that are doing. We’re bringing this out into more and more places, and it’s really nice. Everybody deserves to be touched by peace and love. And I think sound is an accessible place and space for people doesn’t need any words like love. Love doesn’t need any words. Love is colorless. Love is blind. Love is very kind. So I think it’s really a divine time to be sharing these things. 

Leah: You just had a what are they called, performances? You just were at a museum. 

Sandy: Yes, yes. This is this was part of, um, Sonic Unity and the company that created that we did. So it was at the museum in Culver City, a gorgeous, uh, gorgeous space. And, uh, they allowed us to come in and present this vision that we had of sound free available to the masses. We had over seven hundred people show up. Leah. Oh my God, I would love to show you pictures. Or maybe you’ve seen the lineups were right up to the street, never ending, and the flow of the theatre was people would come in and they had somebody who had a bodyguard and everything. People would have had to be flowed in and out. So, there was a constant flow. So, you’d come in to receive sound and listen in the theatre space for twenty minutes or so. Then you’d leave. More people would come in. It was this rotating, informal yet beautiful way of receiving sound without having to be quiet and having it was an all you can sound experience in the beautiful environment that the Vendee Museum is. And I brought my sound there along with incredible. Anthony Profeta. He’s an Evergreen Award winner, I believe in 2025 for Best Sound Healing Artist in the US. He came over from Miami. Um, I had, uh, Bella Rabbit, Grammy nominated artist and I had, um, Isaac Sebu as well, who has a lot of, um, gorgeous healing technology and sound. So, we all had our presentations and we had a huge jam at the end where all of us were jamming with healing bowls and Bella’s vocals and it was amazing. And so we’re building on that. That’s the future. That’s the vision. Aside from other things that I have going on is how do we bring sound to the masses? Where how do I say it’s accessible? Not everybody can access a wellness studio, um, or have the money for it. What was special about that event is that we had all kinds of people under the sun. When I looked up at the audience, see if seven hundred people flowed through, we had award winning producers, artists, beautiful people, people with disabilities in wheelchairs. We had homeless people show up, approach my partner, my in the company to say, you know what? I I’m, I’m house challenged. I don’t have a home. I heard of your event, but when you looked at the sea of people, there is no tag that says um, homeless or award winner. There’s no tags on anybody. Everybody was one. And it was the most beautiful thing. And so, the next vision is to build upon this and share love through sound. 

Leah: Is there anything else that you want to add? Anything that I haven’t mentioned that you want to bring up? 

Sandy: My gosh, if you or your mate, you’re amazing. Where did you get all this information and absorb? 

Leah: There’s the internet out there! I like to kind of know stuff. And it’s hard for me not to like, put words and say like, oh, so this time, you know, I want, I, I’m still kind of working at this. So no, I, I look stuff up. 

Sandy: You’re so amazing. I’m just, I’m a little curious about you. Leah. Like I love what I saw about you and what you’re doing with The Cancer Pod and, and you, um, have such a curiosity and a good energy that comes through my way. And how is this serving your heart? How are you still continuing on with such joy for what you do? 

Leah: It comes from just wanting to help people. Being a naturopathic doctor who worked in cancer centers, and my whole job was to support patients as they’re going through treatment, working with other integrative providers, with dietitians and mind, body and physical and occupational therapy. You know, just working with a whole team and then realizing not everyone had access to that. And so, through The Cancer Pod, that’s what the goal is, is to kind of expose people to things that maybe they never had exposure to. Maybe they didn’t know about acupuncture, or they didn’t have an opportunity to speak to a dietitian or they don’t know about sound, you know, or music therapy or art therapy. I haven’t spoken with an art therapist yet, but I’d love to. Um, and so that’s kind of I’m not practicing. I don’t, I no longer practice. And so this is my way of helping people know that there’s more to conventional medicine. There’s the integrative part by bringing these, these other things. I don’t even know the words right now, but… 

Sandy: Modalities

Leah: Modalities. There you go. Bringing these other modalities to complement. It’s not replacing anything, it’s complementing the treatment and making something. As I know from going through treatment myself, it’s not easy, you know, and just and making things a little bit easier. And also, that element of taking a little bit of control. 

Sandy: Mhm. Yes. 

Leah: Because you don’t have control. And so yeah, just exposing people to everything that’s kind of out there. And, you know, I talk to oncologists and I talk to you, I mean, I talk to, you know, as many people as I can to kind of I don’t want anyone to think that this is in place of something else. It’s just this is to kind of complement your healing. 

Sandy: Yes. 

Leah: You know, on, on different levels, because we have to heal on different levels. 

Sandy: And, you know, I love that you said that and I love what you share. And that’s why I was so happy to, to be able to speak with you because, um, through my process, I just want to tell your people, and I’m sure they’ve heard listening to your many, many episodes. Um, I’m very much a believer of balance and finding your own way and using your wisdom and that you don’t have to demonize one side in order for the other side to make sense, if that makes sense. So for me, as I was going through this process, there’s, you know, a lot of research are chemo is bad. Don’t do chemo. Everyone has their own journey. I’d be dead without my chemo. My cancer was so aggressive it collapsed my lung 10x15 mass. You know, um, I needed the chemo. I wouldn’t be here. I know that, but it didn’t mean that I couldn’t add things from the east. The sound, the yoga, the prayer. There’s there’s a lot of power and prayer, positive thinking, people praying for you, meditation, nature, good food, you know? So for me, it was this whole amalgamation of East and West to complement whatever I needed on the journey. And I was really lucky to have a great oncology team that was like, absolutely. But when you’re in the hospital, don’t do those supplements. But of course, when you go home, that’s so there was no, oh, it’s our way or that way. And I really believe that it’s great what you’re doing and just shedding light to people that, you know, there’s so many options. Don’t be scared. And, um, find many ways to support what you’re going through. 

Leah: Absolutely. Yeah. I’m going to put the links that you shared with me. I’m going to put all of those in the show notes. And so, people know how to reach you. And, um, and thanks for turning the tables and asking about me. Thanks for letting me share. 

Sandy: Oh, it was a joy. I was curious. I mean, I’ve read up on you too. Of course. Who am I sitting with? But it’s so nice to learn from you and your energy and your heart is felt very much in what you’re doing. And that’s why I’m so grateful to people like you. I’m grateful to publications like I hate to, to, you know, repeat publications, but like Cancer World, Cancer Health magazine, hello OncoDaily, but constantly putting out material that shows you what’s happening in science and developments, but also patient points of views. And how can we support in an emotional way as well, because it’s the human connection to cancer that will help us overcome cancer in the best way, I think. So, um, thank you for this. Leah. It was so much fun. 

Outro: Thanks for listening to The Cancer Pod. Support the show by following wherever you stream podcasts. Remember to leave a review and share this episode with someone you love. Join our Patreon community for bonus episodes, free downloads, and behind the scenes conversations! Follow The Cancer Pod on social media for more integrative wellness insights between episodes. This podcast is for entertainment purposes only and is not medical advice. Always talk to your healthcare team before making any changes to your treatment plan. And on that note, I’m Dr Leah Sherman. Music is by Kevin MacLeod.