Believe Big Podcast

56-Maggie & Brad Jones - From Terminal Cancer to CANCER/EVOLUTION: The Metabolic Therapy Journey

May 09, 2023 Ivelisse & Brad/Maggie Jones Season 1 Episode 56
Believe Big Podcast
56-Maggie & Brad Jones - From Terminal Cancer to CANCER/EVOLUTION: The Metabolic Therapy Journey
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

This week’s podcast features an interview with Maggie and Brad Jones. Maggie is a cancer survivor who was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer at the age of 40 and given a terminal prognosis.  Maggie is now NED.

Brad is a director, writer, and producer and has worked in the film industry for over 20 years.  Together, they have used Maggie’s cancer journey as an inspiration to create a new docu-series, CANCER/EVOLUTION which premieres this coming September.

In this episode, Maggie shares her journey from cancer diagnosis to recovery and her use of metabolic therapies to treat her cancer.  She talks about the details of her metabolic therapy protocol and how it helped her overcome her cancer. Brad shares about the new docu-series, why he and Maggie decided to create it and some of the research that went into the project.

From the docu-series website:  "CANCER/EVOLUTION is the story of the revolutionary scientists and practitioners committed to following scientific evidence rather than institutional dogma to find effective cancer treatments. In the process, they are starting to redefine not just cancer treatment, but our very definition of cancer and what causes it."

Be sure to register with the link below for the World Premier of CANCER/EVOLUTION.

Connect with Brad and Maggie on their docu-series Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/CANCEREVOLUTIONdoc/

Suggested Resource Links:


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Ivelisse Page:

Hi, I'm Ivelisse Page and thanks for listening to the Believe Big podcast, the show where we take a deep dive into your healing with health experts, integrative practitioners, biblical faith leaders, and cancer thrivers from around the globe. Welcome to today's episode on the Believe Big podcast. My name is Ivelisse Page and it's an honor to be with you today. Did you know that it takes on average 17 years for research evidence to become clinical treatment? Did you know that new targeted treatments based on genetic model of cancer can cost patients over a hundred thousand dollars per treatment, but have shown to extend lives by an average of 2.4 months? my guests today are trying to change this by bringing more awareness about metabolic therapies. Maggie and Brad's life was changed when the month she turned 40, Maggie was diagnosed with terminal cancer and received a prognosis of less than a year. She's been cancer free for four years now and has dedicated her life to sharing the evidence-based treatments that so dramatically improved her survival and quality of life. Over the course of her healing, Maggie was fortunate to establish friendships with scientists and practitioners changing the cancer paradigm, and has become a prominent voice in the metabolic cancer treatment community. She and her filmmaker husband are the force behind an award-winning docu-series featuring some of the leading scientists and practitioners on the Metabolic Theory of Cancer and associated therapies. Cancer Evolution will premier along with their summit that Believe Big will be a part of in September. Please make sure to follow the links in our show notes to register and watch. But welcome Brad and Maggie to the show!

Brad Jones:

Thank you so much for having us.

Maggie Jones:

Thank you, Ivelisse. It's such an honor.

Ivelisse Page:

We always like to start our show with what our guest favorite health tip is. Can you guys share each one with us?

Maggie Jones:

For me, it's been fasting and I say that on day three of our monthly extended fast and still feeling great and good to be here and I know it's gonna heal me up.

Ivelisse Page:

Yeah, fasting is amazing.

Brad Jones:

I would say for the general public, just the number one health tip would be getting off of processed foods, right? That's just getting back to plant-based, not necessarily plant-based, but just getting back to like whole foods, not eating things in the desert of the grocery store. Even if you don't do a lot of exercise, that could really improve your health.

Ivelisse Page:

Yes. A hundred percent. So for those not familiar with metabolic therapies, can you share what that means?

Maggie Jones:

Whew, let's go back to everyone thinks that cancer is a genetic disease, that is something in your genes that can't be helped, and you are destined to either have it or not, depending on what's in your genes. The metabolic theory of cancer poses that it's actually in your mitochondria, it's in your epigenetics and it's something that can be affected with your lifestyle, your diet, and even things like off-label drugs. And so when we think about metabolic therapies, we're really talking about those therapies that affects epigenetics and metabolics like lifestyle, fasting, a ketogenic diet, off-label drugs, stress, rejection, like meditation or yoga. All of these lifestyle treatments can have a major impact making the conventional treatment that you're using even more effective, reducing the side effects of conventional treatment. And having just an overall better quality of life.

Ivelisse Page:

Yes. Yeah. And it's really encouraging, I think, for people who do have a genetic linking, like myself and my kids, My doctor, when I was diagnosed years ago, he said, it's like a switch that turns on and off. You have that ability based on what you're eating, based on the things that, that you mentioned today, like fasting and eating whole foods and other things as well. So thank you for explaining that. I think a lot of people here, metabolic therapies and if you're not in this world, sometimes you're not sure what that means, but everyone understands diet, fasting, exercise, supplementation. So thank you for

Brad Jones:

Yeah.

Ivelisse Page:

For sharing that.

Maggie Jones:

Yeah. Just lifestyle.

Brad Jones:

And it sounds like you have an amazing doctor, if he was letting you know about those therapies. That's one of the things that we run up against a lot is doctors not letting the patients know that these exist often, cuz they're just not aware of it.

Ivelisse Page:

I was grateful. He trained in Switzerland and then came to the United States, now it's been like, 30 years, but because of that training, he realized the importance of all those factors. He's considered a anthroposophic physician, so it looks at the body as a whole versus just a symptom base. So Maggie, can you briefly share about how you found out you had cancer and what you experienced?

Maggie Jones:

I found out in 2018 and Brad and I had just moved to Hong Kong from our home in Los Angeles. We'd never been to Asia before, certainly not to Hong Kong. But I had a new job and my job by nature was very stressful and I'd had some symptoms before we came to Hong Kong. I just dismissed them. Things like a cough or swollen lymph nodes, thinking it was stress, or I was getting fat, or I simply didn't have the time to deal with it. But about a month into my job, I was going blind, and Brad finally found out that I couldn't see anything outta my right eye, and he insisted that I go see an optometrist. The only one that we could find in Hong Kong happened, oh, sorry. Ophthalmologist happened to be working at one of the best hospitals in Hong Kong, fortunately. So when I got in there on the Sunday, he took a look in my eye. Stepped out told me I needed an emergency mri, which I had, and waited the entire next day to tell me that I had terminal cancer, and they could tell that because the tumors in my eye were also in my brain. And eventually I had a PET scan and biopsy that confirmed it had started in my lungs, but has spread everywhere to lymph nodes throughout my body and eventually to my liver, and then four tumors in my brain.

Ivelisse Page:

Wow. And so at that point, were you familiar with metabolic therapies or integrative therapies? How did that come about?

Maggie Jones:

Oh, what a good question. I had a hint of it from my mother growing up, and then I rebelled profoundly in my adolescence really emphasizing allopathic medicine, and that's all I cared about. I wanted to do exactly what my doctors told me to do. I wanted to be a good patient. I knew I was gonna die in the next six to eight months, and I wanted to die well and make Brad proud of me and my doctor proud of me, and that was my goal for the first week. And then I started reading some books things like Radical Remission, even Kris Carr's, Crazy Sexy Cancer, just to get hyped up. And I realized that some people do survive these kinds of prognosises. And if anybody could do it, I thought I could do it. And so I continued reading and then I found scientists like Dr. Seyfried, like Dr. Nasha, all these wonderful scientists and practitioners who are featured in the docu-series. And just educated myself more on what a truly healthy diet and lifestyle looked like. And, very luckily, I had a lot of motivation to pursue that lifestyle because I don't think I ever would've changed my life as much as I did if it wasn't the threat of death hanging over me every day. And I'm so lucky that I had this terrible diagnosis because it really did need to be that bad to motivate me to change.

Ivelisse Page:

Wow. And so thinking about that, many of our listeners have cancer, are going through that journey now and hearing terminal, it's not okay, I have cancer stage 1, 2, 3. it's terminal. And so I know everyone's case is different, but what were some of the key factors that you guys incorporated into your journey?

Maggie Jones:

It was that very first weekend after I was diagnosed that I decided that fasting was something that was gonna work for me, and I did my first 24 hour fast while we were on vacation, and I decided then that I wasn't gonna put anything else into my body that wasn't actively healing it. If I couldn't find a published piece of research saying that this food is going to make my healthy cells stronger and my cancer weaker. I wasn't gonna bother eating it. So for me, that meant giving up alcohol, which I was quite the alcohol enthusiast in my earlier days. At the time in Hong Kong I didn't trust a lot of the food sources, so I sent Brad out to all the different grocery stores searching for organic vegetables. Everything I'd read about, I started spotting my own broccoli sprouts, making keifer water. The big one for me was getting into mindfulness-based stress reduction, and this was back when I was very into the allopathic medicine, so I knew that there's research around this. It could be something that is right for me, but I knew I had to de-stress somehow. And I'd even had to go off my anti-anxiety medication with my diagnosis for the conventional chemo I was doing, which is such a weird time to go off your anti-anxiety meds right after you find out you have less than a year to live. But yeah, we started meditating and thanks to Brad for supporting me, or I never would've been able to do it myself. But yoga, every morning, a little meditation, and slowly I became aware of my body, and I realized that for the previous 40 years I hadn't really experienced living. I was always waiting for the next thing. Let me get these dishes over so I can watch tv. Let me finish working so I can retire. And I decided, no, I'm going to enjoy this moment right now because I know how many more moments I have and there aren't very many. But then they kept coming and getting better and more and more life ahead of me and just finding a way to enjoy it, completely, absolutely, the good, the bad. I love doing dishes because I'm so lucky to be able to do dishes.

Brad Jones:

I try to do the dishes.

Maggie Jones:

Yes. And he does a lot and I'm grateful for that. And gratitude is a very important part of my healing.

Ivelisse Page:

Wow, that's amazing. You guys are incredible. I love that you said that is you realized that you weren't living. And I think cancer can be a wake up call to so many people and what's really important in my life, what's not, and what can I do each day to bring joy into my life? And seeing the good in the everyday tasks, but also finding things that bring you joy in doing them and living and not waiting for vacation, not waiting till you retire. I love that. I really do. So Brad, you know, what led you to create the documentary and can you share with us some of the content that we will be seeing?

Brad Jones:

Oh yeah, I would love to. The impetus for the documentary was basically, so Maggie found out about these like amazing healing modalities, that we always try to emphasize you can do with standard of care. And after she had healed about a year after her diagnosis, she was no evidence of disease, which I wouldn't say that came out of the blue, but it was surprising when we got that that scan. And it was the doctor was just like, you're clear. We were like, what? So Maggie had started a blog as a sort of dual purpose to let our friends and family know what she was going through and at the same time to try and just help other people, other cancer patients that were going through this. And then she decided to try and expand that after she was no evidence of disease, she became like a cancer coach. So she was working one-on-one with people to try and help them, and it just wasn't having the impact that she had hoped. It was certainly was frustrating like trying to get the message across, and then it was also just the amount of people that she could impact, one-on-one. You can only work with so many people in a day. So I had a filmmaking background. I worked in reality television for several years, and so I was like, Hey, we've met Thomas Seyfried, Travis Christofferson, I was like, at conferences and, and actually, through, a care Oncology. So Maggie, was like, Hey, what if we pitched them the idea of doing a documentary about the metabolic theory of cancer and the treatments, the metabolic treatments. And both of them said yes, and it snowballed from there, right? Once we had those two, great people on board, we quickly after that got, quite a few of the other people that are in the documentary and yeah, I guess.

Maggie Jones:

And I should add, we keep calling it the documentary cause that's what it was when we started. But after we collected all this great footage from these masters, we realized it's gotta be a series cause we're not gonna be able to put this in 90 minutes. And so now we're looking at a four part one hour per episode docu-series in season one. And we already have footage for season two, and this research just happens so quickly and it's not our position as reporters to tell people how to treat their cancer, that we realize it's a perfect fit for a summit where the actual practitioners can share the latest research, their latest treatments. But the docu-series is critically important to explain the why. Why do these therapies work? What is metabolic therapy? Why do your genes not condemn you to your future? And it's all within your control.

Ivelisse Page:

Yes. We heard you mention in an interview that you had to scale back on the history of cancer research when you started making the documentary. Why is that?

Brad Jones:

It's a rabbit hole to be honest with you, right? There's just so many different scientists and avenues that we could go down and they're all worthy of being looked at. But it was just this in the interest of time, basically. It's like we had, you gotta edit, you gotta cut it down, right? And we've picked three key scientists for each episode to focus on and just telling their story of how they progressed this metabolic theory of cancer.

Ivelisse Page:

I love that. And one of'em that you mentioned, I believe is Dr. Otto Warberg, who developed some significant theories about cancer during the early part of the 20th century. Why were his theories, in your opinion, not given the credit they deserve?

Brad Jones:

What kind of happened to Warburg is he wasn't dismissed, he was just left behind. There's two things that really happened with his research. One, he was just sort of Stoutly German from pre-World War II, just very patriotic. And so he didn't want to leave his country when World War II started. He tried to stay there as long as he could. And obviously to his detriment, he ended up being protected even by the Nazis, even though he had a Jewish father. And so his research in a sense after World War II had a sort of a taint to it, right? Nobody really wanted to be associated with him, even though he didn't, you know, have anything to do with the Nazis except for obviously being protected by them. He wasn't helping them to advance anything. The other thing that happened was after World War II in early fifties, we discovered the structure of D N A and that was basically a giant insight into what people had been looking for, like the genes and how we can develop all the cells and everything in our body, and people just were like, this Warburg theory, which was based on injured mitochondria, they were like, yeah, we're just gonna leave that behind, the genes are what's causing cancer. Those two things combined, the sort of taint from World War II, the focus from almost the entire research community on genes, it just left Warburg and his theories behind.

Maggie Jones:

Yeah, and that's one thing that we really focus on in episode one because I had no idea how much these social ideas can really impact the science that we are given. And it's just crazy to me to understand that, Warburg, no one wanted to work with him. He was a genius for sure, but he was openly living with another man, which at the time was questionable. He had Jewish ancestry but stayed with the Nazis. If he had been a different individual, how would our research have changed? And then of course, DNA being such a sexy science in the fifties. Yeah. Yeah. Here we are now thinking everything's genetic.

Brad Jones:

Yeah. And once genes were thought to be the seed of cancer that's continued till today. We're talking about 70 years, we've thought that the that the genes are the seat of cancer and that has guided research away from other avenues. It's still not proven right? You ask someone on the street what causes cancer? Oh, your genes right? That's not actually proven. That's still a theory.

Maggie Jones:

And then when you watch episodes two and three, you're gonna see just how many holes are in that particular theory that are shocking.

Ivelisse Page:

Yeah, and I think it's really difficult too, because I think people don't realize when it comes to research and in things that are done in the United States, especially that everything, in order for it to become part of standard of care, it has to go through that clinical trial process and natural therapies, many metabolic therapies cannot be patented, and so it really makes it hard to find funding them for them, like our Mistletoe clinical trial. We, at Believe Big had to raise the funds for the trial to happen at Johns Hopkins. And we've seen it like a David and Goliath moment because most of the time these clinical trials are funded by pharmaceutical companies who have much to gain, of course. But they have the funding, to give to these research hospitals in order to make their drugs approved. The natural therapies that aren't patentable have a harder time getting funding because of that. And so that's why I feel like this is such a good docu-series for people to watch and to realize, because we all need to come together as a community and say, okay, we wanna make more of this research available, more funding available for natural therapies like mistletoe, so that more people can have access to it, and it covered by insurance and offered by oncologists. And oncologists care, they wanna help their patients, but they're not able to offer anything outside of chemo, radiation and surgery. And a lot of people don't realize that.

Brad Jones:

You hit the nail on the head. I can't imagine how hard it would be to get funding for any kind of research into mistletoe, right? You couldn't possibly make any money off of that. and that's really what, everyone who has cancer right now is up against, is You think that research is trying to solve the disease? It's really not. Mm-hmm. It's really trying to make drugs that they can sell for profit, unfortunately.

Maggie Jones:

Our only hope with this series is to raise people's awareness that we need to fund this research and yeah, things like mistletoe deserve public dollars because this is how we save lives.

Ivelisse Page:

Absolutely. I hear stories. Since we began in 2011, we've been able to help over a million people through their cancer journey, which has been like so exciting to see that. But we hear stories all the time of not only it helping people survive, but their quality of life. And most recently, yeah, we just had a woman who had issues affording the IV version of mistletoe and a group of her friends came together and they funded her to be able to do this therapy. And she texted one of my friends and she says, you're not gonna believe this. But after three infusions, I was able to now cook dinner for my family. And that's a first. I haven't been able to do that in a year. And when you hear those things, it's you're giving people their life back, like you were saying. They're able to live and enjoy these moments with their family. And, so it's so important for us as a community to gather around and be able to support those on their journey and the future patients. So in the docu-series, I heard you say Dr. Thomas Seyfried talks about how the cancer industry has become overly complicated. Can you talk about what he means?

Brad Jones:

Yeah, he's basically just saying that, yeah, it's very convoluted. There's this idea of it, it all becomes tied together. Research institutions are they're in bed with the pharmaceutical companies because the the pharmaceutical companies are actually giving funding for them to do research. And so then all the major hospitals are also working in this same system, right? So he's basically just saying that it's very difficult to break out of this if you want to do research in a different way to break free because there's just this sort of gravitational pull that's where the money is. So it just sucks everyone back in. And we're very lucky that we have someone like Dr. Seyfried that can think and speak outside the box on the topic. He actually is running a biological lab which is slightly separate from a medical lab, which makes it a little bit easier for him to do different kinds of research and go out in a different direction.

Ivelisse Page:

Yes. And what's interesting to me is that a lot of times, and I was surprised to learn this, when it has these huge medical discoveries and this therapy, targeted therapy is incredible. And when you see the extension of life, it's like the average of 2.4 months. And you're like, yes, exactly. Wait a minute. Had I not done anything at all, I wonder if I would've lived longer than that. So a lot of people don't realize also that these huge discoveries are only adding 2.4 months on average, and it's just that was shocking me. That was shocking to me.

Maggie Jones:

And to your point, what quality of life are those months? I know when I look at my personal journey, I've definitely suffered some poor effects from my conventional treatment and having to look back, would it be worth it to me to have a 2.4 month shorter lifespan, but be able to have that true living of every moment? And it's a decision everyone needs to make for themselves and we're not trying to encourage one way or another. But when you talk about mistletoe and treatments like that, that's what improves your quality of life and being able to make dinner for your family, to me, is one of the most important gifts that you can give to somebody with cancer. It's not a couple extra weeks.

Brad Jones:

Yeah, and I was gonna say palliative chemotherapy, I feel like that is almost an oxymoron, right? Even if your doctor is wrong, but says you only have a few months to live. Is that how you wanna spend your last few months? Obviously it's a personal decision, but I'm like, if I had three months to live, I would not wanna go on chemotherapy, right? Just knowing that the end was coming anyway. It's kind weird. Yeah.

Ivelisse Page:

No, I don't think its weird. I, that was my story. And I, I always feel like you have to be treated as an individual. And you know one of the things that I do love about Radical Remission and Radical Hope is that there are people in that book who have survived great odds, less than 25% chance of surviving. And there are some like myself that didn't do any conventional chemo, radiation. I did do surgery, but people who didn't do that and are here today, there are some that combined therapies, and are still here today. And then there are some that started the natural approach post-conventional, and are still here today. So I think everyone has to decide as an individual what is best for them based on the information that they have and, and their personal circumstances. So not everyone would feel comfortable doing what I did, but I was like, you, I've seen so many people suffer and if I only had a few months to live with a stage four colon cancer diagnosis, I was gonna live it out with my family and my kids and make memories and enjoy those moments instead of being for me personally, in bed and sick and weak and not being able to enjoy those precious moments. Really grateful for all those metabolic therapies that also helped me to be here today and are helping so many individuals. Another aspect that you all talk about in the docu-series, and you have one of my favorite people, Jess Kelley on she's been on our podcast and she talks about, oncology nutrition a lot. So how important is nutrition for cancer patients, in your opinion?

Maggie Jones:

In my opinion, it is everything. What you're putting in your body and for my healing, food was medicine and it's done more for me than the medicine. And I do take off-label drugs. I take a lot of supplements, but as much as it's about bringing in food and nutrients that are going to be healing. For me, it's also about not ingesting the food and the nutrients that I personally believe contributed to was one of the many factors of my cancer. Because the human body is amazing. We've got liver and kidneys and skin and all these detox organs, but we live in a world that these organs were not evolved for. And I know that in my personal lifestyle before cancer, I was giving my body a lot to deal with, and so being able to take that away and just give my body this clean slate, bringing in only healing nutrients, I just can't imagine anything more important for healing.

Brad Jones:

No.

Ivelisse Page:

So what was the most surprising thing that you learned while making this film? Was there anything?

Maggie Jones:

Oh my goodness. Can you answer this?

Brad Jones:

Wow. I guess for me, just this idea that researchers aren't able to pursue what they want to. It's like they really do have to write a grant proposal that gets funded by the NIH, NCI or even a foundation. And if you veer too far outside of this world that we think cancer lives in, it's very hard to get any kind of funding and that surprised me. It's like I would think that we're actually trying to like on a through line to try and cure cancer and I that I don't think that we are actually after making this documentary, I think that we might have veered off a little bit.

Maggie Jones:

Yeah. It's the same for me, especially with my previous passion for allopathic medicine and believing in the science and what we hear, just how much the dogma has taken hold, and we're no longer actively working towards curing cancer. We're actively working towards these weird goalposts of an extra week of survival for an extra a hundred thousand dollars. It doesn't make any sense to me. And like you say, oncologists care, they don't want their patients to die. Nobody goes into medicine without wanting to help people, but they're put into this position by the system and they can't help people. And I was just blown away to get more and more exposure to the constraints that are put on would-be healers in our society.

Brad Jones:

Yeah.

Ivelisse Page:

In closing, is there anything that either you would like to say that I didn't ask you?

Maggie Jones:

A question we often get is the most important thing for healing. And Ivelisse, I know you know this, and it's being your own advocate, and that's why we've been talking over and over about doing what's right for you. And we don't try to push any kind of perspective or theory in this docu-series. We're just pushing for more research that science and science research have to evolve. And again, that's part of why we're launching it with this summit because it does evolve so quickly and that's why we're so excited that you'll be involved in this. And hopefully be able to contribute your story to the final episode of season one, because you are such an inspiration to me and so many.

Brad Jones:

Yeah. And I would just echo Maggie's idea that, if you're out there and you, or a loved one is struggling with cancer, do some research, and talk with your oncologist. And if they are hard, hard against you, you might have to look for another oncologist if you can, or just work on the outside. That's what Maggie's done for a lot of her treatment is just, she has an oncologist. She takes their advice with the grain of salt and then does her own thing. Maybe a little mix of the two. So, yeah.

Maggie Jones:

They work for me. They work for me.

Brad Jones:

Be your own advocate for sure.

Ivelisse Page:

Be your own advocate and have a team. Not every one person is gonna know everything about your care. I actually have four integrative doctors that I work with to take care of me, and so everyone has their own specialty. And so it's really interesting to gain knowledge from each of those specialties. Just like in oncology, there's specialty in breast cancer, colon cancer, brain. So same thing in the integrative side is finding a good team that's gonna come around you to be able to support you on this journey. But I really thank you so much for taking this on. Thank you both for this incredible film, Cancer Evolution that will be coming out in September. I would tell everyone who's listening to go to the link in the show notes and register now so that you don't miss this incredible information that, you can then be your own advocate for yourself and those that you love in the future to have the tools to know how to help them. So thank you both again for joining us and we look forward to seeing you soon.

Brad Jones:

Thank you so much.

Maggie Jones:

Thank you so much.

Ivelisse Page:

If you enjoyed this episode and you'd like to help support our podcast, please subscribe and share it with others. Be sure to visit believebig.org to access the show notes and discover our bonus content. Thanks again and keep Believing Big!

What is your favorite health tip?
What is meant by metabolic therapies?
Maggie shares how she discovered she had cancer.
How did you become familiar with metabolic therapies or integrative therapies?
What were some key factors that you incorporated into your journey?
Brad talks about what led him to create the documentary.
Why did you have to scale back the history of metabolic therapies in the film?
Dr. Otto Warburg's theories are discussed.
How has the cancer industry become overly complicated?
How important is nutrition for cancer patients, in your opinion?
What was the most surprising thing you learned while making CANCER/EVOLUTION?
Final comments from Brad and Maggie.