this is not how i'm trying to roll.

It’s been a rough two weeks filled with delayed freelancing money, a lot of bickering at home, and a virus-infected computer.

To put it plainly, this Slayer has been stressed. And that isn’t a good thing.

I am a true believer in the mind-body connection, so after I was diagnosed, I made a promise to myself to live a tranquil and peaceful existence. As far as I’m concerned, stress-induced cancer recurrences are real. In fact, two years ago, I experienced one first-hand.

Well, it wasn’t really an occurrence but rather some dormant cancer cells that I believe were triggered into action when my mom was hospitalized.

In 2008, I was finishing up what was supposed to have been my last chemo treatment. When the nurse unplugged me, I was so happy that the entire experience was over that I actually burst into tears. For several weeks prior, my family had been planning a big celebration. And I spent a lot of time congratulating myself on making it through. No more chemo, no more needles, no more planning my life around cancer — or so I believed.

My last session ended on a Thursday. That Friday, my mom was admitted to the intensive care unit at a hospital in Delaware. Needless to say, I headed down there to take care of her. I spent all of my time traveling to and from the hospital, talking to doctors and specialists, and helping moms get through physical rehab.

After a month or so, my mom got better, but then my doctors found some leftover cancer in my abdomen that flared up. There’s little doubt in my mind that  it was stress related. I had literally worried myself sick and, as a result, had to resume chemo treatments.

Since then, I’ve adopted an anti-stress regime to prevent it from happening again. It includes yoga, regular deep breathing, and a bottle of gin.

Unfortunately, none of my go-to remedies have been much help over the last two weeks. My morning yoga sessions leave me feeling relaxed until I check my e-mail, which is about every 10 minutes or so. I’ve been having a virtual battle over e-mail recently with one of my employers about contract delays, glitches in the matrix, and invoices. It seem they couldn’t care less that I have bills to pay.

The constant drama has turned my deep breathing into sighs of frustration, and that bottle of gin I mentioned. Well, it’s got a swig or two left, but I don’t have the cash to re-up.  Actually, I’ve traded in the booze for green tea, which is a much healthier tonic.

Unfortunately, though, it looks like that stress factor of the last two weeks really has taken its toll. I just received the lab results from my chemo session yesterday, and my CA-125, a blood test that measures cancer in the body, jumped from 87 to 154. Normal is 35 or below.

Until this week, my numbers had been on a nice downward trend, decreasing slowly but surely. And just that quickly they shot up. After making good progress, today I’m feeling like I’ve been running a steady race only to find out that the finish line got moved back a few miles.

But I’m keeping it all in perspective. Not too long ago, my numbers were in the thousands. And I’ve had small increases before. After the last little spike, my doctor, God bless her, told me straight up, “I’m not worried.”

I’m raising a cup of green tea in her honor and hoping that she says the same thing next week.

who knew ginger could be so sexy?

A good friend of mine inspired me to write this post. In the eight or so years that we’ve known each other, she has been relentless in extolling the healing properties of ginger. And she kicked it up a notch after my diagnosis last year.

When I call her complaining of mild nausea after my chemo sessions, she always gives me the same response. “Chew on some ginger,” she advises, although she’s British, so it sounds more like “jin-ja.” But I’m able to look past her occasional mangling of American English, especially because in this case, she practices what she preaches.

Steeping slivers of ginger in a cup of hot water is my girl’s go-to remedy for indigestion, stomach aches, heartburn, and — most critically — food poisoning. So, naturally, she’s convinced that this pungent rhizome can combat the aftereffects of chemotherapy. “Trust me,” she says. “It will work.”

After years of paying her lip service, I’m declaring, in earnest, that she was right. (That incoming call on my cell is her waiting to tell me she told me so). I wasn’t so much doubtful as I was content to rely on anti-nausea drugs to do the job. I’m not one to suffer through aches or pain, and my instinct is to reach for my prescriptions because they’ve worked pretty well so far.

But I gave the ginger a try, mostly because during my last lecture from the Brit chick, I remembered other conversations I’ve had about this ancient digestive. When I first started treatment, another good friend rolled through with some ginger candies to help fight my upset stomach. One of my doctor friends, tired of hearing me whine, suggested that I walk half a block to our neighborhood co-op and buy some ginger powder to cook with. My former trainer, Ammo St. Phard, told me ginger is full of antioxidants and helps get the blood circulating. “Where would we be without trees and plants?” he asked rhetorically. “We learn in school that plants provide oxygen, but what we don’t learn is the wonders they do for our bodies when we consume them.”

A few weeks back, after my last visit to the chemo suite, I committed to a test tryout. For three days straight, I chewed on fresh ginger until the fibrous flesh lodged stubbornly in my back teeth and burned my tongue. I drank ginger tea until my taste buds, perfumed by the hot, spicy plant, became numb. I blended it in homemade fruit smoothies and boiled it with orange peel, pumpkin spice, and lemon as a form of aromatherapy. It made my apartment smell really yummy.

Yep, I passed on the pills to opt for a natural relief, and then I bought the book Healing Remedies, which is filled with interesting facts about the history of ginger and other plant-based medications.

Did you know that a combination of water, cinnamon, yellow dock root, and sugar is an effective laxative? So is magnesium. I found this out because chemo is notorious for blocking the passages, but no need to delve deeper into that. Nutmeg, which is recommended in small doses because of its hallucinogenic qualities, is a fruit kernel with calming abilities that is used to treat insomnia. Amazingly, it’s also a stimulant that strengthens the heart and dispels flatulence (note to boyfriend).

Grapefruits, which are rich in vitamins A and C and potassium, clean the kidneys, break down fat, and reduce the severity of a hangover. That’s news I could’ve used at the bar the other night when I switched from red wine to tequila (note to self). And I recently visited Karen Rose, master herbalist at Sacred Vibes Apothecary in Brooklyn, N.Y., whose Strong Man Tea contains nettle root, fennel seed, and saw palmetto berry for enhanced male potency.

I could go on about how carrots reportedly curb damage caused by smoking or how marigolds have antiseptic qualities. Penicillin, ephedrine, and chemo drugs such as Taxol are also derived from plants. But the benefits of herbs and plant matter are no news flash. The ancient Egyptians were up on their healing powers.

All I know is that I have a special jar now on top of my refrigerator to hold my ginger. Next up, I’m searching for a plant that lets me eat whatever I want while blocking all the calories. That would be a power plant indeed.

In his native Jamaica, Tosh was at the forefront of a movement that has pretty much resulted in officials of the island nation turning a blind eye to the use and sale of marijuana, one of the country’s biggest commodities. More than 20 years after Tosh’s death, government officials in the United States are taking a more hands-on approach.

Although the use and sale of marijuana is still a federal offense, 13 states have enacted laws to legalize it for medical reasons. This hot-button issue, a demonstration of state’s rights in its purest form, has been gaining a lot of momentum over the last few months.

Last week, the New York Senate Health Committee introduced a bill that would let registered patients or caregivers possess and grow limited amounts of pot. The week before, Delaware introduced a bill that would decriminalize any amount less than six ounces and permit licensed centers to grow and sell weed. Rhode Island, one of the states where medical marijuana is already legal, passed legislation that would set up state-run dispensaries. And in Pennsylvania, lawmakers introduced an act that would approve doctor-prescribed marijuana therapy.

A handful of other states such as New Hampshire and Connecticut have seen their publicly supported bills just narrowly defeated.

The debate on medical marijuana has been buttressed by plenty of discussions on the part of political pundits and even celebrities. One of the more memorable ones took place on CNN between actor Stephen Baldwin, who is of the anti-legalization camp, and Texas Congressman Ron Paul, a former presidential candidate who was an early sponsor of medicinal marijuana. In defending his position, Paul, of course, mentioned cancer patients and those suffering from terminal diseases. Baldwin invariably made the age-old argument about marijuana being a gateway drug.

A couple of things here: I find it curious that when TV networks host discussions on the topic of medical marijuana, the opinions of medical patients are rarely heard. With the exception of New Hampshire State Rep. Evalyn Merrick, a cancer survivor who admitted to the press that she found relief for nausea by smoking marijuana, there are generally a bunch of talking heads on the tube. Furthermore, a point not often mentioned by those who claim that weed leads to the use of — and dependence on — harder drugs is that prescription medications such as Percocet, Ativan, Codeine, Oxycotin, and Vicodin are highly addictive. Just ask Eminem. In a cover story for Vibe magazine, the rapper comes clean about his years-long prescription-drug problem. And who could forget the myriad stories last year on teen meth labs.

Now that our government has involved itself in the regulation of over-the-counter medicines, are states simply getting a head start regarding medical marijuana use? Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Vermont and seven other states certainly think so, not to mention Arizona and Maryland, two states that haven’t legalized the drug but have passed laws favorable to its use by patients with cancer, epilepsy, HIV, glaucoma, and multiple sclerosis, as well as people who suffer intense migraines. Let Tosh tell it, marijuana is also good for the flu and asthma. Who knew?

The most exciting thing about this entire debate, however, is getting to witness democracy at work. Federalism, my fellow Americans, is still one of our guiding principles. Whew! Although far from perfect, it led to the freedom of slaves, gives women abortion alternatives, and will be the front line in the fight to legalize gay marriage. In short, where states lead, the nation follows. I would’ve lost money, though, betting on New York to be a pioneer on any of these issues. Just when I thought it couldn’t get any more progressive than the Empire State, along comes Iowa.

Crucial to the election of President Obama and the only state in the Midwest to legally recognize gay marriage, Iowa is also contesting a decision by the state board, which rejected the legalization of medicinal marijuana. Officials there are already planning to reintroduce the measure to the ballot in the fall.

Uh, Gov. Patterson, what’s up with that? New York should feel out scooped, trumped, and just plain late to the party. Ours is a state that supports high schools for gay and transgender students. We’re giving our former prostitute-soliciting governor a second chance at a political career. And we’re responsible for electing a U.S. senator who was damn near tarred and feathered for pushing nationalized health care only to become secretary of state of an administration that is adopting her policies.

New York should’ve been ahead of the pack. If for nothing else, we want the bragging rights.