Cancer is a terrible disease that affects so many people. From early-stage treatable skin cancers to aggressive and incurable mesothelioma, living with any kind of cancer is stressful, scary and physically uncomfortable. If you or someone you care about is going through this, it can seem hopeless and it can make life challenging where it used to be enjoyable. The good news is that implementing a yoga routine alongside traditional medical treatment can give cancer patients relief from symptoms, a mood boost, extra energy and a new focus.
Yoga Can be Restorative & Therapeutic
Cancer patients have physical limitations, so they tend to shy away from a “typical” yoga class. Some light exercise is beneficial, though, and yoga in particular has been, through research, to have some very specific benefits for people living with cancer. If you are living with this illness, get the okay from your doctor first, but then look for a restorative yoga class, a class designed specifically for cancer patients or Yin yoga – a style of yoga that relies more on gentle movements, breathing exercises and mindfulness.
Yoga is a Healthy Coping Mechanism for Depression, Anxiety & Stress
Anyone who practices yoga regularly already knows this: it helps to relax and calm the mind and the body. Research has proven it, though, and specifically has shown that cancer patients can use yoga to cope with negative emotions. Yoga has been found to actually reduce levels of cortisol – the stress hormone – in the body, and this reduction lowers overall stress. Cancer patients practicing yoga have also reported feeling less depressed and less anxious than those who have not tried yoga.
Yoga Boosts Energy Levels
Emotional distress is common in cancer patients, but so too are physical symptoms. Fatigue is one of the most common complaints. Fatigue has a snowball effect: limiting activities and preventing social interaction, which leads directly back to feelings of depression, stress and isolation. The good news is that if you can summon the strength to try therapeutic yoga, you can regain some of the energy you had before cancer. People with cancer who practiced yoga regularly were found to report less fatigue than those who did not, according to studies.
Yoga Helps Patients Cope with Cancer Treatment Side Effects
Cancer is bad enough, but the treatments to fight it can be brutal. Chemotherapy, radiation and surgery plus medications can cause symptoms like pain, fatigue, nausea, vomiting, weight loss and many more. Some studies have found that side effects can be mitigated by regular yoga sessions. Yoga is already known to reduce pain, but it may also help to limit nausea and other common symptoms of cancer treatment.
Cancer Patients Live Better with Yoga
The bottom line is that living with cancer is never going to be easy, but it can get better with yoga. As long as it is approved by your doctors and you work with an instructor who understands your limitations, you an enjoy a better life in spite of cancer. The effort is worth the benefits of more energy, less pain, less stress and a greater ability to get out of bed and enjoy activities you used to love.
Virgil Anderson was recently diagnosed with mesothelioma, which is a cancer caused by exposure to asbestos. Virgil’s exposure came from working in demolition and excavating since high school.
When he was diagnosed with mesothelioma, he needed immediate medical attention. He found a few websites on the internet that are supposed to help people with mesothelioma cancer, but nobody got back to him. After discovering Mesothelioma.net, Virgil is now being treated at the National Cancer Institute and is being offered financial assistance for a place to live during his chemotherapy treatments. These advocates gave him his only chance at survival and have helped him find a new lease on life.