Afkary

ONE WOMAN'S STORY ON SOYA...
This is my true story, nothing altered. These are facts, as they relate
to
my experience, my opinions based on what I have read and felt. I am
relating them to warn other young health-conscious women who are
unwittingly harming themselves.

In 1989, I graduated from high school in Texas and couldn't wait to hit
the
big college city. One of the changes I wanted to make was to eat
healthier.

Once I moved to health-conscious Austin, Texas, I began to fortify my
body with the best and healthiest foods I could find.

Tofu was the main ingredient in every healthy dish and I bought soya
milk almost
every day used it for everything from cereal to smoothies or just to
drink for a quick snack. I bought soya muffins, miso soup with
tofu,soybeans, soybean, sprouts, etc. All the literature in all the
health and fitness magazines said that soya protected you against
everything from heart
disease to breast cancer. It was the magical isoflavones, the
estrogen-like hormones that all worked to help you stay young and
healthy. I looked great - I was working out all the time, but my
menstrual cycle was off.
At 20,I started taking birth control pills to regulate my menstrual
cycle.

In addition to this I began to suffer from painful periods. I began to
get
puffy, it was as though I was losing my muscle tone. I began to suffer
from
depression and getting hot flashes. I mistook all this for PMS since my
periods
were irregular. By the time
I was 25, my periods were so bad,I couldn't walk. The birth control
pills never made them regular or less painful so I decided to stop
taking them.

I went on like this for another two years until I realized my pain
wasn't normal. At 27, my gynecologist found two cysts in my uterus.
Both were the size of tennis balls. I went through surgery to have them
removed and thank God they were benign. The gynecologist told me to go
back on birth control pills. I didn't. In 1998, he discovered a lump in
my breast. Again, I went through surgery and again it was benign. In
November 2000 my glands swelled up and my gums became inflamed.
Thinking I had a tooth infection I went to the dentist who told me
that teeth were not the problem.

After a dose of antibiotics the swelling still did not go down. At this
point I could feel a tiny nodule on the right side of my neck. I told
my mother I had thyroid trouble. She thought I was being silly. No one
in the family suffered from thyroid trouble. Going on a hunch I saw a
specialist who diagnosed me with Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma. After a
series of tests he told me it was cancer. My fiance and I sat stunned.
We were not prepared and I was so scared. We scheduled surgery right
away.

The specialist told us that it would only be after the operation that a
pathologist would be able to tell us for sure if it was cancer. They
found a tumor at my right lobe composed of irregular cells and another
smaller tumor growing on the left,
so the entire thyroid was removed. They told me that after undergoing
radioactive iodine I would be safe and assured me that I could
live a long life.

After treatment I began to search for the cause of all these problems.
I never once thought it could be all the soya I had consumed for nearly
ten years. After all, soya is healthy. I came upon a web page that
linked thyroid problems to soya intake and the conspiracy of soya
marketed as a by-product of the vegetable oil industry. This was
insane, after all, the health and fitness magazines had said nothing
about soya being harmful.

I visited a herbalist who was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 1985.
She informed me that soya was the culprit. She had a hysterectomy due
to cysts and other uterine problems.
A few months later another acquaintance who had consumed soya came down
with thyroid cancer.

A girl in England I met through the Internet in a thyroid cancer forum
had just undergone surgery and she was only 19. What was going on?

Breast cancer is linked to estrogen. What mimics estrogen in the female
body, SOYA! But I never suspected soya because until now I never once
found a single article that stated soya could be dangerous.

Women who took soya prior to thyroid problems will continue to take it
after if they are not aware of what soya actually does, what it
contains and how it reacts in the female body. I think this is the
reason that women with thyroid cancer often develop breast cancer
later. My co-worker is big into soya and I see her losing hair and
gaining weight despite a walking workout during her break and after
work, and apples and oranges for lunch. She just had cysts removed from
her uterus too. I
warned her to stay off soya. I referred her to websites but until it is
on the evening news on all four networks, women will suffer. Since the
thyroidectomy, I do not touch soya, haven't for two years.

Dear readers,
Please use my story in any way you can. There are so many young girls
who are consuming soya because they think they are taking care of
themselves, and women taking soya because they want to be healthy. It
is so unfair that the information about the dangers of soya isn't more
widely circulated. It is sad.



Here are some references:
http://www.netlink.de/gen/Zeitung/2000/000813.html

http://www.netlink.de/gen/Zeitung/2000/000813.html
http://www.biotech-info.net/soya.html

http://www.biotech-info.net/soya.html

http://www.haelan.co.uk/Wholefood-Soya.shtml

http://www.haelan.co.uk/Wholefood-Soya.shtml