October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month and although prevention is crucial, many women of every age are affected by this disease and the agressive treatments can let both body and mind in critical situation.
Here is the story of a young woman that found salvation in Nirvana® after stage 3 breast cancer. Read until the end, her testimonial is impressive!

"I was little over 32 when I got diagnosed with breast cancer. It was stage 3, and I had to undergo Modified radical mastectomy (Total), which involves removal of complete left breast including the 17 lymph nodes. The treatment involved 6 rounds of extensive chemotherapy as well as 28 cycles of radiation therapy.

Due to such an invasive treatment, I found my left shoulder frozen. The removal of all the connecting nodes left the arm completely dysfunctional. The movement of the arm was restricted to the point that it couldn’t be raised at all or even straightened. The internal nerves became weak and I started to experience severe water retention in this arm.



The first year after the chemo treatment, I underwent physiotherapy. The relief was mild, but it certainly helped me in opening the arm. I started to do my daily chores with the left arm like changing gears while driving, typing etc barring heavy weights of any kind. Slight pressure on this arm would lead to severe swelling and water retention. Accessories like watches, rings, bangles etc wouldn’t fit at all.

Apart from this, another major post-treatment problem was the pain in my legs and lower back. The knees, calf muscles and ankles would hurt severely leading to several sleepless nights. I could barely walk without support. If I dare to sit down on the floor, it would take me immense amount of inner strength to stand up or I would scream for help to lift me up.

Such physical apathy left me to wonder if I should recompense this with adequate nutrition. However, nothing seemed to work significantly. After several trials and errors, I lost the zeal towards pushing my body to behave normally. I was scared to travel long distance due to weak lower back. I would refrain myself from visiting malls fearing long walking sprees. I would dread lying on the bed fearing sleepless nights due to pains.

My appetite for fitness went to the highest levels of lethargy whereby to be able to move around normally became like a far-fetched dream. The heaps of failed remedies, treatments, exercises mounted to obvious disappointments, hence I stopped making efforts. I started to put on weight. Adding to the misery was my hormone therapy pills with a drug called Tamoxifen (To curb malignancy post Estrogen receptive breast cancer) which played havoc to my body’s current state of dormancy. I felt low in energy all the time and it became an effort for me to peel myself off the bed.

However, few months back I met Neha, who had shifted to my condominium from Singapore. When I got to know she specialises in some unique fitness programs, I pushed myself again with diminutive hope, to feed my inquisitiveness towards these unheard workout regimes.

While I briefed her with my medical history, Neha was very clear about where to start from without rendering any false hopes. Her passion towards making each individual tap into their existing capabilities, gave me the confidence that she would dedicatedly start working on me from the very basic.

Her focused attention on each participant, made me gear up for her classes. I started with her nirvana sessions. My first class comprising the basic postures made me realise that I have a long way to go. However, despite my physical incapability, the emphasis on breathing patterns coupled with positive affirmations and the sound of music worked magically on my inner self. Merely being part of such a session was therapeutic enough to centre my chakras and feel the essence of healing. The inner shift had already taken place and I was motivated to just push myself to participate in nirvana sessions irrespective of my physical challenges.

Neha would suggest exercises modifications, to allow the ones with extremely low physical strength to perform the postures and sequences at their very basic level. At the same time, she would just know when to start challenging the participant for the next level of complexity. Her detailing and explanations helped us achieve acurate postures and confidence regarding negligible injury during workouts.



I slowly yet gradually started to notice changes in my body. My stamina improved dramatically, and so did the strengthening of muscles. My pains lessened with time and I started to sit for long durations without hurting my back. I can walk and run swiftly and can lift myself from the floor in no time without any support.

It’s about 6 months of being associated with Neha and NirvanaFitness® Program, where I see significant improvement in my body’s strengthening and flexibility. I not only perform most sequences at optimum stated levels but also lift weights with my left arm. I do full squat sequences, push ups and planks as part of functional training, while I also rev up for high intensity programs.

Nirvana is a program curated beautifully to provide wholesome holistic and fitness experience to an individual in 1 hour. It’s a complete mind, body and soul fitness modality where breathing, asanas and affirmations are intertwined aesthetically. One can experience magical transformation in their breathing and oxygen levels right after first few sessions.

Most fitness programs are mutually exclusive in terms of their focus. Some are purely spiritual, while others are high in intensity cardio, gym, Zumba etc. focusing purely on physical aspect.

However, I’m yet to come across a better wholesome fitness program which in true sense falls straight as a complete lifestyle fitness programme."

* Story written by a student of our NES Neha Saxena Bagga from India.

---
Read more about this:

>"Deprive a cell 35% of its oxygen for 48 hours and it will become cancerous."
>The role of the breath in the development of cancer
>The Science behind Nirvana