It seems like it all began and ended with the juicer. For Christmas, 1993, Bill, my husband of 40 years, gave me a juicer. The world of health food was not uncharted territory for us. Some 25 years earlier, I had been diagnosed with diabetes. Following that, we learned the importance of good nutrition. Juicing fresh fruit and vegetables seemed like a great idea to us.

Bill broke in the juicer with a delicious blend of vegetables. We both drank and enjoyed it. However, Bill began complaining of stomach pains. Soon, he became really ill, vomiting and experiencing extreme pain. I knew how sick he was when he came through the living room, about 11:30 pm, with his coat on, headed for the nearest hospital. In all our years together, Bill had never once gone to the hospital. Concerned, I put on my coat too and drove him to the emergency room. They performed a series of tests, but Bill’s agonizing pain continued for several hours. Early the next morning, the pain began to subside, and since they had found nothing wrong with Bill, they let him go home. He missed the following day of work, the first of many to come.

We did not use the juicer again! However, the attacks returned repeatedly, every 4 or 5 days. In the end of January, Bill was admitted to the hospital for a week of testing. The doctors were still unable to make a firm diagnosis, but they said Bill’s symptoms sounded like gall bladder attacks. They also mentioned that his C.T. scan had showed slightly rough edges around the pancreas, but that could just be something in the film.

By February 7, we had decided that many people live without their gall bladder, so in case that was the problem, let’s have it out. After that, the severe attacks did not return, but it settled into a constant, chronic pain. Bill continued to see the doctor on a weekly basis.

Finally, on May 10, Bill had had enough. He said to his doctor, "Something has to be done! I cannot go on like this." A second C.T. scan showed that his pancreas had tripled in size. Bill went to a surgeon in a large city who specialized in pancreatic surgery. His words did not paint a pretty picture. He said Bill almost assuredly had cancer. Benign tumors of the pancreas are extremely rare. The surgeon said his chances of being able to remove the tumor were less than 50%. It was roughly the size of a tennis ball. Bill was scheduled for surgery on May 25, and it was scheduled to last approximately five hours. Two hours after the operation began, the surgeon came into the waiting room where Bill’s whole family sat, anxiously awaiting news. The doctor told us that it was worse than he had thought. The tumor was twice the size indicated on the C.T. scan, and had already began to spread, wrapping around two main blood vessels. It was impossible to untangle it. They took several fine-needle biopsies and closed Bill up, removing nothing. We were told Bill’s life expectancy was 3 to 6 months. After two weeks and a few complications, Bill was sent home. It was the bleakest time of our lives.

We immediately plunged into intense prayer. It was a kind of four-pronged prayer. We asked God boldly and directly to heal Bill. We asked Him to guide and direct us as we searched for whatever might help. We mustered all the faith we could and thanked God, in advance, for the healing. And we told God that most of all, we wanted His will to be done and whatever that was, we pledged to accept it. I think for the first time, we really learned to pray fervently.

We commissioned a research report on pancreatic cancer and all it’s treatments, traditional and alternative. We haunted the literature section of our local health food store, as well as the public library. Our noses were always buried in books. The juicer came back into the picture, in a big way. I served Bill six 12-ounce glasses of vegetable juice a day. He took Laetrile treatments, which included DMSO, massive amounts of vitamins C and A, followed by an "enzyme enema." Bill also took shark cartilage, Kyo-green drink, flax seed oil, and Essiac tea, among other things. He worked with a medical doctor and a nutritionist, and practiced the Simonton visualization method.

And Bill began to improve! When we went back to the surgeon for the three month check-up, he was delighted to see Bill doing so well. At the next check-up, we requested another C.T. scan. When the surgeon entered our room to give us the report, he was shaking his head, He said, "I don’t know what to tell you, but that cancer is gone. Everything in there is normal."

We know that God healed Bill. We just don’t know which avenue He used – whether He just zapped him well, or utilized some of our alternative methods. Whatever way it happened, we know WHO did it.

by Nan Parsons