Malcolm Stern: 0:46

So welcome to my podcast, slay your Dragons with Compassion, which I'm making in conjunction with my friends at online events, and I'm getting a range of amazing speakers who have extraordinary stories to tell, and today is a particularly extraordinary story of conquering life-threatening illness in an extraordinary way. So I'm really happy to welcome my very old friend, John Hager. And John, welcome to you and welcome to our podcast.

John Hager: 1:13

Thank you, malcolm, lovely to be here.

Malcolm Stern: 1:17

And I think I first came across you a few decades ago actually, and you had recovered from what you had been told was a terminal illness and that you only had months to live. Can you tell us a little bit more about that and your journey with that?

John Hager: 1:35

Well, I was 42. That was just over 30 years ago and it was a classic midlife crisis kind of thing. Everything was falling apart. My marriage was on the rocks, my business I was a financial advisor at the time. I'd had a very checkered history but I found my way into selling life insurance on a commission only basis and I was doing that for seven years and it was at a time when everything was very buoyant in the economy and, um, you know, there was. It was just a very interesting business to be in at the time, interesting business to be in at the time.

John Hager: 2:35

But all good things come to an end and the bubble burst anyway and I don't know. I'm sure you remember 1992, crashes everywhere, wars in the Middle East, and lots of my clients went, went down and took me with them. So financially I was on the rocks as well. And then, hey ho, along came a cancer diagnosis at the same time. So it was very, it was a very difficult time. I managed to patch up things with my wife because our priorities became very different At this stage. The diagnosis wasn't serious or life-threatening serious or life-threatening, but it was definitely a call to action and I realized that I had to do. I had to make changes was the main thing. So I did some introspection, I changed my lifestyle and tried to carry on.

John Hager: 3:59

However, nine months later, secondaries appeared, I was told. So I was diagnosed with melanoma and I think it was stage two because it was quite in the doctor's terms. It was stage two because it was quite in in the doctors terms. It was quite deep and I think they they did expect a recurrence, but they were quite positive with me and said I'll go away and just just hope that everything will be okay. But anyway, nevertheless, nine months later I had a recurrence. I had a lump under my arm which was clearly a secondary. I mean, that's where they told me it would appear. But it wasn't a painful lump. It was, and they said that you know it would be, if it came it would be hard and painless it would be. If it came it would be hard and painless, and so it was very scary. And then I just had to wait to have the biopsy done, which was interesting because in that that time, in the time between the primary and the secondary appearing, um, I'd done some research and decided that in the event of a recurrence, that I would do a nutritional therapy.

John Hager: 5:24

My my background before financial services was health foods. I had health food shops and I was very interested in nutrition all my life I'd been. My grandmother was seeing a naturopath and my mum took me to the homeopathic hospital as a child, so we were very, in medical terms, quite alternative. I then went into the health food business. This was before financial services and my natural inclination was to go to nutrition to heal my illness. And I had a friend who was a homeopathic doctor, who was a homeopathic doctor and he said to me the only thing he knew that was good for melanoma particularly and cancer in general is Gerson therapy. Gerson is. He was a German doctor. He died in 1959. His name was Max Gerson. His daughter, charlotte Gerson, was running a clinic in Mexico.

John Hager: 6:46

So I guess you know there wasn't anything else.

John Hager: 6:57

It was before the Internet, so there weren't lots of options being fed to me.

John Hager: 7:06

You know it was diagnosed as a stage three melanoma, so it was in my lymphatic system when I went in, just backtracking a bit, when I went into the operating theater I made it really clear that I didn't want to have all my lymph nodes taken out, that I didn't want to have all my lymph nodes taken out.

John Hager: 7:36

I really just wanted a diagnosis at that point so they could take out one lymph node, because I'd heard that the normal procedure was if they suspected that one lymph node was malignant they would remove everything, on the basis that if one lymph node was malignant then it would have already spread. But I didn't want that. I just wanted a diagnosis because for me, I was going to go to mexico to the clinic and, um, and I was going to have nutrition be my healer rather than anything else. So then I got the diagnosis within a few days. He called me, the doctor, called me, I mean, very quickly, he was the surgeon and he said you know, very sorry, but this is the situation, um, and I, uh, booked a train to mexico, booked a plane to mexico wow, I mean, that's quite an extraordinary thing to do, isn't it?

Malcolm Stern: 8:41

at this, at that stage, just like you are sort of feeling like, oh my god, I might be dying. But actually what I'm hearing is this very strong state of mind I am going to deal with this my way. And you got the information you could get from where you could get it, and then you sort of took yourself off on a major adventure. So what happened in Mexico?

John Hager: 9:02

Well, just making the decision wasn't difficult. Malcolm the surgeon, he was really helpful, uh, by saying to me well, I could offer you chemotherapy, but I don't think it's going to be very effective for you, wow. So so that was kind of interesting, you know, because it wasn't like. I mean, I maybe if he'd said things differently, you know, if he'd have said, well, yeah, well, the new chemotherapy situation, the new chemotherapy regime that we're running now is really effective with um, you know, with your condition, and I think you'll do really well. But instead he didn't say that. He said I don't think it's going to be very helpful for you.

Malcolm Stern: 9:49

So in effect, I think what I'm hearing is that he was probably saying you're going to die either way, so you might as well not have the chemotherapy. Is that?

John Hager: 9:57

was that pretty much it he did yeah, and he also said uh, you've got months, not years uh-huh. So he was clearly saying you're dying yeah and yeah I and I didn't feel like I was dying. You know, I wasn't feeling sick, I just had this diagnosis. So, but actually, in the couple of weeks following and before I got on the plane to Mexico, I did start to feel myself going downhill. But whether that was psychosomatic or not, I don't know.

Malcolm Stern: 10:46

You got on the plane. You got to Mexico. You got to this clinic. You got on the plane, you got to Mexico, you got to this clinic and some of our listeners will know the Gerson regime, but you can perhaps give us a headline about what it entails.

John Hager: 10:57

Yeah, well, it's a bit like a fast-flowing river. You know you go into the hospital and they always arrange admissions to be sort of very early morning so that you can just uh jump in and you know just it. It's incredible. It's just the whole time it's just juices, so okay, so for people who don't know, gerson therapy, it's a, it's a regime which was pioneered by a german doctor, um, and it's uh, it, it's just the same routine every single day, from the morning you get up until the moment, from the moment you get up till the moment you go to sleep, you wake up juice after juice after juice yeah, but every other morning there's castor oil to take at six o'clock in the morning, you know, just to sweeten the process, yeah, yeah, followed by a cup of coffee, strangely, really.

John Hager: 12:05

Wow, so it's um, so it's um. Castor oil, followed by coffee, drinking coffee, and then after that you go in for a, I think, a coffee enema, I think you do next, and then you have breakfast and you can always tell the patients that are on a castor oil day, because they're literally gray you know, know, I mean it's grim.

John Hager: 12:34

And then about 11 o'clock you have castor oil again, but this time it's in an enema with coffee. So you have a coffee and castor oil enema at around 11 o'clock. So there's this period between 6 o'clock and 11 o'clock where you've got this castor oil that you've taken orally and the effect is like I guess it's the detoxification effect you get really foggy. It's almost like driving down a motorway and you know you can't see out because there's fog. And then all of a sudden the fog clears and you can see clearly. And that's like when you have that castor oil enema at 11 o'clock, the fog clears, you let it out and oh, it's amazing. It's an amazing experience because when you let it out, it's taking all of the you know the built-up toxins, because it's, it's, it's very, it's a very liver related um therapy. It's a very liver-related therapy. It's a major detoxification and obviously the organ of detoxification is the liver.

Malcolm Stern: 14:03

Yeah, and you spent months in this clinic, didn't you?

John Hager: 14:08

No, actually no. I spent three weeks in that clinic.

Malcolm Stern: 14:11

Okay.

John Hager: 14:12

But it was long enough for me to understand the therapy. It was long enough for me to go through all of the initial reactions to the therapy, because it's a major, major detox. My eyes changed color, which was very interesting. I came out with blue eyes. I went in with kind of green eyes. Hazel was my mom. My mom always told me I had hazel eyes. But I came out of that clinic after three weeks with blue eyes.

Malcolm Stern: 14:56

So you know that was weird.

John Hager: 14:57

Maybe you were taken over by an alien, john or something. Well, you know. It reminded me of some studies I'd done in iridology previously. Anyway, that's another subject. So it was important to be there for three weeks. They say that you should be there for three weeks because you know you go through all sorts of changes important changes when you start the therapy. It also gives you a chance to take advantage of the lectures. There's some really interesting lectures.

John Hager: 15:32

The two main people were Charlotte Gerson. She would come in once a week, I think once or twice a week, and the other person was Gar Hildenbrand. Now, gar was a really fascinating man and he still. Charlotte has died sadly now, but Gar is running the Gerson Research Organization in San Diego. He is the most knowledgeable person I know on the subject of alternative cancer treatments and whereas Charlotte stayed very much with the work of her father, gar has moved with the times.

John Hager: 16:16

This did cause a little bit of friction between them, but Gar split off and he's now working very closely with some clinics in Southern California, in San Diego, diego, where there's some really interesting new developments happening in the field of alternative cancer medicine. In fact, the boundaries between alternative cancer medicine and conventional cancer medicine are becoming blurred now. In the old days it was very simple you either did chemotherapy, surgery, radiation, the orthodox way, and then you um, and the alternatives were very much separate to that uh, but now there's a uh sort of a coming together, I think, which is very interesting so you came out after three weeks, john, and then you have to manage on your own, but you've learned the basic ropes.

Malcolm Stern: 17:17

So you're then carrying on the process, presumably, or is three weeks enough, and then you go back to an ordinary life? No, no.

John Hager: 17:26

No, so you never go back to an ordinary life after after a terminal diagnosis? I don't think um. You know, my life is life before cancer and life after cancer. Very clearly, but um it's interesting.

Malcolm Stern: 17:45

A lot of what we've done on this show has been has been people who come through extraordinary adversity, including me, where I lost my daughter. Yeah that changes you forever, and that's what you're saying effectively. Is it changed you forever?

John Hager: 17:59

Yeah, the the therapy was the therapy. It's a. It's a blanket prescription therapy, so it's like you know you do this, you do this every single day at these times. So you get up, you have the enemas, you have the juices, you have the meals. The meals are always the same. You know no protein, no oil. Actually, the only oil was flax oil, but very, very little protein. Eventually you're allowed to have cottage cheese, but it's all very much uh, juices and vegetables and um, not much else, certainly for the first three or four months, but the therapy itself lasts for two years. So you're supposed to continue the therapy at the same intensity for a period of two years after tumors disappear.

John Hager: 19:05

So after the symptoms disappear do it for two years, pardon.

Malcolm Stern: 19:09

It's not a quick fix and also you have to have what I've seen in you is this, this tenacity to drive your way through it, because a lot of people probably falter along the way and don't stick with the, with the process well, it's interesting you say that because, um, so gar gar hildenbrand did a study on uh, gerson therapy and melanoma.

John Hager: 19:36

melanoma was the it was like the flagship disease for gerson um, they did a retrospective study, um, and they came up with some stunning figures, you know, something like 60% remission after five years with stage three melanoma. I mean, I'm saying that off the top of my head, it might be different, but anyway, compared to conventional medicine it was significantly better. So they had the study peer-reviewed and one of the reviewers, a woman called Jean Atterberg her, I suppose, if you say criticism of the study was that your people are different. To begin with, she said to go that's very interesting yeah, so I thought it reminds me

Malcolm Stern: 20:35

of um it reminds me of elizabeth kubler-ross, who I I assisted for a while when she was running workshops and she used to work with cancer patients and she would get them to draw their cancer and from the drawings she had an artist who worked with her who would work out whether they would be more suited to conventional treatment or alternative treatment, and so clearly you fitted the alternative. It's like you would. You had a clear path towards that treatment, especially from your, your upbringing. Before that and, by the way, I'm not knocking conventional medicine either, I'm just and I know you're not either but for you this is what happens.

John Hager: 21:11

Yeah, it was the way I responded to the therapy. My doctor in Mexico said, and Charlotte Gerson in fact said I was a textbook case. So my body responded in the way that they expected, without complications.

Malcolm Stern: 21:34

That's really interesting. And now, 30 years on, you're not only I mean, I've seen you go through another shift as well because you've actually taken on a big diet, because you were a bit roly poly before, when I knew you, and now you're slim and you've done something again with diet that's changed yourself. So perhaps you could tell us a little bit about that, not in sort of in great detail, but a little bit about what you're doing with diet as well now.

John Hager: 22:01

Well, I think it's related. So I do things. I very, I'm quite intense and obsessive, um, and when I was doing the um, the carrot juices I was doing, I felt like and in fact my son was making the juices for me as well a lot of the time and and he his his thing was well, you know, if, if an eight, if an eight ounce juice is going to make you better, a 16-ounce juice is actually going to make sure that you're going to get better. So you know he would double up on the carrots. But what I realize now is that he also doubled up on the sugar. He also doubled up on the sugar, um, and it. I did some kind of interesting experiments with carrot juicing afterwards and I found that if you put the pulp back in again to the press because we used a, a press if you put the pulp back in after you've extracted the juice and you press it again, what comes out is a, really a very clear liquid, and if you drink that clear liquid, you'll realize that it's just pure sugar.

John Hager: 23:18

Um, and one of my symptoms even though I was able to regress because I I went to mexico with a, with a lymphatic tumor that got bigger and bigger over the course of the three weeks and actually exploded inside me. I wanted to put this bit in, even though it's not relevant to what I'm saying there, but I just wanted to put that in because it's very significant that my body actually destroyed the tumor, that the tumor actually became inflamed, and the typical symptoms of inflammation are heat, swelling, redness, pain. It became bigger and bigger, more and more painful and then literally exploded inside me, and that happened 11 days after I arrived in mexico. Um, I wanted to put that in yeah but the?

John Hager: 24:17

um. The thing about the um the sugar was that I was getting hypoglycemic um episodes during the therapy and I wasn't sure I didn't understand what they were. I thought that it was the effect of the detoxification, but what I realize now in retrospect is that it was the excess sugar and as I got older, these hyperglycemic episodes have become more regular and I would say that I was probably pre-diabetic because I was eating sugar in all different forms, not only you know. I mean, I moved on from gerson therapy and I just lived a normal life and was um eating all sorts of things you did your two years being quite strict, and then you just very, very strict.

John Hager: 25:24

But then you know that was you know a lifetime ago, um, and then you know that was you know a lifetime ago. And then you know I've been back out there doing my thing. I just found myself eating loads of sugar and becoming more, with more Hyperglycemic episodes, and just feeling like, well, I've got to do something about this. I thought if I. And then I just caught myself. I was driving back from my son's one night in London and I just caught myself just having gone into the garage filled up with petrol, got a bar of chocolate, a bar of something else, and was just sitting there eating it and I just thought, what am I doing? You know it was. I mean I thought, well, I've got to do this just to keep awake for the drive back to Devon. And and I just thought, what am I doing this? If I carry on doing this, I'm going to end up diabetic. So I changed there and then I just made the change I stopped sugar.

Malcolm Stern: 26:43

You mean just like that?

John Hager: 26:44

Just like that. Yeah, it was a realization. And then, a bit later, I met a man. I told you the other day, Malcolm, I met a guy from Israel, from Tel Aviv, and he introduced me to ketogenic diet and that was it really. Again, I just changed Like, okay, I'm on the keto from now. Yeah, and I just changed.

Malcolm Stern: 27:08

Like, okay, I'm on the keto from now and so it feels like you are able, once you get in a groove, you're able to stick with it. I think that's one of the features I can see about you that actually there's a doggedness, that you are going to follow a trail.

John Hager: 27:21

Yeah, yeah, dogged is the word, but it's very annoying for some people, my wife particularly because because it's also quite obsessive. No, it's a bit of a double-edged sword, isn't it?

Malcolm Stern: 27:35

well it is. But actually what I'm, what I can see and what I've seen in you over the years, is that you're actually you.

Malcolm Stern: 27:41

Your health feels better and better as you into your, you're into your 70s now I'm 73 now, yeah yeah, so, with similar age, and so what I see at this stage is that actually, you feel healthy, vibrant, well, and you've been through the mill and you've you've also disciplined yourself very deeply. I think that's one of the things I observe about you is is this total discipline, which is not that easy to come by and in your case it's it's obviously inherent in you. If it's not like me, I'll you. There's someone like me. I'll meditate for a while and then I'll just go. Well, I won't do it this morning, then it'll drip, drip away, whereas I'm hearing you've stuck with a ketogenic diet for a couple of years, a few years, five years, now five years. So five years you've stuck with this diet. It's changed your body shape. It's also changed you energetically. And now, where, where do you go from here, as you, as you enter into your, your elders eldership, as I do?

John Hager: 28:35

well, that's a good question. I, I don't know that I can. I don't know how to answer that one. I suppose I'd I just put one foot in front of the other, don't I don't? I mean I've. I've been through some more changes lately. I've sold my business two years ago, so it's quite a difficult thing coming to terms with not working. Not working in the same way that I was working. I mean, when you run a business you're thinking about it 24 hours a day. I had staff, I mean 24 hours a day. I had staff. I mean I had a business. I made handmade leather goods. I was a leather worker. I trained as a saddler in Walsall.

John Hager: 29:42

Back in, in fact, just after I finished Gerson therapy, I was looking at what I wanted to do and, oh God, I just remembered the conversation that I had with you Back at God. That was a long time ago. We had that conversation. I could do all these things. And I said, malcolm, I don't know what to do, I can do. Do I've trained as a hypnotherapist? I've, I've, I've been working with cancer patients and and I had, I had, there was lots of things I could have done. Anyway, this night I was particularly confused and I met you and you just said to me what gives you joy that's a great question and again, that was another eureka moment.

John Hager: 30:45

Another eureka moment when you said that what gives you joy? And I and I said, well, actually making working with, working with leather in the traditional way, um, that's what gives me joy. And then it was that night, after that discussion with you, that I decided to set up my business, as it was a leather goods brand called Tanna Bates, and I started that in it's been about 18 years ago and then did that for 15 years, built the business, had four staff. Um, it was great, it was a wonderful business, and but it was also good to sell it too I'm sure that's true, but you were, you're actually, um, really, really skilled.

Malcolm Stern: 31:40

I mean, I wear a ton of baits belts because he gave me one, which was extremely kind of you, um, but it's like, I just find it it's a, it's a beautiful piece of it. You know, you don't think of a belt as beautiful, no, but it's a beautiful piece of equipment and I wear it every day because I always belt around my trousers, so, uh, so I'm reminded of you every time I do my trousers up.

John Hager: 32:00

So that's the joy of making. You know. I mean I've got in our kitchen, we've got so many different pots. You know from potters all over the world that I know and friends and every time I eat something or drink, drink my coffee out of a mug. I think about the person that made that.

Malcolm Stern: 32:23

That's nice. That, that's nice. That's nice, yes no, so I mean that you know making is a wonderful thing so when I ask you the question where do you go from here, what I'm hearing is that actually you're letting life lead you rather than you're going. This is where my passion is now, where I could ask you that same question what brings you joy, john?

John Hager: 32:45

What brings me joy? One of the things that brings me joy apart from my loved ones.

Malcolm Stern: 32:55

By the way, don't underestimate that. I think that's also a statement that actually you're capable of creating deeply loving relationships. I know you've been together with Debbie for a long time now as well. Well yeah, the beauty of your relationship. I know all relationships have that.

John Hager: 33:11

Sure, we have 12 grandchildren.

Malcolm Stern: 33:15

Wow.

John Hager: 33:17

And so that's wonderful to have children in my life, but we've also got surrogate grandchildren as well. We're typical grandparents, I think, but we've still got quite a lot of life and enthusiasm and love to give, and so we seem to adopt others as well along the way, children maybe who don't have grandparents nearby, or something like that. But that's that gives me joy. Another thing that gives me joy still is making. Even though I've sold the business, I still make. I still work on commissions and occasional, occasional exhibitions. But my regular daily program involves swimming, which I do around about. I swim around three quarters of a mile to a mile a day, and that is so settling somehow. You know, however, I feel when I wake up, when I'm very fortunate that we have a river outside the house and I'm able to swim for miles just outside my door. But we're on the river Dart in Devon, but we're on the River Dart in Devon and you know that just starts my day in a way that is better than anything else.

Malcolm Stern: 34:52

It's funny because one of the most memorable evenings of my life I went with you in it was a kayak.

Malcolm Stern: 34:58

I don't know what each boat these boats are called, but I went with you down the river at night. It was dusk and it felt like pure magic. And we parked on an island and we're sitting there and then along comes this chap who starts talking to us, and it was the guy who'd written the Horse Whisperer Nicholas Evans, who'd written the Horse Whisperer. And we had such an extraordinary evening. It felt like I was in a magical land with you out on the river. Yeah, so it's that that you bring to your life also.

John Hager: 35:24

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And when the grandchildren come, we do a similar trip, malcolm. Oh, lovely lovely yeah, yeah.

Malcolm Stern: 35:32

That's really beautiful. So we're coming towards the end of our podcast. It's been really lovely hearing your story. I've heard it in bits before, but not in this detail, and I always ask the question at the end of the, at the end of the podcast what's the particular dragon you've had to slay in order to become who you are? And when I say slay your dragon, I don't mean to kill something, I just mean what is the thing you've had to overcome, the obstacle you've had to overcome in order to be you at this stage in your life? I think it's. I should have thought about this before. No, no, I like it coming spontaneously. No, no, that's good.

John Hager: 36:11

I should have guessed that was gonna come. Well, I'm not. I don't know if the dragon actually died when I slayed it, because I think it reoccurs and I think it's to do with responsibility. It's to do with taking responsibility for my actions. Um and uh it. I mean, if I, you know my life before, um, I, I really had to clean up my act in lots of ways I wasn't a good example of a father to my children and I regret that. And it was to do with taking responsibility for myself and my actions. And that still goes on. I still have to bring that into check and I had this bizarre experience just in October last year when I was.

John Hager: 37:37

I have a camper van and we've had a camper van for years and me and Debbie, that was our favorite thing to do is go in the camper van and just go off somewhere. You know, we just about know which way we're going to turn at the top of the road, but beyond that, we didn't know where we were going, where we were staying, and yet on this particular weekend was our birthday weekend. Last October we went to Dorset, no plans at all, and it was pretty awful. Uh, the weather was bad. We couldn't find anywhere to park. It was. It was very difficult and on the way back it was dark and um, it was 7, 30 and I was driving at 60 miles an hour on the A38, in the dark, and all of a sudden, there was a cow five yards in front of my camper. A cow belongs in a field, not on the road, it was right there and I just drove straight into it. And you know, I can still feel the shock and the trauma as I, as I'm telling you and it was, I had to go. You know. I mean, we were okay, the van was written off, the cow was put down the next day.

John Hager: 39:12

It was a horrific experience and and somehow I, you know I had to do some introspection. What's this about? You know why? And it was to do somehow with responsibility. You know, we just went away that weekend and didn't know where we were going, didn't make any plans and somehow, you know, this happened and it was so final. It was so final. It was almost like a death and in a way, it was a death of something that we enjoyed and loved doing, but it was a very significant moment. It was a very significant moment. It was a very significant moment and I think that somehow in there there is something to do with responsibility. Since then, we've got a small caravan, an Eureva caravan, instead of the van, and we have to take, we have to make plans going away with that, we have to plan out where we're going to, where we're going to stop, because you do have to with a caravan. Anyway, it's.

Malcolm Stern: 40:53

What I'm hearing the word that sticks with me is introspection that actually we are constantly in a situation where we're designing our lives, and I'm hearing that you've designed your life in a couple of really big ways first with the Gerson therapy and cancer and second with the ketogenic diet that you've adopted, and I can hear that actually you are very, that you're dedicated and that you're also in a process of practice in your life, and I believe that's what we that's how we, that's how that's what evolves us actually is staying with that practice and bringing it through. So I'd really like to thank you for what you've shared with with our listeners this morning and, um, it's really lovely that you can talk so so ably about and articulately about your story.

Malcolm Stern: 41:39

Yeah, um thank you, malcolm good to see you in good health decades on from terminal diagnosis. Yeah, yeah, good to see you too yeah, thanks a lot, all the best.