"You're the only person who truly cares about you."

Jeffrey Eisenberg faced three cancer diagnoses during the pandemic: stage 1 colon cancer that turned into a four-month ileostomy after his intestines burst during surgery, large B-cell lymphoma, and then a 2cm lymphoma tumor behind his brain where his MD Anderson oncologists couldn't promise the chemo would cross the blood-brain barrier. He came out cancer-free after an autologous stem cell transplant at Houston Methodist on December 28, 2023 — and in this conversation he tells Joelle why most "survivor talk" is too shallow to help anyone, and what actually got him through.

They dive deep into:

• Why the question is never "what are my odds?" — population studies lump 97-year-old grandmothers and 20-year-old athletes together. The phrasing that actually gets an oncologist to answer: "Do I have a fighting chance?"

• The sequencing logic for picking autologous stem cell transplant over CAR-T first — and what three months living within five minutes of Houston Methodist, with zero ports and a non-functional immune system, actually requires.

• Mia's three-poster-board strategy for humanizing a patient in a transplant unit — and how it shifted the care Jeffrey received on a floor where staff are trained to disengage.

• Why Jeffrey and Mia got legally married mid-treatment despite decades together in Texas, a common-law state — and exactly what their estate attorney flagged about insurance, power of attorney, and the paperwork limbo unmarried partners hit.

• EMDR as a treatment for cancer-specific trauma — the non-talk modality Jeffrey and Mia both used, and why it's often harder to find a practitioner in New York or California than in Texas.

• The one-line question Jeffrey used to replace a pharmaceutical cardiac stress test with a treadmill: "If I can't make it on the treadmill, you still have the option of doing the shot, right?"

• What actually breaks through professional detachment on a transplant floor — the Patch Adams book inscribed to a covering doctor, and the nurses who quietly started bringing him coffee from their own break room.

• The 26:40-per-mile walk with his aging labradoodle that Jeffrey now ranks alongside Rome, Zurich, Jerusalem, Istanbul, and the New York Times bestseller list — plus what his father, who outlived a six-month mantle cell lymphoma prognosis by six and a half years, taught him about regret.

Kicking Cancer's Ass. We never chose the pitch, but we always choose the swing.

"30 times more women die from breast cancer than need a liver transplant because of UPA. And yet the drug is paused."

What if the drug that could prevent your breast cancer is already on pharmacy shelves — and regulators won't let your doctor prescribe it for that purpose?

Dr. Sasha Howell, a medical oncologist from Manchester who runs one of the UK's leading breast cancer prevention programs, joined Kicking Cancer's Ass at the 2026 Rise Up Conference. His team's research, published in Nature in December, shows that three months of Ulipristal acetate reduced pre-cancerous cell proliferation and produced measurable changes in breast tissue on MRI.

European regulators suspended the drug after five women in nearly a million developed liver failure. Statins and hormonal contraceptives carry higher risks and remain widely prescribed.

This episode covers why two-thirds of women who develop breast cancer have no family history, what a polygenic risk score actually measures, and how clinical trial participation often means better monitoring than standard care.

If you're worried about breast cancer risk, start with thewisdomstudy.org

The Wisdom Study is open to anyone 30+ in the US who hasn't had breast cancer: thewisdomstudy.org. Polygenic risk scoring is available in the UK for roughly £500 (about $650 USD), though accessing someone who can interpret results and prescribe risk-reducing medication remains a gap almost everywhere outside specialized centers like Manchester.

Kicking Cancer's Ass. We never chose the pitch, but we always choose the swing.

A drug that reduces pre-cancerous breast cells has been sitting in U.S. pharmacies for twenty years. OB/GYNs prescribe it every day. Most oncologists have never heard of it.

Dr. Abigail Liberty, an OB/GYN at OHSU, attended a cancer prevention conference in Manchester where British researcher Dr. Sasha Howell (next week’s guest) presented findings on anti-progestins — drugs that block the progesterone receptor — showing significant reductions in pre-cancerous breast cells and changes in tissue stiffness that make it harder for dangerous cells to survive undetected.

When the room asked why we weren't doing this everywhere, someone noted: this drug doesn't exist in America. Dr. Liberty stood up and said: actually, it does. It's called Ella. It's emergency contraception. And the reason it hasn't crossed into breast cancer prevention is politics, not science.

In this episode: the biology of why progesterone may matter more than estrogen in breast cancer risk, the regulatory and social barriers keeping this drug from women who need it, and what to ask your doctor for today.

The drug: Ella (ulipristal acetate, 30mg). Ask for advanced provision — a prescription before you need it.

Kicking Cancer's Ass. We never chose the pitch, but we always choose the swing.

Learn more about scalp cooling from episode sponsor - www.coldcap.com

Learn more about UCSF RiseUp at https://riseup.ucsf.edu/

Learn more about ELLA: https://www.ellarx.com/