Proverbs 17:22 is about bone cancer.

King Solomon wrote :"Being cheerful keeps you healthy. It is slow death to be gloomy all the time"(Proverbs 17:22)

The traditional King James translation of the Bible, the verse is : 'A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones.'

Another translation (Gideon): A cheerful heart makes a good cure, but a broken spirit makes the bones dry up.

In paperback by Dr Jan de Vries, Cancer and Leukaemia quotes this verse. You see the King James Version puts medicine in a sane context. We can all identify with a merry heart. But Jan de Vries's slow death to be gloomy all the time . . . the dowdiness of modern truism.'

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The traditional Bible's phrase drieth the bones interests me.

In myeloma, the cancer eats into the bones. If you do not die in any other way, your skeleton collapses.

The idea of drying the bones is absent from the translation Jan ve Vries uses, but later in his book he writes that 'the Chinese believe that the center of your bones is responsible for the well being of the human body as a whole' (pp.149-50)

Prolonged habit of not drinking enough water, will cause dehydration at cellular level, which also involves the bone. Inflammation occurs, lead to infection, leads to cells DNA mutation, leads to cancerous growth of dehydrated cells, which need no oxygen to survive.

New idea to me. And Dr Jan ve Vries goes on to describe a Chinese bone breathing exercise.

Could it be on target for bone marrow cancer? Worth a try.

I went to a room. The wonderful Chinese bone breathing exercise is very elaborate. I lie on my back, feet apart, arms by my side, palms up. Calm breathing for a few minutes.

I am then to imagine breath coming in through the toes of my left foot and up the bones of the left leg to the hip. Then breath out from the hip along the same route. In and up, out and down, seven times.

Same procedure with the right leg. In and up, out and down, seven times. back again to the left. Breath comes in through the left foot, up to the left hip and now across to the right hip. You breathe out down the right side. The shape of a U. Seven times.

I then breath in through the fingers of my left hand up to the shoulder. Breathe out from the shoulder down to the fingers. Seven times.

Ditto with the right hand. Seven times. U movements again: up from the left hand to the left shoulder and across to the right shoulder, breathe out down the right arm. Seven times.

Same procedure in reverse, right hand, right shoulder, across to left and out. Seven times.

The spine. Breathing in, I go to the top; breathing out, to the base. Seven times. Same with the skull - this feels the most odd. Seven times. The final breathing starts with both feet and goes through all the bones to the top of the skull. All the time, breathing in. Then down again in a giant breath out. Up. Down. Seven times.

At the end I am deliciously warm and so airy I can float. The book says that cancer patients 'should do such an exercise three times a day'.