Living Through Breast Cancer

by Carolyn M. Kaelin, Francesca Coltrera

A compassionate and uniquely authoritative guide to surviving breast cancer Dr. Carolyn M. Kaelin is nationally recognized as a leading expert on breast cancer. At the age of 42, this highly respected cancer surgeon and the director of the prestigious Comprehensive Breast Health Center at Brigham and Women's Hospital, one of Harvard Medical School's main hospitals, had a young family and demanding career. When she discovered that she had breast cancer, she was suddenly transformed from doctor to patient--and learned firsthand just how this terrible disease makes women question their sense of self. Now, following a mastectomy and an ongoing course of chemotherapy, her prognosis is good and her passion and commitment to helping other women with breast cancer is greater than ever. In a book that will be a source of priceless information and much-needed understanding and support for women with all forms of breast cancer, Dr. Kaelin provides the most up-to-date information on virtually every aspect of the disease, both as a top specialist in the field and as a survivor. Compassionate, comprehensive, and uniquely authoritative, Living Through Breast Cancer provides women

370 pages, Hardcover

First published January 4, 2005

Reviews

[Kate]

This was an important resource for me when I was going through treatment for breast cancer. I read certain chapters over and over. It's written by a doctor who herself was diagnosed and it covers a lot of territory: surgical, radiation, hormonal, and chemotherapy treatment; how treatment will affect your body, your skin, your hair, your teeth; how to handle the stress and mental effects, the importance of exercise and eating well. No book can answer all your questions or tell you the correct treatment for you: that's what doctors, and more importantly, you, are for. But this is a comprehensive and compassionate book.

[Cindy]

An excellent resource for patients and would be helpful to friends and families as well. I picked up on a lot of useful information about what to expect in the months to come. Includes tips on various options for diagnosis and treatment.

[Esther]

So is it too depressing that the authors of the two most helpful books I have read post breast cancer diagnosis, both authors being breast specialists, cancer surgeons, and cancer survivors themselves (until they weren't) have, since the publication of their tomes, both succumbed to their cancers? Never mind. The answer is yes. Of course it is depressing.

The books were Living Through Breast Cancer, by the late Carolyn M. Kaelin, and Dr. Susan Love's Breast Book by, surprise, surprise, Dr. Susan Love (also "the late").

I am so tired of medical persons in the oncology field, be they oncology surgeons, radiation oncologists, medical oncologists, oncology nurses, oncology PAs, oncology social workers, oncology therapists, radiation therapists, oncology CNAs, oncology thises, oncology thats, who are so immersed in cancer day in and day out, as a profession, a rather lucrative profession for some of them at the top of the field, I might add, that they have totally forgotten, or have chosen to overlook the fact that we, the shocked and frightened peons who make their careers in oncology care possible, are feeling pretty damn awful--terrified, helpless, traumatized, and vulnerable--at the point when we enter their orbit.

Sometimes I think that they all should receive a cancer dx themselves, fake of course. After they've been scared out of their ever loving minds, we'll say, "Just kidding." Might do them some good. It would certainly do their patients some good, going forward.

Both Carolyn Kaelin and Susan Love eventually, after treating cancer patients for years, found themselves on the exam table themselves. Nothing, but nothing, prepares you for the effect a diagnosis of cancer has on a human person until it is your own. These women know. Or knew, rather.

These books are intended to guide us through our breast cancer effing rotten detour (my personal substitute for "cancer journey," a grand favorite amongst doctors, laypersons, and cancer patients themselves, but I refuse to tarnish the word "journey" by applying it to what is, in fact, an effing rotten detour).

However, who sits down and reads a book about how to cope with breast cancer before they have breast cancer? Anybody? Surely not. All that advice about making the best choices for our own care or how to choose a surgeon or medical oncologist is great, but I guarantee it comes too late for most of us. By the time we open these books we are already too far along our effing rotten detours to change what we've already done, or what has already been done to us.

However, I persevered. In this, Dr. Kaelin's book, I even read the chapter on reconstructive surgery, though it does not apply to me. What these brave women will endure to regain a semblance of the female shape is absolutely jaw-dropping.

I say this chapter does not apply to me, but that's wishful thinking. If in future I suffer a recurrence in the same breast, I will not be a candidate for another lumpectomy and radiation. Radiation is a one time deal. Another cancer in the same breast would mean a mastectomy, and so, maybe that chapter WILL one day apply to me after all, only because, having read it, I know for sure I will never, ever subject myself to TRAM flaps, or latissimus dorsi flaps, or tissue expanders and implants inserted beneath detached and stretched pectoral muscles. No siree, it'll be flat for me. The mastectomy alone would be way and enough surgery all by itself, thank you very much.

Even Dr. Kaelin went the route of a tissue expander and implant. These ladies are all so much braver than I am. The comparatively uncomplicated surgery that I did endure, a lumpectomy and sentinel node dissection, was an experience that left me reeling from stress and trauma. Had the word "cancer" not been involved, I might have handled the day better. Who knows.

[Susan]

Seems to be a good survey of what to expect after a diagnosis. It's well written and easy to read and understand.