After Cancer

This is the first book written by a doctor for the layperson that addresses the medicine, the practical issues, and the psychosocial elements of recovery after cancer treatment. The author a cancer survivor herself, understands that surviving cancer is more than just killing cancer cells and getting through treatment. Patients must deal with the emotional, social, spiritual, and financial fallout of a cancer diagnosis. By helping survivors understand that they can't go back to where they were before cancer, she liberates them to move forward to a different, "new normal." Writing in a reader-friendly, question-and-answer format, Dr. Wendy Harpham addresses a wide range of issues realistically yet hopefully. Among them are understanding the medicine of reevaluation, follow-up, and prevention treatment; dealing with the most common physical aftereffects of treatment; learning how to make decisions about work and school; relating to friends and family; helping children deal with parent's cancer; and coping with the practicalities of living wills and insurance. An important section on post cancer fatigue will be of special interest to patients who find that exhaustion is one of the most difficult problems with which they deal.