Authors: Susan Kuner, Carol Orsborn, Karen Leigh Stroup
ISBN-13: 9781573241687, ISBN-10: 1573241687
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Red Wheel/Weiser
Date Published: January 1999
Edition: (Non-applicable)
Drawn together by their dismay over the medical establishment's approach to the healing process, four women offer a new way of viewing the five stages of illness using a language of relationship, spirit and integration.
Rejecting the pervasive medical view of cancer treatment as a "war" against illness, four women with breast cancer offer holistic perspectives on the processes of treatment, healing and renewal. Drawing on their diverse spiritual backgrounds (Orsborn is Jewish and a student of Eastern philosophy; Kuner studied with a Sufi teacher; Quigley has undergone 12-Step programs; and Stroup is a Christian minister), the authors have crafted a framework that allows women to view their cancer as part of an encounter with their deepest selves. They postulate five stages through which "initiates" travel on the journey from fear to acceptance: impact, chaos, choices, community and spirit. As each author relates her experiences--such as confronting fears of death, pain and isolation, choosing between mainstream and alternative therapies and enduring the loss of hair, self-esteem, friends and, in once case a fianc --she suggests ways to counter the prevailing view of doctors and patients that patients who "fight back" stand the greatest chance of being healed, that survivors are "winners" and those who die have lost their "battles." Readers at any stage of breast cancer treatment will likely take comfort from the authors' spiritual emphasis. Agent, Linda Roghaar. (Oct.) FYI: A portion of the proceeds from the books sold will go to breast cancer research. Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.
Speak the Language of Healing | |
Preface by Dr. Joycelyn Elders | ix |
Foreword by Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D | xi |
How This Book Came to Be | 1 |
How to Have Cancer Without Going to War | 5 |
How to Speak the Language of Healing | 15 |
A Pathway to Spirit | 16 |
The Five Stages of Transformation | |
The Stage of Impact | 21 |
ONE Did I Create This? | 23 |
The Stage of Chaos | 43 |
TWO Does Death Mean I Lose? | 45 |
THREE Does God Get to Vote? | 61 |
The Stage of Choices | 75 |
FOUR Is Treatment War or Initiation? | 77 |
FIVE Do I Hold On or Let Go? | 95 |
SIX Do I Trust the Medical Establishment or Do I Put | |
My Faith in Alternative and Spiritual Healing? | 107 |
The Stage of Community | 125 |
SEVEN From Whom Must I Learn to Receive? FromWhom | |
Must I Learn to Protect Myself? | 127 |
The Stage of Spirit | 147 |
EIGHT How Can I Find Peace of Mind When I'm Living | |
My Life over the Edge? | 149 |
NINE What Have ILearned? | 165 |
Afterword | 185 |
Resources | 191 |
Group Study Guide | 197 |
Acknowledgments | 211 |
Index | 215 |