My New Best Friend: Living well with Cancer, Its Medication and its Side Effects

By Ute Buehler

Ute Buehler's positive, well-researched information will help all patients dealing with cancer and other serious illnesses and their medications. Ute has focused on Gleevec(r), also called Imatinib, a treatment for chronic myeloid leukemia, to tell her readers about it and its side effects.

Throughout the book, her personality sparkles through, he

• Language: English
• Publisher: Studio 214 Publishing
• Release date: Mar 31, 2015
• ISBN: 9780977074938

Book preview

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Contents

Contents

Review

Dedication

Foreword

Copyright

Preface

And So It Began

My New Best Friend

Muscle Spasms

Nausea and Diarrhea

The YES Diet

Fluid Retention

Insomnia

Bad Hair Day

Drug and NutritionalSupplement Interactions

Claustrophobia

The Financial Conundrum

Epilogue

Addendum

Resources

And finally ...

Thank You

Meet the Author

Review

Ute Buehler’s positive, well-researched information will help all patients dealing with cancer and other serious illnesses and their medications. Ute has focused on Gleevec®, also called Imatinib, a treatment for chronic myeloid leukemia, to tell her readers about it and its side effects.

Throughout the book, her personality sparkles through, her faith inspires, and her joie de vivre is infectious. The photographs, quotes, and added information at the end of the book amplify her message. I would recommend this book to anyone who has been diagnosed with cancer.

Mary Joan Meagher, author and poet

Dedication

To all my fellow patients:

On our journey through cancer with chemotherapy, lifetime-saving drugs and their side effects the days can be very challenging. I believe that with a pro-active approach, survival can be made enjoyable, rather than miserable. With this book, I want to help you look at the side effects from a different point of view.

Yes—life is still good!

Foreword

Unfortunately

, we all know something about cancer. It is a rare person whose life has not been touched by cancer, either as a patient, family member, friend, or caregiver.

Statistics tell us that one in three women and one in two men will be diagnosed with some type of cancer in their lifetime. Cancer is either the number one or number two cause of death in the United States, depending on where you live. In Minnesota, it is number one. I live in Minnesota, but I didn’t die. I am a cancer survivor. I describe cancer as the narrow spot in an hourglass. I am the sand that has traveled from the top, through the tight spot, to the bottom—the same sand, but now arranged differently.

The broadest definition of a cancer survivor is a person living with and beyond cancer, from the time of diagnosis onward to the end of life. So what are we to do with the statistical reality of occurrence and our somewhat misguided belief that we will be the one who is spared? Name it. Talk about it. And gather resources.

Our lives are unique journeys, with twists and turns that teach us lessons along the way. When we pay attention during our narrow spots, we gather resources and methods of navigation we can use when the hourglass is overturned again.

Stories are essential to our nature and survival, helping us to make sense of our lives, and keeping us in contact with others. Wholeheartedly sharing stories, as a teller or a listener, strengthens resilience, which is an integral part of health, as well as wellness and the capacity to heal. We cannot control what will happen in our