Life, happiness... & Cancer

Living with cancer is a journey. So is life a journey to savour and enjoy. Phil Kerslake's narrative, his diary of survivorship is a manual of how to grab life by the throat and live it, and in so doing, cussedly live with cancer.

 

Phil's cancer journey embraces more than 25 years, the same era that he has have worked as an oncologist. Over that time patients and the rapists have grown to communicate better, to learn from each o the r. In an era that encompasses some of the greatest scientific discoveries of over two millennia, where we now know that humans have 70% of the same genome as fruit flies, we have rediscovered the importance of self-discovery in the fight against many chronic illnesses.

It is somewhat humbling to be reminded in this little but profound book, that discovering oneself will enable individuals with cancer, the ir families and the ir communities to cope better and to demystify a group of illnesses that are often no more frightening or difficult to cope with than diabetes, asthma or motor neurone disease.

Phil's book, as he challenges us, can and should be read in entirety and the n delved into in sections. Re-reading enhances and values the meaning.

It is a profoundly honest and simple manual. It will help patients, the ir families, the ir workmates and the ir the rapists. It is quite simply a celebration of living and proves that often cancer or living with a chronic illness can be a gift. It can lead us in o the r directions and enhance life even though sometimes the illness will take life.

To paraphrase Nietzsche, 'We can endure almost anything if the re is a 'why?''

Chris Atkinson MD

Deputy Chair, Cancer Control Council of New Zealand; Medical Director, Cancer Society of New Zealand; Chair, Psycho-Oncology New Zealand; Clinical Associate Professor (Oncology), Department of Medicine, Christchurch School of Medicine & Health Sciences, New Zealand

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