Customer Reviews

After the Diagnosis : From Crisis to Personal Renewal for Patients With Chronic Illness

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

JoAnn LeMaistre,Ph.D., the author of this book, is a clinical psychologist who specializes her practice in dealing with patients who have a chronic medical illness or disability. She herself lives with MS, and bases the foundation of this book from both a personal and professional standpoint. She breaks the book down into chapters regarding Crisis, Isolation, Anger, Reconstruction, Intermittent Depression, Renewal, Helping, and concludes with an overview of each. She begins with an introduction about herself and how her disease invaded her life, and touches base briefly with each chapter's focus. At the beginning of each chapter, she introduces us to an indivdual who is struggling with a particular illness and focuses specifically on how they deal with a that chapter's topic....i.e. Isolation, anger, depression. She offers commentary at the end of each chapter, as well, by discussing how that person handled the issue at hand, recommendations of more positive ways to deal with the issue, etc.

This book is not only written to help others living with chronic illness, but also their helpers....the caregivers. The chapter entitled "Helper" is very informative for those who help to care for the chronically ill. She stresses the importance of self-care for the helpers. She again uses the different stages of emotion (crisis, isolation, anger...) to address the needs and concerns they have. My Mom, who is my primary "helper" read this chapter and felt very validated, as did I. If you come away with nothing else from this book, you'll come away feeling validated, which can be a rare experience. I felt very "understood," incomparison with the frequency of misunderstandings by the well world. Don't get me wrong, this isn't a "let's-have-a-pity party-together" kind of book, rather she validates the emotions those of us living with chronic illness's, often struggle to express. She also motivates the reader to find ways of "renewal." That is, finding ways around, and through, your limitations that still enable you to contribute to life..finding valued aspects of yourself, discovering simple joys in spite of your circumstances, finding creative ways to express yourself, etc. She encourages others, as she does herself, to look for positive avenues to vent frustrations and discouragements.

I have read several books on the topic of living life with a chronic illness. Overall, this book provided me with more suport than most others. Perhaps it's all about timing....we all deal with our illnesses and disabilites at different paces. Maybe she specifically touched base on area's that were of particular interest to me. As with any book of this nature, there are aspects that hit home and others that may not. Whatever the reason, I would certainly recommend this book if you feel lost in emotion about your illness. She helps to give a little order to the "roller coaster ride" we so often endure. I think I received this book well because she offers it as a journey we travel together. I felt I wasn't alone in my struggle. This is a book I would also recommend to family members and friends, who desire a better understanding of the emotional aspects, their loved ones endure, in living with a chronic illness and/or disability. Very informative for them.

Also of interest are listings, in the back of the book, of many different organizations that provide information and support to patients and families who have to cope with chronic pain and/or illness, and disability.

The author knows what she is talking about; she is not just a psychoterapist with a doctoral degree, but also a multiple sclerosis patient who has greatly damaged eyesight. Emotionally, however, her eyesight is 20/20: She can look pain, fear, disappointment and extremely altered lifestyles right in the face, with no glib or over-easy answers. You'll find yourself in this book, even if your problem is not MS; she shows case histories of patients with heart problems, intestinal surgery, crippling arthritis and more, and she seeks to find the core questions in ALL chronic disorders; my medical problem is a rare one that even many doctors don't know about, but I found myself, right on the money! Unlike most books of this sort, she gives equal time to the problems of the family/friends who act as caregivers (helpers, she calls them.) They, too, have their crises of anger, depression, etc. and they, too, need to learn how to reach out for help. If you, or someone you care about, has ANY chronic medical problem--try this book.

I was diagnosed a month ago with MS and frankly the past month was not a fun one - it was filled with many of the emotions that are discussed in this book. When I ordered this book I thought it was going to read more like one of those self help books and I secretly dreded such a thing thinking it would be dry and boring - not so with this one! Its quite interesting to read - stories and situations are used in each chapter to illustrate what's going on so that its less of a lecture and more of an exchange of understanding. Its written in a conversational tone and actually reads more like a novel. Even the introduction, the author starts it out writing, "My cat was snoring. In recent months, I had had to learn so many new things that I almost could not believe there was anything left to disciver. But there it was. My cat, it seems, snores." Anyway, a good book that others will probably enjoy as well.

This book is a total validation of the feelings and fears I experienced after the onset of my genetic illness. No one else understood, but JoAnn LeMaistre did, and finding that I was not alone in my experience and learning that there was a process I had to endure made things easier. I was so moved that I found JoAnn and joined one of her support groups! This is a must-read for people newly diagnosed AND their families. An illness never affects just one person - it affects that person's entire family in every aspect of their lives.

LeMaistre, a psychotherapist living with Multiple Sclerosis, identifies six stages of the ongoing emotional process of dealing with chronic illness - crisis, isolation, anger, reconstruction, intermittent depression, and renewal - but she doesn't seem to shape a hypothesis or outline the purpose of her book. As a result, the material, while interesting and occasionally insightful, lacks focus. I did appreciate that each of the chapters (focusing on one of the stages) began with a well-written dramatization of someone coping with chronic illness followed by the author's analysis of how the characters handled the issues involved. I realized this book would be an excellent book for an illness support group to read and discuss chapter by chapter.