Author pushes one-day-at-a-time belief

Woody Weingarten's first TV interview, about 'Rollercoaster,' now available on YouTube

All we have is today.

So we absolutely must appreciate the here and now.

That one-day-at-a-time lesson became palpable to my wife, Nancy Fox, and me 20 years ago when she was diagnosed with breast cancer.

We've done our best to implement it, each day, ever since.

Most often we succeed.

And I, Woody Weingarten, have made multiple references to that quest in my new VitalityPress book aimed at male caregivers, "Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer."

David Perry

I also commented about it during the wrap-up to my recent first foray into television, when I was interviewed by David Perry on his "Ten Percent" telecast on Comcast Hometown Network Channel 104, a cable station in San Francisco.

You can listen to that entire 8-minute, 45-second interview on YouTube — here and now.

Then you might want to test out a shorter, 90-second KCBS radio interview, or a considerably longer, 30-minute, 33-second Love Letters Live podcast.

Also available is a full-length newspaper feature, substantial blog interviews by a Texan and a San Franciscan, and a glowing review by Santa Fe author Hollis Walker.

Not to mention an extremely positive follow-up online piece by Janet Gallin, a tribute-recommendation by blogger Marilyn Miller, and a plug by a nonprofit organization, Zero Breast Cancer.

You also can find more information by delving deeper into this VitalityPress blog, by checking out the Marin-Man-to-Man support group for male caregivers of breast cancer patients — or, perhaps best of all, by ordering a copy of "Rollercoaster" from your local bookstore (or Amazon) or asking your local library to stock it.

I urge you to do it now. Remember, you only have today.

Oh, yeah, in case you want to know more about Nancy and her selfless attitudes, revel in her appearances on YouTube or KTVU.

You can do that here and now as well.

Disease-free? Book still worth reading, site says

'Rollercoaster' is praised in online article for showing men how they can be good partners 

A new examiner.com feature article titled "Woody Weingarten's ride through wife's breast cancer may help you" states unequivocally that my book "is worth reading even if no one in your life has cancer."

Why?

"Because," it says, "it is filled with very smart clues about how a man can be the best possible husband or partner. And how a wife can help him be that."

"Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer," the story points out accurately, is also "a guide to give people a sense of what they will be facing" if, unfortunately, a life-threatening disease does strike.

It furthermore labels the book "a memoir, a love story, a research guide, and some realities of chemotherapy and medications."

Written by Janet Gallin as an adjunct to her "Love Letters Live" podcast package, the online piece notes that the "husband of a woman diagnosed with breast cancer has to…survive his own terror in order to be a strength to her."

How to do that, despite the ups and downs, is the main thrust of my new VitalityPress book.

Accordingly, the article indicates, "Rollercoaster" can help you figure out what is true concerning the disease, its treatments and its aftermath — and, by the same token, what is not. 

And that's not as easy as a caregiver or patient might think. "A study says X is true and Y is false, the next week it is the opposite," I'm correctly quoted as saying.

The piece maintains that I'm a survivor of my wife's cancer.

I am.

But she, too, is a survivor. And we're both thriving.

You can read the entire article here — and then learn even more by following a couple of its links.