So the day has arrived. I have a real life author guest blogging here on my blog. her name is Stephanie Butland and she has just launched her new book 'Thrive The Bah! Guide to Wellness After cancer'. I first came across Stephanie when searching for bloggers who wrote about breast cancer. I loved the way she wrote with a wonderful sense of humour but also writing it as it is. I was delighted when she wrote her first book 'How I Said Bah! to cancer'. Her second book 'Thrive' has come at just the right time for me as I move from just surviving cancer to thriving. I am so glad she is part of my life. 

1.          Can you tell us a little bit about yourself

I’m the author of ‘How I Said Bah! To cancer: a guide to thinking, laughing, living and dancing your way through’ (Hay House 2011) and ‘Thrive: the Bah! guide to wellness after cancer’ (Hay House 2012).

I live in Northumberland near the place where I grew up. (I did live in London for 20 years, which I really enjoyed, but it’s good to be home.) When I’m not writing, I train thinking skills and creativity throughout Europe, and work with individuals to help them to think more effectively. In my spare time, I knit, spin, read, bake, walk on quiet beaches, and try to be a good mother, wife, auntie, sister, godmother, niece and friend.

2.    When were you diagnosed with breast cancer and how are you now?

I was diagnosed with a breast cancer in late 2008. Since then I’ve had surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, and drug treatment. I will keep taking some drugs until May next year, and will be officially in remission in November 2013. As far as I’m concerned, though, I’m thriving.

3.    Why do you describe it as a ‘dance’ with cancer?

I think language is so important in all that we do, and so much of the language around cancer is frightening - battling, fighting, winning, losing. As someone who is, essentially, a bit of a wimp, I decided to find a better metaphor. Dancing usually involves pretty shoes - and you’re unlikely to die of dancing. So I decided I’d dance with cancer.

I’m still very careful with my language. I’ll never talk about ‘my’ cancer because I don’t want to attach it to me; I talk about ‘a’ cancer rather than cancer; and if you look at the covers of my books you’ll see that the c-word isn’t capitalised.

4.    What made you decide to write about your ‘dance’?

Initially, starting the blog was a pragmatic approach to keeping lots of people informed about how I was doing. But very soon I realised that writing was helping me to cope because it was helping me to process what I was going through. And the feedback I started to get told me that I was being useful to others dancing with cancer. Cancer made me feel useless in so many ways - feeling that the blog was helping others helped me in turn.

5.    Tell us a little about your new book ‘Thrive’

Cancer treatment is hard and it takes a lot out of you - physically, mentally and emotionally. There’s a point at which the medical profession is more or less done with you, you’re considered one of the lucky ones and left to get on with it.... and you are probably in worse shape than you have ever been in your life. That’s the point where this book begins. It’s meant to help you to get from the place where you have survived to a a place of genuine wellness. It uses practical exercises, thinking strategies, visualisations and suggestions for you and your friends and family to help you thrive.

6.    What 3 things could you have not lived without during your treatment?

Ooh. That’s a tough one.

Abstract answer: love, support, information.

Food answer: chocolate milk, cornish wafers, rice pudding. (Please don’t take that as dietary advice. I put on an awful lot of weight!)

Time-well-spent answer: knitting, reading, blogging.

Good-for-the-soul answer: beaches, tiny godchildren, sleep.

Helping-with-treatment answer: hypnotherapy, massage, that thing I can’t remember the name of to do with pressure points in your feet.

Keeping-hold-of-me answer: my family, working, friends who remembered that I was still there underneath the baldness and the medical stuff.

7.    Has your dance changed you and if so how?

Yes and no. I don’t think I’m radically different, but I am more ‘me’. I feel as though my dance with cancer gave me the opportunity to find out what was important in life and embrace it. So things have changed: we moved to Northumberland, I am very careful about how I spend my time, I consciously appreciate the people and things that I love.

     8.What does the future hold for you?

Well, my first novel ‘Surrounded By Water’ comes out in early 2014, which is super exciting. I’m writing a second novel at the moment, and that will come out in 2015. I plan to continue writing and hope that people will continue to read my work. I hope to remain cancer-free, and keep on thriving, until I die at the age of 103. (I will be found in a hammock in the sun, in a cherry-red swimsuit, having just finished reading a fantastic book and drinking a glass of good champagne.) 

Here is my review of Thrive 

THRIVE The Bah! Guide to Wellness After cancer

written by Stephanie Butland

This is the book that every woman should be given when finishing her breast cancer treatment. Stephanie encourages you to move from just surviving after treatment to ‘a place where you are thriving’ She uses a variety of different activities to help you including visualisations, meditations and practical exercises. Her sense of humour shines through the pages but she doesn’t shirk the hard issues understanding the fear that it might return…  ‘but I do feel fear nipping gently at the edges of my heart’. She helps you to look at your ‘dance’ with cancer and to reach a place of rest where there is acceptance that what has happened, has happened, and life is moving on now’. There are many helpful suggestions for those who support a partner or family member learning to thrive after cancer. I am sure that this book would be very helpful for them too. I am learning to ‘walk in the moment’; enjoying what each new day brings and this book will certainly help me on my journey

Stephanie's blog is http://bahtocancer.com/






Download your copy of ‘Thrive : The Bah! Guide to wellness after Cancer’  for Kindle etc...here:http://amzn.to/OBFmjK

Download your copy of ‘How I Said Bah! to cancer’  for kindle etc...here:http://amzn.to/O4FcAM

Buy  your copy of ‘Thrive’ here: http://amzn.to/NsCIKh

Order your copy of ‘Bah!’ here: http://amzn.to/Sr9yBK

Tomorrow Stephanie will be found at Jo http://gapyearsthebook.blogspot.co.uk/

Thank you so much Stephanie for sharing a little of your story with us. I can't wait for your new book to be published and will be one of your first readers.