About this item

Everyone knows someone who’s sick or suffering. Yet when a friend or relative is under duress many of us feel uncertain about how to cope.Throughout her recent bout with breast cancer, Letty Cottin Pogrebin became fascinated by her friends’ and family’s diverse reactions to her and her illness: how awkwardly some of them behaved; how some misspoke or misinterpreted her needs; and how wonderful it was when people read her right. She began talking to her fellow patients and dozens of other veterans of serious illness, seeking to discover what sick people wished their friends knew about how best to comfort, help, and even simply talk to them.Now Pogrebin has distilled their collective stories and opinions into this wide-ranging compendium of pragmatic guidance and usable wisdom.



About the Author

Letty Cottin Pogrebin

Letty Cottin Pogrebin is a writer, activist, and national lecturer. A founding editor and writer for Ms. Magazine, Pogrebin is also the author of eleven books, including the new novel, Single Jewish Male Seeking Soul Mate (May 2015) , the memoirs Deborah, Golda, and Me: Being Female and Jewish in America, and Getting Over Getting Older, the novel Three Daughters, and the groundbreaking How to Be a Friend to a Friend Who's Sick. She is also the editor of the anthology Stories for Free Children, and consulting editor on Marlo Thomas' Free to Be... You and Me. Pogrebin's articles, op-eds, and columns have been published in a wide variety of print and online publications, including the New York Times, Time, The Nation, Ms., Huffington Post, Harpers Bazaar, Travel & Leisure, Moment, and the Forward.



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