Bone by Marion Woodman is the autobiography by a woman faced with death. Marion faced one of the scariest things anyone is ever faced with, cancer. She guides you with her day to day life in this terror. She was diagnosed with uterine cancer in November of 1993. Marion had worked her whole life trying to care for and manage a good and healthy well being. She wondered how could her body do this to her after everything she had done for it? Throughout the book Marion tries and connects with her body. By connecting to her body she believes she can free herself from cancer, even though she feels as if she doesn't have cancer at all. Radiation therapy she considers as a toxin for her body. Radiation gives you burns, leaves you feeling weak, and with one miscalculation can damage other organs leaving her with permanent damage. Even though Marion has her beliefs about radiation therapy she continues on with the treatment; she is able to eliminate the uterine cancer. Feeling free from this horrible disease she continues to live her life joyfully, and she reconnects with her body and soul. Later on she develops pain in her back when she walks. She is diagnosed with severe osteoporosis and osteoarthritis in her lower back. Marion's scans also showed something else. Marion had a tumor on the inside of her sacrum. The doctor figures the cancer has metastasized, but it is too dangerous and impossible to biopsy the tumor to give them the results. Given this news Marion is only given a certain amount of time to live. She seeks the opinion of another doctor and he suspects it is not cancer. So Marion continues to struggle walking and moving, left with great pain, but insists on living her life, thankful she is alive.
Bone is a fantastic book that showed me an insight of a cancer patient. It showed and explained some of the popular cancer terminology such as metastasized and explains what brachytherapy is and what happens during the procedure. Lastly it doesn't explain how and why tumors form, and why people have to go through this awful disease. But overall I recommend Bone to others who want a better understanding of the day to day life of a cancer patient.
This book greatly affected me personally. My grandpa had terminal cancer. Even though I watched him go through the pain and suffering, Bone showed me the thoughts and concerns that run through a cancer patients mind. They too are afraid and don't understand why this has to happen to them. Marion connected with her body, and I want to do so as well. This book has shown me that caring for and connecting with my body is very important. I must take these steps now in order to live a joyful life.