Sorry I have not posted in a week - I was traveling a lot and it was difficult to get online.  A shame since this amazing email has been sitting in my inbox.  I asked Gail to write a piece for Citizen Hunter (which I'm cross-posting on Earth to Philly tonight) since I recently read her funny, uplifting and super-smart book Cancer is a Bitch!

As I am sure you noticed I have written about the topic more than usual lately as a close family member is in the throes of this terrible disease.  Gail and her book is just what the doctor ordered.  I figured she'd write me a summary of her book to post but she didn't.  So check out what she wrote, because she is frustrated and wants to get moving with her plan to implement change!

So read on and then go get her book Cancer is a Bitch: (Or I'd rather be Having a Midlife Crisis)  - it rocks!

I was a competitive runner, a yoga practitioner, an organic mostly-vegetarian eater, an arm-chair nutritionist, a person others consulted for health and anti-aging tips, a person with no aches, no pains, who rarely caught a cold... when I was diagnosed with non-invasive breast cancer in my mid-forties. This made no sense to me. I literally could not believe it. I was positive there had been some kind of big mistake.

This was not the me I knew. This was not the healthy persona I wore and preached and flaunted proudly.

After the reality sunk in and when I was recovering from surgery, I started Googling carcinogens obsessively and learned that even though I thought I was living a consciously healthy and clean lifestyle, carcinogens are everywhere, impossible to avoid unless you live off the land in the middle of nowhere. I even suggested that to my husband until he reminded me I wasn’t really a country person and was a terrible gardener. After reading a very small Canadian study about parabens found in breast tumors and learned that they were in most cosmetics and hair products, I realized I’d been rubbing parabens into my skin and scalp for years in the name of anti-aging. Ha! I threw out all those products and started making my own homemade organic lotions.