Crowds swarming at the new Whole Foods. Your boyfriend’s dirty clothes piled around your bedroom. A new ding in your new car.

Of all the things you sweat each day, none compare to what happened to Gail Konop Baker right before Valentine’s Day. At age 46 she was living a good life – exercising, eating organic, helping her kids navigate school, managing normal bumps in marriage and friendships – and then at a her annual mammogram she heard something every woman dreads: “I think we should biopsy.”

Her resulting struggle with breast cancer is detailed in her new memoir “Cancer is a Bitch.” Never a sob story or victim’s portrait, the book chronicles a real woman’s frank coping process. Like considering a radical mastectomy before ironically crossing centerfold off her list of choices. Or fearing what she’d miss after death (and how her yoga teacher would be perfect for her husband), then noting the upside – becoming a medically sanctioned pothead.

Unflinchingly intimate, never whiney, often hilarious and always authentic, Gail’s story is also frighteningly relevant to us all. By revealing how she brought her life back into balance, she makes it seem less scary and a little more bearable.

And all the small stuff so not worth sweating.

Available online at amazon.com

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