Lean on Me: 10 Powerful Steps to Moving Beyond Your Diagnosis and Taking Back Your Life

The author, founder of the Center Without Walls (a medical research foundation), has written an inspirational book for anyone with multiple sclerosis (MS). When she was a mother of three small children, she was diagnosed with MS at the age of 33. Her neurologist told her to go home and "go to bed... forever." Determined to have an active life, Davis developed a program to live as fully as possible. First she ditched a troubled marriage and surrounded herself only with people who would support her emotionally. She learned as much as she could about MS, working her way through the maze of medical information and misinformation to find which physicians and treatments would be the most help. In order to remain positive, avoid stress and commit to a healthy diet, she explored alternative approaches (among others, Davis has found homeopathy, acupuncture and osteopathy to be useful for her condition). Davis provides readers with an informed overview of how to negotiate the health-care system as well as Web resources. Today, remarried with two more children, the author, an MS activist, has devised a thoughtful plan for dealing with a devastating illness that should motivate others. (Apr.)