I just received this website email, from a reader friend named Amy. I asked her if I could excerpt a little bit of it in my blog. Amy is 46-years-old, a dynamo really, who suffers from quite a few chronic conditions. You would never know it to see her. She is beautiful, vibrant, raising two sweet boys, active in every way. She keeps her conditions private, very private.

Here’s what Amy had to say about how few of us who have a chronic health issue admit to how it impacts our lives, including our marriages:

“In 46 years I’ve never picked up a book on health until I picked up your last book, The Autoimmune Epidemic. Had I not heard so much about it, I still may not have read it. It would be the next opportunity for my husband to poke fun at how much I am becoming like my grandmother.  I hear this type of thing from a number of my friends, including my sister, about their husbands who usually ignore their ailments.”

And here is what Amy had to say about how capable those of us who do have a chronic issue so often are, despite our “tiger in the lifeboat:”

“I usually think I can handle more than the average person. Some days I may just struggle with a Cat in the Lifeboat. I think a lot of times those of us who are dealing with a condition we don’t talk about are some of the most capable women out there. I’m hoping your book The Last Best Cure helps those of us who already have a positive attitude to realize that we can rally and be more productive than most. And because we have a different perspective on life we are the ones to pass on a lot of great potential and understanding about what matters in life on to our kids. We’re good moms, we’re smart, we’re good at what we do.

But we might not pick up a book that seems to be about illness per se. Because we don’t want people to put us in that category. So maybe you should call your book something like, “Fit and Fabulous over Forty?” or “The Real Lives of American Wives?”

I had a great laugh when I read Amy’s last title idea. What do you think of what Amy had to say?