Antoinette Truglio Martin - Hug Everyone You Know: A Year of Community, Courage, and Cancer

Praise for

Hug Everyone You Know

Hug Everyone You Know is a compelling memoir about the importance of community while navigating a life crisis such as cancer. As an oncology nurse and a cancer survivor myself, I found Martins writing to be a refreshingly real depiction of life as a cancer patient. Her writing is a testimony to the endurance of the human spirit, the importance of love and community, and the need for hope every day of the journey.

Story Circle Reviews

This book will show readers the power of human connectivity and how sharing our experience can become an inspiring journey, not only for those who listen to us, but for us who live it. Hug Everyone You Know: A Year of Community, Courage, and Cancer is a painful and empowering journey, a book that will speak to those undergoing any hopeless situation; its a gift to receive, use and pass on. This book will give readers the strength and the inspiration to name their suffering and to triumph over it. Its exciting, informative and, above all, entertaining. Readers Favorite

This is a great story: inventive, informative, and irresistibly readable. Quite an accomplishment when the subject is cancer. Brava.

Odette Heideman, Editor, Epiphany Magazine

Hug Everyone You Know captures beautifully the terror and anxietyas well as the awkwardness and occasional humorthat follow a diagnosis of breast cancer, and the salvation to be found in the love and support of family and friends. Peering deeply into the experience through a detailed assessment of her fears, the bonds she shares with others, and hitherto unknown reserves of courage, Martin shares revelatory insights about her willingness to go to any lengths to fight the disease because of what she has learned about the preciousness of life.

Andrew Botsford, Editor and Visiting Professor, Stony Brook Southampton University

I picked up this book on a early Sunday afternoon and did not set it down until I was finished. The writing is like being with a long-time friend. It is honest and you can feel the love that the author exudes and surrounds her. Being an escapist, I was reluctant to read a journey on cancer because it hits too close to home. However, quite the opposite is the effect the book had on me. It is not clinical and if you are going through treatments I would imagine you would find it comforting. I would recommend this book to anyone. It is a very enjoyable read. Monique Abel, GHT Book Club

This is an honestly written account of the challenges that face women and families confronting a breast cancer diagnosis. It passionately illustrates the ability of women and their Everyones to find strength.

Karen Schmitt, MA, BSN Director, Manhattan Cancer Services Program New York Presbyterian/Columbia

Hug Everyone You Know is more than a memoir of combating cancer head onit is a personal account of the love of family and friends; Antoinettes Everyone who supported her and witnessed her bravery over an arduous year. As Antoinette retells her story, she tries not to give a voice to cancer. Yet, she reveals her innermost thoughts, sharing experiences and fears through the journal she kept during her year of treatment. The authors narrative is carefully woven together with the e-mail exchanges she has with her loved ones. Long after the book is finished, its message continues to linger: life is bigger than itself when fueled by determination and love.

Janice Gatta, MS/CCC-SLP, Babes Against Cancer Fundraising CommitteeSouthward Ho Country Club

I am inspired by Antoinettes courage and spirit. She is blessedblessed with her husband and children, blessed with her family and friends, and blessed with her doctors and nurses. Being in the medical field, its a shot of reality seeing it from the patients point of view, with the day in and day out struggles of life compounded with the diagnosis. This book brought a face to breast cancer and I feel privileged and honored that she shared it with me. I will hug everyone I know, now and forever.

Barbara M. OBrien RN, Director of Cancer Services Program of Staten Island Staten Island University Hospital

Martin has a way of writing that really captured my attention and brought me into her story. I felt like her best friend.

Kathryn Gates-Ferris, MS, MPA, CHT, Avon Project Director CAI Global

Filled with fresh air, light, and life, Hug Everyone You Know is an intimate conversation with an intelligent, funny survivor. The voice rings true, and the insights resonate well beyond the cancer moment.

Joni Rodgers, New York Times best-selling author of Bald in the Land of Big Hair

Copyright 2017 Antoinette Truglio Martin

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, digital scanning, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, please address She Writes Press.

Published 2017
Printed in the United States of America
ISBN: 978-1-63152-262-8 pbk
ISBN: 978-1-63152-263-5 ebk
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017939855

Book design by Stacey Aaronson

For information, address:
She Writes Press
1563 Solano Ave #546
Berkeley, CA 94707

She Writes Press is a division of SparkPoint Studio, LLC.

For my mom, Diana Mastropaolo Truglio, and my grandmother, Margherita Mastropaolothe women who inspired fierce perseverance.

For my grandma, Mary Truglio, who always believed that I was a writer.

contents

introduction

M ost of us live within a complicated web of relationships. We admire some people with whom we have these relationships for their fortitude. We like others for their humor and interests. We love those whom we are born to, those we birthed, and those who stir the passions in our heart and mind. Our relationship web can be a massive collection of beings, all with unique needs to recognize and gifts to share. We are not alone. We have our