How to Be Sick (Second Edition): A Buddhist-Inspired Guide for the Chronically Ill and Their Caregivers

“When we lose our physical health, it can seem like we’ve lost our life. Toni Bernhard, with unflinching realness and deep insight, shows us how the fires of loss can clear the way for a new and profound capacity for appreciation, love, and understanding. This book can bring you more fully alive by healing your spirit.”—Tara Brach, author of Radical Acceptance

 “Toni shows how her longtime study and meditation practice in the Buddhist tradition help her accommodate her situation with gentle acceptance and compassion. The techniques that Toni presents for working with one’s mind in the distressed states it finds itself when facing an uncomfortable and unchanging truth are basic Buddhist insights and meditation practices…[that] will work for anyone.”—From the Foreword by Sylvia Boorstein

 'Beautiful, heartfelt, and immensely courageous.'—Sharon Salzberg

In 2001, Toni Bernhard got sick and stayed that way. As she and her partner faced the confusion, frustration, and despair of a life with sudden limitations—a life that was vastly different from the one they’d thought they’d have together—Toni had to learn how to be sick. In spite of her many physical and energetic restrictions (and sometimes, because of them), Toni learned how to live a life of equanimity, compassion, and joy. Rich with insights and practices hard-won from Toni’s own ongoing life experience, this book reminds us that our own inner freedom is limitless, regardless of our external circumstances.