10 tcf.org.uk COMPASSION | BOOK REVIEWS Book Reviews Losing You, Finding Me by Kay Backhouse reviewed by Mary Hartley This book is written by a sister whose brother, Syd, died from a rare type of cancer when he was 36. The book is divided into three parts, ‘Asleep’, ‘Awakening’ and ‘Remembering’ and it documents the way a sibling’s untimely death brings you face to face with what is really important in life, makes you reevaluate your own life and can ultimately almost force you to live the way you were meant to live. Kay has found a way to live the life she was meant to and she’s offering the hope that others can do that too. The first part of the book tells us about the person Kay used to be, a people pleaser, a teenager who dabbled with drugs, alcohol, smoking and became stuck in an abusive relationship. All the time she knew this wasn’t the person she was meant to be; she is actually an idealistic and highly sensitive person who feels her own and other people’s pain deeply. She has three brothers and felt very close to Syd who was the youngest. Syd also struggled with the way the world saw him, hiding his real self in the same way his sister did. Kay eventually got her life into some sort of order, married Rick, the love of her life, and had two sons. They emigrated to Australia, but all was not well. Kay’s marriage was in trouble, her husband’s physical and mental health were not good, and Syd was diagnosed with a neuroendocrine cancer of the thymus gland. The second part of the book tells us how Kay became aware of the need to fight back against her own feelings of helplessness and depression. She describes how she tried to help her brother and herself by learning as much as she could about the cancer, about good holistic patient centred health care and about the way some alternative treatments, alongside formal treatments, could help. In 2013 Syd’s diagnosis was terminal, with a prognosis of about two years, but he actually lived another six years. At the same time Rick continued to struggle with depression and poor health and Kay herself was struggling. In 2018 the family came back to the UK, and she unfortunately had a nervous breakdown, ending up in A and E. Syd died in 2019 and, during his final month Rick was admitted to hospital with sepsis so she was backwards and forwards between hospice and hospital. By then she was displaying the classic symptoms of PTSD, was rushing around trying to be a superwoman and was grieving deeply for her brother. Then along came the pandemic, a blessing in disguise for her. The third part of the book is where hope starts to take centre stage. Kay, like so many of us, was forced by the lockdown to stop and think and she realised she had to take responsibility for her own inner peace while letting other people take control of theirs. She’s built a framework of advice which we can all use. Kay emphasises that this is what helped her, and we must all find our own way but there are plenty of ideas here to help.
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