Dr. Robert Mignone: Doctor, Teacher, Scholar, Author, Cancer Survivor

I am a man who has survived prostate cancer. I am also a physician. My book, Ordinary Valor, fulfills a promise I made at the outset to chronicle my journey so that others can learn from my experience. Certainly millions of men have triumphed over prostate cancer before me, but few, especially a physician, have publicly shared their inner experience. That would not be “manly”. Lance Armstrong is a recent notable exception. It is time for another male voice in the dark night, especially one in plainspeak supported by years of highly credentialed medical expertise and psychiatric insight.

Ordinary Valor tells the inside story of my vulnerability and strength, faltering and persistence as I faced my death, reconciled life’s mysterious unpredictability, and made the best of it. I offer it to millions of readers waiting for a template to use for bouncing back from their own shattered dreams.

The audience, comprising most of our population of literate men and women already frequenting Amazon.Com. and the national book stores and book clubs will want to learn directly from a psychiatrist about the human experience of taking on a blindside hit and coming out the better for it. Men will feel validated. Women will experience relief and reassurance. And, by extension, they will consider their own struggles with life. To paraphrase Mr. Armstrong, “It’s not about the prostate.”

No generalities or platitudes. No machismo. Just straight talk for people of many cultures. After all, the thrust of the lessons is about the human condition. Since enlightenment permits empathy, people need to hear about my temporary chemical castration’s enlarged painful breasts, hot flashes and supplies of Kotex and plastic urinals. They need to hear about post radiation “bladder time” and a new meaning for the phrase “critical window.” For me that meant designing two lifestyles (mine and my wife’s) around the time and distance to the nearest urinal. They also must hear about daily workouts, only occasionally “taking a knee”, and the power of truth, love, and faith. And laughs.

Since I am a psychiatrist of thirty-five years experience, I have had the privilege of approximately 160,000 clinical conversations about striving to bounce back from life-shattering crises. My orientation has always been mind/body/spirit. The fires tested that mettle during my wakeup call. I share how to take a crisis as a gift, not a curse. Walking through this together, the reader and I find ways to reconcile life’s mysterious unaccountability and unpredictability and make the best of a bad situation. In effect, make lemonade.

Robert J. Mignone, M.D., F.A.P.A.