Ryan Devlin:
Book Review-
My Daddy is My Superhero by Michaelagh Broadbent
Broadbent, mother of two boys aged 2 and 5, and whose husband was diagnosed with a brain tumour in 2009, writes the story from the perspective of a young child speaking about their father. It aims to help children who have lost a parent or have a parent who is seriously ill, to celebrate their loved one, to understand their situation, to accept and to help with the process of grief.
In the last book review on ‘Do No Harm’, I pondered how I could not begin to comprehend telling someone that they have cancer. Seemingly in response, this short children’s book by Michaelagh Broadbent explores the question of how a patient shares the news of a terminal illness with their family.
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The text achieves these aims in little over 30 illustration rich pages, reflective of its target audience. The colourful, vivid and warm images convey a message of positivity and support, allowing the words written on the page, or read by a parent to their child, to help in understanding, and in focusing on positive memories when a loved one may inevitably deteriorate from illness, or from treatment such as chemotherapy. As explaining a difficult situation can be cathartic, the book can also provide support for the adult who is ill, or other adult family members, as they read with a child to help them to commemorate and console.
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The way that we improve how we fight a tumour, distinct from the person, is in the laboratory, in research. The way that we improve how we treat people, the ailment mixed in with the complexity and whirlwind of emotion that is humanity, is by speaking to the patient: Speaking to them in consultation, on ward rounds, and most importantly (as was recommended at the BONUS conference), talking to patients when you travel the wards in your clinical years. This book is a patient’s family reaching out not only to others experiencing the same situation, but also to us as today’s and tomorrow’s clinicians.
Overall, I thoroughly recommend this book to remind yourself of the patient. It takes a few minutes to read, and has a target reading age of 5, but provides an emotional insight into a family’s loss that one can certainly empathise with. From listening to other readers’ stories, it does an incredible job of helping to console a child experiencing grief, whatever the reason. The book may therefore be a useful resource to recommend to a family in need, and to a patient who you treat. Pain and suffering of course does not evaporate upon reading several lines written on a page, but they can do tremendously in opening discussion, developing understanding, and in reminding us in the darkest of times to remember, and to hold on to the best of those we love.
If you are interested in reading the book, it can be purchased here , and all money raised will go to Maggie’s Edinburgh. You may also find the book on Amazon, however please do not purchase the book from there as Amazon take a cut that would otherwise go to this amazing charity.
Whilst it is a children’s book, it says everything it needs to. Broadbent, a University of Edinburgh alumna, I believe joins the best of children’s authors that succeed in condensing a story into few pages, conveying ideas in their rawest, and most powerful form. It demonstrates a greater command of language, of storytelling, than many facets of fiction aimed at adults, taking in 30 pages to say what some authors state in 400. To do this with something as complex and emotionally fraught as loss is astonishing.
Furthermore, as readers we do not merely get a way of seeing how a family of a terminally ill patient can be supported, but we get an insight into the author’s mindset, her pain, and her determination to look after her children and the memory of her husband. It can provide those who treat cancer with a better insight of what a diagnosis, and what treatment can mean to not only the patient, but the family surrounding them. For many, cancer is still a boulder that comes crashing down into a person’s life; the ripple effects are bound to be many. It is our responsibility as clinicians, as students, to understand this, and to best support our patients and their families.
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