Pebbling the Walk: Surviving Cancer Caregiving

Pebbling the Walk will change the way you think about cancer and chemotherapy, and perhaps even the way you think about life, death, and love. Steve Reed writes about his own experiences as a caregiver and offers advice to others in language that is uncomplicated by intimidating medical and psychological terminology. Each short, digestible chapter includes useful and encouraging suggestions for how to enhance the quality of life for those with cancer and ultimately turn cancer treatment into a constructive and life-affirming experience for both patient and caregiver.

Take time to collect pebbles and search for four-leaf clovers. Inspire your patient’s appetite with a variety of menu options. Learn to dance. Keep a calendar of medications and treatment appointments. Steve Reed’s suggestions and instructions for caregivers range from the practical to the whimsical and silly. Few know better than Reed, who has been a caregiver to seven family members, the serious and overwhelming nature of a caregiver’s duties. But no one knows better than he how to infuse even the most dire circumstances with humor and joy.

Steve Reed is a professional writer who served as caregiver for seven terminally-ill family members. Most recently, he cared for his wife, Marthy, as she battled breast cancer. While she was going through eleven months of chemotherapy, Marthy asked Steve to write Pebbling the Walk. This work of nonfiction is based on their experiences together and on Reed’s experiences with other family members in his care.

After his sister, Karen, died of lymphoma in 1994, Steve Reed moved back to his hometown of Vashon Island, Washington. While preparing his family’s property, he re-met Marthy, who had been among his first friends when he arrived on the island at the age of seven. They had lost touch after high school, but were reunited by what Terry Tempest Williams calls "the shared landscape of grief." Marthy and Steve now live together in a small cottage with a river stone fireplace in the woods on Vashon Island.

Steve Reed currently works as a technical courseware designer for IBID Publishing, a columnist for Northwest Prime Time News, and a contributor for Beachcomber and The Ticket (both weekly newspapers). He has also written features for Pacific Maritime Magazine. Pebbling the Walk is his first published book of nonfiction.