Have you ever really thought about the differences between symptomatic myeloma and smoldering myeloma?

If you ask newly diagnosed patients about their symptomatic myeloma, you’ll likely hear stories with common themes – like “we’re hitting the myeloma hard,” and how the treatment was scheduled with a sense of urgency. This type of myeloma usually has patients and their specialists leaping into action in hopes of bringing a quick and lasting remission. Of course, symptomatic multiple myeloma is an active disease with serious symptoms and repercussions, and it calls for an immediate response.

That’s …

Have you got any plans this February 28th? Throngs of adults will soon don party hats and make champagne toasts in living rooms across the nation. Sur­rounded by black streamers and gold statuettes, they’ll make friendly wagers on who will win the best actor or supporting actress. There’ll be some surprises when nominees’ names are called to the podium that no one thought would win, and there’ll be triumphant cheers when crowd favorites are honored for their popular efforts.

The 88th Annual Academy Awards is a couple of days from now. This …

My husband Daniel and I love visiting New York City at Christmas time. No other city seems to decorate quite so well, and we find all the festivity is just what the doctor ordered to get us in the holiday spirit.

We made our familiar pilgrimage to New York earlier this month, and we visited a major department store to see the holiday windows and all the decorations they had hanging inside.

The store’s theme this year is Believe in the Magic of Christmas, and while I understand that it’s a department …

As we draw nearer to Thanksgiving, I’ve been thinking about how mye­loma patients will spend the holi­day. I suspect that many of you will be with family and friends, and some of you may have some bedside cele­bra­tions with your hospital staff.

Now that myeloma has entered your world, I wonder if you see the holi­days in a new light – illuminating less of what’s on the table, and more of who’s sitting at it.

I know it has for me, but I hadn’t realized how much so until I finished the …

During my husband Daniel’s last specialist visit, I noticed a young couple sitting in the waiting room that I hadn’t seen before. They appeared to be in their late thirties and were nicely dressed, like they had just come from work. They looked ill at ease with their environment, as if this was all something new for them.

Since the woman’s plastic bracelet matched my husband’s, I could guess why. She sat there stoically, with her hands folded neatly in her lap. Her posture was a portrait of calm, statuesque equanimity. …

I have a new favorite place in our house. It’s a place to discover, create, and retreat. A quiet space with pale walls of robin’s egg blue, creamy white cabinets, and sun beams on butcher block countertops. There are three workspaces in the room: one desk flanked between short book­cases along one wall, and two project tables along the perpendicular walls. It’s perfect for scrapbooking, putting puzzles together, journaling, or just sit­ting peace­fully.

From my workspace I can see the resilient red rosebush that grows in the garden just outside my window, and I often find …

Last week my husband Daniel and I returned home after his regular ap­point­ment with his myeloma specialist. As we collapsed into the couch, we began our de­compression ritual of channel surfing and I caught one of my favorite movies: A River Runs Through It.

The movie is about Norman Maclean and his free-spirited brother Paul, who grow up in rural Montana in the 1920s. Their father, a Presbyterian minister, believed “that there was no clear line between religion and fly fishing,” and so it was amidst the panoramic views of nature that Norm spends …