Coping with Chronic Illness Theories, Issues and Lived Experiences

This valuable book combines psychological theories of health with the lived experience of coping with chronic health conditions, focusing on the "ill person" as an actor of their own development. It draws on perspectives from developmental and health psychology alongside the author’s personal experience of chronic illness. Bonino considers all aspects of living with illness, from issues that impact on everyday functioning such as pain and fatigue, to the rebuilding of identity through meaningful new goals and effective actions, and the development of therapeutic relationships. Psychological theories are interweaved with descriptions of lived encounters to center the experience of the person living alongside illness and provide insightful points of reference that everyone could try to use when facing the challenges of chronic disease in the course of their daily lives. Coping with Chronic Illness is important reading for those living with chronic health conditions, as well as for healthcare professionals looking to gain awareness of the psychological issues caused by living with illness. It is also of interest for postgraduate students of health psychology.

Table of contents Preface for this edition Why this book Part I 1. Healthy and ill: equal and different 2. Beyond the myth of perfect health 3. Protagonist of one’s own development 4. Protagonist of one’s own development in chronic disease Part II 5. Why me? 6. Finding meaning 7. Reconstructing identity 8. Self-efficacy: the exercise of control 9. Stress 10. Coping with stress Part III 11. It is all your fault 12. Pain 13. Fatigue 14. Depression 15. Mourning and loss 16. Optimism and happiness 17. Logical thought magical thought 18. Telling the story of one’s illness Part IV 19. The therapeutic relationship 20. Trust 21. Empathy 22. The patient between statistical logic and clinical logic 23. Alternative medicine 24. Confidentiality Part V 25. Us and the others 26. Between visible and invisible 27. Solitude 28. Attachments 29. Work 30. Life and death Part VI 31. Diagnosis: confronting the truth 32. "I want to do it on my own" 33. Being ill in the Internet age 34. And life goes on 35. Parents and children Bibliography

Silvia Bonino is Professor Emeritus of Developmental Psychologyin the Department of Psychology of the University of Turin (Italy), where she founded the Laboratory of Developmental Psychology. She is the author of Nature and Culture in Intimate Partner Violence: Sex, Love and Equality, (Routledge,2018).