A local author has published a new memoir looking at her cancer journey from misdiagnosis, to being diagnosed and eventually finding a path to recovery.

When she was 35-years-old, Ashleigh Matthews was diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer.

Matthews had three small children at home while undergoing treatment.

She wanted them to understand what was happening to her so she started making notes, which were eventually turned into the basis for her book, Otherwise Grossly Unremarkable.

Matthews says the most difficult thing for her has been to reconcile the things that have been taken away because of her disease, and the things that it gave to her.

She says there are days where she is angry that she doesn’t have breasts or other parts of her body any more. That said, there is an “acid wash of cancer” in that it is .clarifying.” She says it made her see the things that are most important, such as spending an hour and a half with her kids on Halloween, and the other things just “fall away.”