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More Than You Can Handle: A Rare Disease, A Family in Crisis, and the Cutting-Edge Medicine That Cured the Incurable
When a two-month-old baby falls ill, his apparently ordinary symptoms turn out to signal a rare and lethal immune deficiency. For parents Miguel Sancho and Felicia Morton, the discovery that their son, Sebastian, has chronic granulomatous disease (CGD) upends their lives and leaves the family with few options, all of them terrifying. With Sebastian at constant risk of deadly infection, they spend the next six years in some degree of self-quarantine, with all its attendant anxieties and stressors, as they struggle to keep their son alive, their marriage intact, and themselves sane.
The quest for a cure leads them into the alternate universe of the rare-disease community, and to the cutting edge of modern medicine, as their personal crises send them fumbling through various modalities of self-help, including faith, therapy, and meditation. With brutal honesty, Sancho describes how his struggles derail his career, put his marriage on life support, get his family evicted from a Ronald McDonald House, and ruin a Make-A-Wish trip.
Sancho's riveting tale of the diagnosis and treatment of his son's illness takes us deep inside the workings of the immune system, and into the radically innovative treatment used to repair it. Ultimately Sebastian is saved with a stem cell transplant using discarded umbilical cord blood, a groundbreaking technique pioneered and practiced by the medical wizards at Duke University Hospital.
The quest for a cure leads them into the alternate universe of the rare-disease community, and to the cutting edge of modern medicine, as their personal crises send them fumbling through various modalities of self-help, including faith, therapy, and meditation. With brutal honesty, Sancho describes how his struggles derail his career, put his marriage on life support, get his family evicted from a Ronald McDonald House, and ruin a Make-A-Wish trip.
Sancho's riveting tale of the diagnosis and treatment of his son's illness takes us deep inside the workings of the immune system, and into the radically innovative treatment used to repair it. Ultimately Sebastian is saved with a stem cell transplant using discarded umbilical cord blood, a groundbreaking technique pioneered and practiced by the medical wizards at Duke University Hospital.
336 pages, Hardcover
Published March 2, 2021
7 people are currently reading
245 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
January 17, 2023
This. Book. Is. Great. I burned through it in 2 days - so fast it didn’t even make it onto my email signature — LOL. Miguel Sancho and his family went to hell and back fighting for the life of his son, Sebastian. Superbly written, it's raw, honest, utterly human, and at times - even funny. More than just the story of a medical miracle, it's the story of how you survive - as a parent, as a spouse, as a person - when you're are given more than you can handle. Highly recommend.
March 16, 2021
Thank you to Avery Books for the gifted book for my honest review and opinions.
This book took me on quite a journey- Miguel Sancho and Felicia Morton were told their son, Sebastian, had a rare and deadly disease at just two months old. Chronic Granulomatous disease (CGD), an immunodeficiency disease that leaves you unable to fight off common bacteria or viruses. We follow Miguel on their journey to cure Sebastian.
During my time in clinical dietetics I saw many patients with chronic diseases who were frequently in the hospital for secondary infections and such. This is a story of one of those families. While it could have been edited down quite a bit I really enjoyed this book overall.
More Than You Can Handle is an excellent read for HCP's looking for an insight into the world of the family of a patient. Especially a pediatric patient. Miguel does not shy away from how he sometimes snapped or got upset at those trying to help them. It's happened to all of us in this field and most of the time we don't understand why. But reading this book helped me to see why.
I especially appreciated the section where Miguel was fighting against a feeding tube being placed- as that is my area of work and I constantly have to fight for one for patients. Patients of all ages hate them, but I promise they're for your own benefit! You can't heal if you're malnourished.
Understanding how an illness in the family, especially a child, can affect every aspect of your life is difficult to grasp until it happens to you. I highly recommend this book to those who may be experiencing something similar, whether it's a friend or family member going through a chronic illness, this book will be helpful to you.
This book took me on quite a journey- Miguel Sancho and Felicia Morton were told their son, Sebastian, had a rare and deadly disease at just two months old. Chronic Granulomatous disease (CGD), an immunodeficiency disease that leaves you unable to fight off common bacteria or viruses. We follow Miguel on their journey to cure Sebastian.
During my time in clinical dietetics I saw many patients with chronic diseases who were frequently in the hospital for secondary infections and such. This is a story of one of those families. While it could have been edited down quite a bit I really enjoyed this book overall.
More Than You Can Handle is an excellent read for HCP's looking for an insight into the world of the family of a patient. Especially a pediatric patient. Miguel does not shy away from how he sometimes snapped or got upset at those trying to help them. It's happened to all of us in this field and most of the time we don't understand why. But reading this book helped me to see why.
I especially appreciated the section where Miguel was fighting against a feeding tube being placed- as that is my area of work and I constantly have to fight for one for patients. Patients of all ages hate them, but I promise they're for your own benefit! You can't heal if you're malnourished.
Understanding how an illness in the family, especially a child, can affect every aspect of your life is difficult to grasp until it happens to you. I highly recommend this book to those who may be experiencing something similar, whether it's a friend or family member going through a chronic illness, this book will be helpful to you.
April 17, 2021
Who are we without each other?
July 28, 2021
What a beautifully told, scientifically fascinating, heart wrenching, and hopeful story. With four friends in the last year that have been diagnosed with cancer, three of which have since passed, this book provided me with invaluable insight into what their families have had to go through. Many thanks to Miguel Sancho for bravely sharing his research, perspective, and experiences.
April 9, 2021
I will never know what it’s like like to have a child with a debilitating disease, but I am now certainly aware of how massive the struggles are, and how there can be be hope for the rare diseases. Extremely well written. Easy to understand even though the topic itself is so complicated. I think there’s a lot of perception in here also, not just for the family’s struggles, but in everyday life, esp. in these Covid times.
Some of my favorite quotes...
“I am highly skeptical that hell exists after death; I am equally positive it exists on earth-we create it whenever we let extreme negativity define our reality.”
“The innate immune system is fixed, but the acquired immune system designs customized antibodies as it encounters new attackers over time. That’s why vaccines work- the system learns and it remembers.”
“...when you are with someone you love, your time is never wasted.”
I pray that Sebastian continues on toward a beautiful long life and I thank his father for sharing such a personal inside look with all of us. We could all learn from this story.
Some of my favorite quotes...
“I am highly skeptical that hell exists after death; I am equally positive it exists on earth-we create it whenever we let extreme negativity define our reality.”
“The innate immune system is fixed, but the acquired immune system designs customized antibodies as it encounters new attackers over time. That’s why vaccines work- the system learns and it remembers.”
“...when you are with someone you love, your time is never wasted.”
I pray that Sebastian continues on toward a beautiful long life and I thank his father for sharing such a personal inside look with all of us. We could all learn from this story.
May 18, 2021
A wild ride poignantly reminding you that you are not alone. Five stars all the way.
Reviewed in the United States on May 11, 2021
Brilliant, LOL funny, sweet and full of heart. I’ve been recommending to my friends and family because this book was a roller coaster ride while learning so much about a world about which I had never thought. Mr. Sancho unveils this world with respect and brutal honesty. I have to also say I ate up the New York aspects of this true story. Through the prism of Mr. Sancho’s insight and hilarious takes, it’s a wild ride seeing Manhattan, Westchester, the network news world, parent circles, friend circles, etc. through his eyes.
Reviewed in the United States on May 11, 2021
Brilliant, LOL funny, sweet and full of heart. I’ve been recommending to my friends and family because this book was a roller coaster ride while learning so much about a world about which I had never thought. Mr. Sancho unveils this world with respect and brutal honesty. I have to also say I ate up the New York aspects of this true story. Through the prism of Mr. Sancho’s insight and hilarious takes, it’s a wild ride seeing Manhattan, Westchester, the network news world, parent circles, friend circles, etc. through his eyes.
September 24, 2024
When the parent writing about their experience with a rare disease works as a tv journalist, you get a story that is told with beautiful words. The other real beauty of this book is that so much of it takes place in Durham and at Duke, two places dear to my heart. Wow did this book make me feel like our two medical difficulties (preemie triplets, which was bet scary when it happened 24 years ago, and cystic fibrosis, which is still happening in our lives) could have been so much worse. It was gut wrenching to read the details, and I'm so glad that it had a happy ending.
---
P13--like most couples in the 21st century developed countries, we plan to have fewer children than past generations, but we fully expect them to be perfect. Between our jeans and our diligence, we would nature-and-nurture them straight to the top.
P16--this marked the first time Sebastian's veins were pierced for a blood draw. The desperate, terrified scream the needle precipitated would eventually become as familiar to Felicia and me as the opening cord from "A Hard Day's Night," But we'd never get used to it. I've poked my nose into many a parenting book. None of them tell you how to watch your child suffer.
P71--We could neither weasel out of making this decision nor delay it indefinitely. This call would be ours alone and we'd live with it forever. To make it, we'd need to find within ourselves what it takes to be a true adult: the strength to make decisions with profound and irreversible consequences under conditions of imperfect information.
P95--The needle was moving out of the red zone, where the relationship is fully militarized and every questionable remark ordeed is interpreted in the most negative light, and into the green zone, where we once again saw each other as a team and began to grant each other the benefit of the doubt.
P99--All of the elements of the surround-the-football approach - the workouts, the sobriety, the therapy, the meditation, The meds - became part of what I loosely called my Program... To this day I found that unless I'm doing some combination of practices to maintain this mental immune system, the state of my marriage will deteriorate.
P293--If Dr Malik is throwing it around [the word miraculous], perhaps we should all get on board with Freeman Dyson and can see that God exists, and that science and technology are his greatest gifts. For those looking to reconcile the spiritual and scientific, that may be the best way to thread the needle.
P295--he came around and took a second [bike] lap, leaving me behind. I inhaled the future and thought of the countless people who'd labored, given, and suffered to make this happen. Thanks to them, our child has a lifetime of paths before him to explore and conquer, some with us, many more without. Whether his ambitions turn out Olympian or prosaic, he is free to pursue them without fear. A parent can ask for nothing more.
---
P13--like most couples in the 21st century developed countries, we plan to have fewer children than past generations, but we fully expect them to be perfect. Between our jeans and our diligence, we would nature-and-nurture them straight to the top.
P16--this marked the first time Sebastian's veins were pierced for a blood draw. The desperate, terrified scream the needle precipitated would eventually become as familiar to Felicia and me as the opening cord from "A Hard Day's Night," But we'd never get used to it. I've poked my nose into many a parenting book. None of them tell you how to watch your child suffer.
P71--We could neither weasel out of making this decision nor delay it indefinitely. This call would be ours alone and we'd live with it forever. To make it, we'd need to find within ourselves what it takes to be a true adult: the strength to make decisions with profound and irreversible consequences under conditions of imperfect information.
P95--The needle was moving out of the red zone, where the relationship is fully militarized and every questionable remark ordeed is interpreted in the most negative light, and into the green zone, where we once again saw each other as a team and began to grant each other the benefit of the doubt.
P99--All of the elements of the surround-the-football approach - the workouts, the sobriety, the therapy, the meditation, The meds - became part of what I loosely called my Program... To this day I found that unless I'm doing some combination of practices to maintain this mental immune system, the state of my marriage will deteriorate.
P293--If Dr Malik is throwing it around [the word miraculous], perhaps we should all get on board with Freeman Dyson and can see that God exists, and that science and technology are his greatest gifts. For those looking to reconcile the spiritual and scientific, that may be the best way to thread the needle.
P295--he came around and took a second [bike] lap, leaving me behind. I inhaled the future and thought of the countless people who'd labored, given, and suffered to make this happen. Thanks to them, our child has a lifetime of paths before him to explore and conquer, some with us, many more without. Whether his ambitions turn out Olympian or prosaic, he is free to pursue them without fear. A parent can ask for nothing more.
April 12, 2022
I made the mistake of starting to read this book a couple of hours before bed. Well, of course, it kept me awake an extra couple hours til I reached a part I felt I could (temporarily) stop.
An excellent read and I highly recommend it. I’ve been registered as a bone marrow/stem cell donor since 2015. Learning the step by step of the stem cell transplant process (in this case, cord blood rather than marrow) from someone who experienced it was fascinating—I’m thankful Sancho shared his family’s story with us.
An excellent read and I highly recommend it. I’ve been registered as a bone marrow/stem cell donor since 2015. Learning the step by step of the stem cell transplant process (in this case, cord blood rather than marrow) from someone who experienced it was fascinating—I’m thankful Sancho shared his family’s story with us.
September 23, 2021
A weirdly enjoyable book. Weird because of its subject matter, but enjoyable nonetheless. Credits to the author's candid honesty. And while it was heavy at times, it was very endurable knowing it had a happy ending. I have a new admiration to sciences and medicine researches after reading this book.
A good read all in all!
A good read all in all!
September 2, 2025
More Than You Can Handle" is a powerful story of a family facing a rare disease and the cutting-edge medicine that changed everything. I’ve summarized the book in detail on my website, along with insights on chronic and rare diseases. A must-read for anyone interested in real medical stories
Click:Doctorly
Click:Doctorly
August 8, 2021
This is a fascinating book, written by a parent of an extremely ill child. The parents had to decide whether or not to do a bone marrow transplant on their son, to cure his Chronic Granulomatous Disease.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews