Disability Memoir

See? is an inspirational autobiography that describes how God's grace and the firm, loving support from family, friends, neighbors, an exceptional teacher, and caring supervisors guided the author through life's challenges. It also debunks common myths of blindness and discusses adaptive equipment used by the author on her journey.

O sonho de Juli era ser mãe e ela o realizou–e segue realizando diariamente–porém, ela não esperava os desafios que a maternidade atípica lhe reservava. O diagnóstico de Rafael veio no ano de 2015 e, de lá para cá, o hobby de Juli em escrever e influenciar pessoas teve uma mudança drástica: compartilhar tudo aquilo que estava reaprendendo com seu filho e sua família, fazendo-a acrescentar em seu currículo mais uma função: palestrante.

For two decades a father kept a secret journal documenting the life of his only son, Christopher, who was born profoundly deaf. He had a simple dream of someday presenting that journal to Christopher as a special gift from father to son. But as each new challenge was surmounted, it became clear Christopher Caulfield’s story had to be shared.

If your friends jumped off a cliff, would you jump too? Bryan chose to dive. Moments later, as he lay on the beach, unable to move his arms or legs, two questions ran through his mind: Would he walk again? And would he ever have kids? Based on the incredible true story of life, love, and never giving up.

Darkness—that’s what Bozena Gasior remembers feeling when she first heard her two-year-old son’s autism diagnosis. What followed was a cacophony of despair and cries, not knowing what to do, say, or feel. It was the day she thought that part of her son’s life had died. But one eventful day some four years later, his fingers touched the piano keys for the first time, and she felt something—a glimmer of light shining down, illuminating her home and family.

In this inspiring memoir, Emily Falcon chronicles her lifelong journey with a congenital cardiac condition. In 1982, at seven weeks old, she had a heart attack that destroyed 40 percent of the left side of her heart. This was her entry into a world of multiple cardiac procedures, surgeries, hospitalizations, and a later diagnosis of glaucoma. Balancing these serious conditions defined her life.

The Magic Circle tells the story of what happens when Charmaine Chan's sister Elaine is diagnosed with a rare and aggressive cancer. As the illness progresses, family members living on different continents gather together during Elaine's last days. Striving to distract Elaine from the worst effects of the cancer, Charmaine takes to the pen: conjuring up the vanished world of their childhood in Singapore, and discovering a way to keep her promise to Elaine's six-year-old daughter.

Kamata's adventures with her teen—who happens to be deaf, with cerebral palsy, and in a wheelchair—through subterranean Tennessee, to the islands of Japan, and to the top of the Eiffel Tower ultimately lead to a daughter's increasing independence, a mother letting go of expectations, and advocacy for travel which prohibits discrimination.

Ellen Keane spent most of her teens uncomfortable with her limb difference and battling to hide her insecurities. It was only when she embraced her difference that she found her superpower. She started to believe in her unique abilities and gradually find the success that she had never dreamed possible. Perfectly Imperfect is for anyone struggling to accept who they are. With anecdotes from her own life, practical advice and good-natured humour, Keane challenges you to let go of waiting until everything is perfect and instead embrace your imperfections and accept who you are, flaws and all.

In the mid-1970s, brothers Buddy and Jimmy Miley were close, both on the verge of impressive athletic careers. A promising high school quarterback, Buddy's potential was cut short by an injury that left him quadriplegic. Immobile and imprisoned in his body for decades, Buddy would watch life pass by from his wheelchair, living at home under his mother's and brother's care and wondering what his life could have been.

Take hold of your own personal journey. Make peace with it. Peace is truth. If you suffer from bipolar disorder (also called manic-depression), or if you love someone who does, then you already know how frustrating and baffling this mental illness can be. This book assures you that there is great hope—through all of life's circumstances. Even though bipolar disorder may put us through extreme challenges each and every day, if we are rigorous about taking the right medications and keeping an appropriate lifestyle, we can effectively stabilize the disease and choose a good life.

In 1992, when Henry Grunwald missed a glass into which he was pouring water, he assumed that he needed new eyeglasses, not that the incident was a harbinger of darker times. But, in fact, Grunwald was entering the early stages of macular degeneration - a gradual loss of sight that affects almost 15 million Americans yet remains poorly understood and is, so far, incurable. Now, in Twilight, Grunwald chronicles his experience of disability. This is a story not merely about seeing but about living; not merely about losing sight but about gaining insight. It is a remarkable meditation.

The moving true story of a little girl with Asperger syndrome, controlled and abused by the one person she called her friend. Taylor had always struggled to make friends - she felt 'different'. Taylor never knew her father, and her mother wasn't around much. She just didn't understand people and was alone and scared most of the time. That was until, aged just 11, an older married man called Tom befriended her. She loved having someone who would talk to her, listen to her - a protector. But when he moved away a few months later, she was easy prey.

Jason Dunkerley’s Visions of Hope: Running Towards My Own Truth is the inspiring autobiography of a distinguished Canadian middle-distance runner, who has been blind from birth due to a congenital eye condition. He achieved international acclaim as a five-time Paralympic medalist and world champion.

While finishing off her degree in Gerontology at Umass Boston, Yvonne Decelis started writing about her life in the hope of showing others with similar conditions that they are not alone in the trials they face. Yvonne goes over her upbringing and life prior to, during, and after diagnosis covering things like medications, “healthful living”, work, SSDI disability benefits, friendships, and relationships, etc. This was also written for people seeking information on how to interact with others who have "invisible illnesses" like MS, Fibro, Post-traumatic Stress injury, etc.

Half a world away from home in 1976, 18-year old Anne B. Thomas awakens on the side of a two-lane road paralyzed from the chest down. Fast forward through a rigorous year of physical therapy to when her doctor gives her an ominous warning: “You will live a long time and be a burden on your family for the rest of your life unless you check yourself into a nursing home”.

Als Matt Haig mit 24 Jahren urplötzlich krank wird, begreift er nicht, welch dunkle Macht da von ihm Besitz ergreift. Die Krankheit überfällt ihn auf so dramatische Art und Weise, dass sie ihn buchstäblich an den Abgrund bringt. Doch Haig entscheidet sich für das Leben - und für seine große Liebe Andrea. Er findet heraus, dass er nicht allein ist mit der Diagnose Depression, sondern dass Millionen Menschen auf der Welt sein Schicksal teilen.

See how, throughout her life, she became a believer, and even with Kerry and Kaylynn's love and support, she had to find the strength elsewhere to get up each and every day to be the best mom she could be for Austin. Listen to how still, to this day, she struggles with negative emotions and guilt and needs to be reminded often that God is in control, and he will never forsake her, even when she feels she is alone.

In 2004, Mindy begins hearing a voice in her head, someone she calls "Joe," and sees signs everywhere that hold mysterious clues only for her. What she doesn't know at the time is that she is experiencing her first schizophrenic episode. For the next decade, she oscillates between two worlds -- a normal life and a secret voice-filled one -- until she begins the journey of merging her two worlds back into one. Becoming Whole documents her onset of schizophrenia and the subsequent years spent learning about it and how to live with it. It is her journey to find solace.

The yard was a huge piece of property with a forest out back (or at least a few dozen trees). We had a barn and a horse (really a very small pony, but I didn’t know that then) named Romeo, because he liked to roam—often ending up out of the fenced pasture and out on the street. We had chickens, as well, in a coop by the barn up at the edge of the forest.