Showing titles in People with Disabilities

When Ellie Goldstein was first diagnosed with Down Syndrome, her mother was soon told that her new-born would amount to nothing. For 21 years and counting, Ellie Goldstein has been defying the odds and overcoming every hardship thrown at her. Told she wouldn't walk, Ellie has danced on mainstages. Told she wouldn't learn, she has gained a college education. And told not to dream, Ellie has gone on to become the first model with Down Syndrome to be photographed for Gucci and continues to change the face of fashion from the inside out in countless international campaigns.

After contracting polio as a child, Sandra Gail Lambert progressed from braces and crutches to a manual wheelchair to a power wheelchair - but loneliness has remained a constant, from the wild claustrophobia of a child in body casts to just yesterday, trapped at home, gasping from pain. A Certain Loneliness is a meditative and engaging memoir-in-essays that explores the intersection of disability, queerness, and female desire with frankness and humor.

Marilyn Elaine Lundberg’s true crime memoir, Jagger’s Eyes, is a brutally honest account of how one unfortunate little girl turned to animals for love, safety, and comfort. The trauma of incest and neglect occurred behind closed doors in her Christian home and crippled her psychologically as a child. Her attacks produced PTSD, suicidal depression, chronic anxiety, panic attacks, agoraphobia, anorexia, plus more, and she was housebound for many years as an adult.

Isaiah was eighteen years old when he was diagnosed as being on the Autism Spectrum along with having OCD. It was a relief for the young man to finally have a name for what he had been feeling and experiencing for so long. For his parents, it was a different story. They had never observed any signs or symptoms that would have led them to believe their son might be autistic. At least, there were none they knew to look for. Autism in Hindsight is a conversation between mother and son about getting diagnosed, working through it the process, and learning to connect the dots. Along the way they ...

By the time native Sicilian Mariagrazia Buttitta turned 26, she’d planned out the perfect life. After finishing her residency in Buongiorno Medical School, she’d be primed for a job at the prestigious Roma Hospital, the first step toward becoming an Italian Dr. Oz. Instead, she wakes up to discover a medical diagnosis that leaves her almost completely blind. Her family, frustrated and desperate, seeks medical aid in the US, but it comes with a steep price.

What would you have left if you awoke and were told you would be paralyzed from the eyes down for the rest of your life? After an almost fatal car crash and a botched surgery to repair nerve damage, that was Clay Byars' reality at 18 years old. Determination became the only constant in his life from that point on, and miraculously he quickly began to defy the odds. Clay discovered a life far different from that of his identical twin brother, Will.

Disability is often described as a tragedy, a crisis, or an aberration, though 1 in 5 people worldwide have a disability. Why is this common human experience rendered exceptional? In All Our Families, disability studies scholar Jennifer Natalya Fink argues that this originates in our families. When we cut a disabled member out of the family story, disability remains a trauma as opposed to a shared and ordinary experience. This makes disability and its diagnosis traumatic and exceptional.

Through his unique blend of good Scottish humor, real-life experiences, and funny stories of mishaps and misadventures, Iain M. MacLeod draws the listener into his vibrant life from childhood to the present - a life not defined by cerebral palsy, which he has had since the age of three.

Do you like sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll? Do you know what jails, institutions, and death are all about? I don't want to be controlled, but can I control myself? Who says I have to live by society's rules?

Love for a Deaf Rebel introduces listeners to a vivacious Canadian woman who was born into a silent world and with the foundation for schizophrenia. With pathos and nostalgia, the author recounts his roller-coaster ride with Pearl, a vivacious deaf maverick, who, unknown to him, had paranoid schizophrenia. We follow their encounters through actual notes written before Derrick learns sign language; we go on their motorcycle ride to Mexico and Guatemala; we watch as the happy couple moves to Bowen Island, a British Columbia community with just three paved roads.

Our Life Our Way: A Memoir of Active Faith, Profound Love and Courageous Disability Rights explores an extraordinary love story grown out of engagement with both disability rights advocacy and christian faith communities. This memoir contains thoughtful, often entertaining, and sometimes heart-wrenching anecdotes of a couple’s journey to create their profound relationship and Christian marriage, in a world not yet ready for them.

Dan McSkimming was a Deputy for 18 years and on the SWAT team (SET - Special Enforcement Team) for 13 years— all with the Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office. A normal adjustment of his rifle led to a visit to a chiropractor which would change his life forever. A stroke sent him to Cottage Hospital—the same Hospital of his birth. At age 43, Dan had to learn to live all over again—how to talk, eat, communicate, love… This is the true story of a shocking tragedy and trauma, the fear, despair, and triumph of a first responder, in his own words.

I am not a poet. I'm just a so-called writer. I am half-blind. Visually impaired, if that makes more sense. These are my words. Words as smooth and creamy as milk chocolate wine. Words as clunky and misshapen as life itself. This is my story. This is VISION BENT. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~. John L. Harmon currently resides left of center in a quiet town in the state of Nebraska. When he's not writing or blogging, John is delivering bad news around town, soaking up the local library atmosphere, or relaxing with a cat on his lap. VISION BENT is his first book of poetry and his first book since becoming ...

After years of unexplained health problems, Polly Atkin's perception of her body was rendered fluid and disjointed. When she was finally diagnosed with two chronic conditions in her thirties, she began to piece together what had been happening to her - all the misdiagnoses, the fractures, the dislocations, the bone-crushing exhaustion, the not being believed. Some of Us Just Fall combines memoir, pathography and nature writing to trace a fascinating journey through illness, a journey which led Polly to her current home in the Lake District.

It was a crisp winter day when six-year-old Kacey McCallister lost both of his legs, forever altering the course of his life. This unthinkable trial could have broken him, but from that day forward, he chose to rise above his circumstances and learn to live without limits. For those struggling to find hope in the depths of physical, spiritual, or emotional trials, this incredible story of one man’s unbreakable courage will inspire and motivate listeners to not only survive, but thrive amidst life’s challenges.

Mothering under normal circumstances takes all you have to give. But what happens when your child is disabled, and sacrificing all you've got and more is the only hope for a decent future? Full of rage and resilience, duty and love, Ashley Bristowe delivers a mother's voice like no other we've heard.

When Emmett de Monterey is eighteen months old, a doctor diagnoses him with cerebral palsy. Words too big for his 25-year-old artist parents and their happy, smiling baby. Growing up in South East London in the 1980s, Emmett is spat at on the street and prayed over at church. At his school for disabled children, he's told he will be expelled if the rumours are true, if he's gay; at his mainstream school, teachers refuse to schedule his classes on the ground floor, and he loses a stone from the effort of getting up the stairs.

Adventurous international teacher, Amy Bovaird, is diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa, a hereditary eye disease that will blind her. In spite of that, she manages to continue teaching overseas. Then her father's final illness brings her back home for good. There, friends and acquaintances begin to notice that she doesn't always recognize them and sometimes stumbles as if drunk! Insensitive students ridicule her in the classroom.

When a devastating event takes away the way of life you are accustomed to, you have two choices: Stop living, or start planning! In this memoir, Shawn Paulsen demonstrates how he has overcome his stumbling blocks and turned them into stepping stones on his journey through the misfortunes of life. Shawn’s story inspires and motivates others to overcome. He describes how he has learned to face adversity with his chin up by taking a comedic view of his malady and life.

Not that anyone wishes to be paralyzed in a motorcycle accident, but tragedy set the stage for triumph and the making of a real life fairy tale. When the harsh reality of paralysis turned the dream of having a family together into a nightmare for Erik and Jennifer, they had to face their deepest fears and live courageously, because sometimes fairy tales are just stories of love's perseverance.