patients

SPC Kayla Williams and SGT Brian McGough met in 2003. They were instantly attracted to each other and no one could have predicted that Brian, on his way back to base after a leave, would be affected by a roadside bomb that would send shrapnel through his brain. With courage and commitment, Williams and McGough have worked through the myriad devastating effects of traumatic brain injust and PTSD.

Thirty-four-year-old Rebecca Alexander is a psychotherapist, a spin instructor, a volunteer, and an athlete. She is also almost completely blind, with significantly deteriorated hearing. When Rebecca was twelve, her parents were told that she would be completely blind before she turned thirty. At eighteen, she fell through a window, shattering her body. In college, she found out that due to a rare genetic disorder-Usher Syndrome Type III-she was losing her hearing as well. Since then, she has earned two Master's degrees from Columbia University, ridden a six-hundred-mile bike race, hiked the Inca Trail, and established a thriving career-all while maintaining a vibrant social life. Rebecca makes the journey from a teenager who tried to hide her disabilities, to a woman who is able to face the world exactly as she is. Even though Rebecca inhabits a gradually darkening world, she refuses to let that stop her from living life with joy and enthusiasm.

Post-traumatic stress disorder haunts us in the early years of the twenty-first century. Over a decade into the United States' "global war on terror," PTSD afflicts as many as 30 percent of the conflict's veterans. But the disorder's reach extends far beyond the armed forces. In total, some twenty-seven million Americans are believed to be PTSD survivors. Yet to many of us, the disorder remains shrouded in mystery, secrecy, and shame. David J. Morris -- a war correspondent, former Marine, and PTSD sufferer himself -- has written the essential account of this illness.

A mother's account of the courage and perseverance of her son, who, at times, was hindered by the very people who were supposed to be helping him with his OCD disorder.

On May 13, 2008 Isabella Maria was born, the eighth child of Rick and Karen Santorum. While the family rejoiced, they were also saddened. Isabella was born with a rare genetic condition called Trisomy 18, or Edward's Syndrome. She had an extra eighteenth chromosome in every cell in her body, making a genetic code doctors call "incompatible with life". Only ten percent of children born with this condition are born alive, and ninety percent do not make it to their first birthday. The Santorums refused to accept this fact, and made plans for Isabella's life with her family. During the next seven years, the Santorum family adjusted to life with a special-needs child and watched her transform their lives. Bella was a joy to live with and she became an inspiration to everyone around her.

Twenty-two-year old Su Meck was married and the mother of two children in 1988 when a ceiling fan in the kitchen of her home fell from its mounting and struck her in the head. She survived the life-threatening swelling in her brain that resulted from the accident, but when she regained consciousness in the hospital the next day, she didn't know her own name. She didn't recognize a single family member or friend, she couldn't read or write or brush her teeth or use a fork--and she didn't have even a scrap of memory from her life up to that point. The fiercely independent and outspoken young woman she had been vanished completely. Most patients who suffer amnesia as a result of a head injury eventually regain their memories, but Su never did. After three weeks in the hospital she was sent back out into a world about which she knew nothing: What did it mean to be someone's wife? To be a mother? How did everyone around her seem to know what they were supposed to do or say at any given moment? Adrift in the chaos of mental data that most of us think of as everyday life, Su became an adept mimic, fashioning a self and a life out of careful observation and ironclad routine. She had no dreams for herself, no plans outside the ever-burgeoning daily to-do list of a stay-at-home mom. The Meck family left Texas to start over in Maryland, and told almost no one in their new life about Su's accident. Nearly twenty years would pass before Su understood the full extent of the losses she and her family suffered as a result of her injury. As a series of personally devastating events shattered the "normal" life she had worked so hard to build, Su realized that she would have to grow up all over again, and finally take control of the strange second life she had awoken into.

A shy, small-town girl from Kiln, Mississippi, Deanna had always been perfectly content to let her famous husband steal the spotlight. Though married to the NFL's only three-time MVP, she preferred to live a life of quiet anonymity. But on December 22, 2003, the spotlight shifted. When television cameras zeroed in on a somber Deanna watching her grief-stricken husband lead the Green Bay Packers to a Monday night victory over the Oakland Raiders immediately following the death of his father, Deanna's anonymity was lost, and her life changed forever. Tragedy struck again the following October when Deanna's younger brother, Casey, was killed in an ATV accident. Four days later--still reeling from the loss of her brother--Deanna was diagnosed with breast cancer. Through it all, however, Deanna has emerged a survivor. Deanna's story is living testament that with faith, hope and love, ordinary people can overcome even the most extraordinary circumstances.

Liam Campbell faces a difficult choice when he discovers that his beloved wife, Mikaela, trapped in a coma after a riding accident, was once married to international movie star Julian True, and seems to be responding only to her first love's name.

Tells the story of a father's journey toward acceptance of his daughter with Down syndrome, chronicling her coming of age while confronting his own limitations as a father.