Love Fat


Tabitha Farrar - 2015
     Tabitha Farrar became ill with anorexia at seventeen. This book describes her ten-year struggle with the disease and dispels many myths about eatings disorders. During her recovery, she felt bombarded with all sorts of conflicting advice on food and diet. An avid researcher, she became obsessed with nutritional science and "healthy" eating. Despite all the literature that informed her she was eating the right things, her body rebelled against her low-fat diet and ultra-healthy eating plans. Stuck in a battle between her head and her gut, who would have ever thought that she would learn to Love Fat.

A Mother's Reckoning: Living in the Aftermath of Tragedy


Sue Klebold - 2016
    Over the course of minutes, they would kill twelve students and a teacher and wound twenty-four others before taking their own lives.   For the last sixteen years, Sue Klebold, Dylan’s mother, has lived with the indescribable grief and shame of that day. How could her child, the promising young man she had loved and raised, be responsible for such horror? And how, as his mother, had she not known something was wrong? Were there subtle signs she had missed? What, if anything, could she have done differently?   These are questions that Klebold has grappled with every day since the Columbine tragedy. In A Mother’s Reckoning, she chronicles with unflinching honesty her journey as a mother trying to come to terms with the incomprehensible. In the hope that the insights and understanding she has gained may help other families recognize when a child is in distress, she tells her story in full, drawing upon her personal journals, the videos and writings that Dylan left behind, and on countless interviews with mental health experts.   Filled with hard-won wisdom and compassion, A Mother’s Reckoning is a powerful and haunting book that sheds light on one of the most pressing issues of our time. And with fresh wounds from the recent Newtown and Charleston shootings, never has the need for understanding been more urgent.  All author profits from the book will be donated to research and to charitable organizations focusing on mental health issues.

The Empty Room: Surviving the Loss of a Brother or Sister at Any Age


Elizabeth DeVita-Raeburn - 2004
    Her parents explain that he went to the hospital for a while. "A while" turns out to be eight years in a plastic bubble, where he dies of a rare autoimmune disease at age seventeen. "The Empty Room" is DeVita-Raeburn's unflinching, often haunting recollection of life with Ted, woven into a larger exploration of the enormous -- and often unacknowledged -- impact of a sister's or brother's death on remaining siblings.With an inspired blend of life experience, journalistic acumen, and research training, DeVita-Raeburn draws on interviews of more than two hundred survivors to render a powerful portrait of the range of conditions and emotions, from withdrawal to guilt to rage, that attend such loss. Finding little in professional literature, she realizes that those who suffer are the experts. And in the end, it is DeVita-Raeburn and her experts who present a larger, more complex understanding of the sibling bond, the lifelong impact of the severing of that bond, and the tools needed to heal and move forward."The Empty Room" is a fascinating literary hybrid in which Elizabeth DeVita-Raeburn seamlessly fuses deeply affecting remembrance with a pragmatic, lucidly written exploration of the healing journey.

The Last Dance: Encountering Death and Dying


Lynne Ann DeSpelder - 2004
    Integrating the experiential and the scholarly, as well as the emotional and intellectual dimensions of death and dying, this seventh edition provides coverage of death studies.

The First 20 Minutes: Surprising Science Reveals How We Can: Exercise Better, Train Smarter, Live Longer


Gretchen Reynolds - 2012
    With the latest findings about the mental and physical benefits of exercise, personal stories from scientists and laypeople alike, as well as researched-based prescriptions for readers, Gretchen Reynolds shows what kind of exercise—and how much—is necessary to stay healthy, get fit, and attain a smaller jeans size. Inspired by Reynolds's wildly popular “Phys Ed” column for The New York Times, this book explains how exercise affects the body in distinct ways and provides the tools readers need to achieve their fitness goals, whether that's a faster 5K or staying trim.

Once More We Saw Stars: A Memoir


Jayson Greene - 2019
    She is immediately rushed to the hospital. Once More We Saw Stars begins with this event, leading the reader into the unimaginable.But although it begins with the anguish Jayson and his wife Stacy confront in the wake of their daughter’s trauma and the hours leading up to her death, it quickly becomes a narrative that is as much about hope and healing as it is about grief and loss. Jayson recognizes, even in the very midst of his ordeal, that there will be a life for him beyond it—that if only he can continue moving forward, from one moment to the next, he will survive what seems un-survivable.With raw honesty, deep emotion, and exquisite tenderness, he captures both the fragility of life and absoluteness of death, and most important of all, the unconquerable power of love. This is an unforgettable memoir of courage and transformation—and a book that will change the way you look at the world.

There Is No Good Card for This: What To Say and Do When Life Is Scary, Awful, and Unfair to People You Love


Kelsey Crowe - 2017
    But many people don’t know what words to use—or are afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing. This thoughtful, instructive guide, from empathy expert Dr. Kelsey Crowe and greeting card maverick Emily McDowell, blends well-researched, actionable advice with the no-nonsense humor and the signature illustration style of McDowell's immensely popular Empathy Cards, to help you feel confident in connecting with anyone experiencing grief, loss, illness, or any other difficult situation.Written in a how-to, relatable, we’ve-all-been-that-deer-in-the-headlights kind of way, There Is No Good Card for This isn’t a spiritual treatise on how to make you a better person or a scientific argument about why compassion matters. It is a helpful illustrated guide to effective compassion that takes you, step by step by step, past the paralysis of thinking about someone in a difficult time to actually doing something (or nothing) with good judgment instead of fear.There Is No Good Card for This features workbook exercises, sample dialogs, and real-life examples from Dr. Crowe’s research, including her popular "Empathy Bootcamps" that give people tools for building relationships when it really counts. Whether it’s a coworker whose mother has died, a neighbor whose husband has been in a car accident, or a friend who is seriously ill, There Is No Good Card for This teaches you how to be the best friend you can be to someone in need.

Cancer-Free: Your Guide to Gentle, Non-toxic Healing


Bill Henderson - 2013
    This latest book gives you a precise regimen for self-treatment along with extensive information on other resources now available to you.

The Woman's Book of Confidence: Meditations for Strength & Inspiration


Sue Patton Thoele - 1992
    In The Woman's Book of Courage, she helped women find the courage to overcome anxiety and fear. Now, in her new book, she helps women learn to trust their intuitive wisdom and nurture and support themselves every day of their lives.

Spoon-Fed: Why Almost Everything We’ve Been Told About Food is Wrong


Tim Spector - 2020
    Is salt really bad for you? Is fish good for you? What about coffee, red meat, or saturated fats? Can pregnant women rely on their doctor’s advice about what to eat? Does gluten-free food carry any health benefits at all? Do doctors know anything about nutrition?In twenty short, myth-busting chapters, Tim Spector reveals why almost everything we’ve been told about food is wrong. He reveals the scandalous lack of good scientific evidence for many medical and government food recommendations, and how the food industry holds sway over these policies. These are urgent issues that matter not just for our health as individuals but for the future of the planet.Spoon-Fed forces us to question every diet plan, government recommendation, miracle cure or food label we encounter, and encourages us to rethink our whole relationship with food.

Gratitude


Oliver Sacks - 2015
    I have loved and been loved. I have been given much and I have given something in return. Above all, I have been a sentient being, a thinking animal, on this beautiful planet, and that in itself has been an enormous privilege and adventure.” —Oliver SacksNo writer has succeeded in capturing the medical and human drama of illness as honestly and as eloquently as Oliver Sacks. During the last few months of his life, he wrote a set of essays in which he movingly explored his feelings about completing a life and coming to terms with his own death. “It is the fate of every human being,” Sacks writes, “to be a unique individual, to find his own path, to live his own life, to die his own death.”Together, these four essays form an ode to the uniqueness of each human being and to gratitude for the gift of life.

Going Home: Finding Peace When Pets Die


Jon Katz - 2011
    Now, in this moving and thoughtful book, Katz addresses the difficult but necessary topic of saying goodbye to a devoted companion, and offers comfort, wisdom, and a way forward from sorrow to acceptance.When Jon Katz first brought Orson home, he couldn’t predict how this boisterous border collie would change his life, most notably by inspiring him to buy Bedlam Farm. Yet for all of Katz’s years as a dog owner, Orson’s death shook him in a deeply profound way. “I was embarrassed by my grief,” he remembers. “What right did I have to fall to pieces over a border collie?”Drawing on personal experiences, stories from fellow pet owners, and philosophical reflections, Katz provides guidance and support for those in mourning. By allowing ourselves to grieve honestly and openly, he posits, we can in time celebrate the dogs, cats, and other creatures that have so enriched us. With great compassion, Katz compels us to consider if we gave our pets good lives, if we were their advocates in times of need, and if we used our best judgments in the end. In dealing with these issues, we can alleviate guilt, let go, and help others who are undergoing similar passages. Full of empathy, insight, and sage advice, Going Home is an invaluable guide and touchstone for anyone who has lost a pet. Jon Katz honors the animals that have graced our lives and reveals their truly timeless gifts: unwavering companionship and undying love.

Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife


Eben Alexander - 2012
    Dr. Eben Alexander was one of those scientists. A highly trained neurosurgeon, Alexander knew that NDEs feel real, but are simply fantasies produced by brains under extreme stress.Then, Dr. Alexander’s own brain was attacked by a rare illness. The part of the brain that controls thought and emotion—and in essence makes us human—shut down completely. For seven days he lay in a coma. Then, as his doctors considered stopping treatment, Alexander’s eyes popped open. He had come back.Alexander’s recovery is a medical miracle. But the real miracle of his story lies elsewhere. While his body lay in coma, Alexander journeyed beyond this world and encountered an angelic being who guided him into the deepest realms of super-physical existence. There he met, and spoke with, the Divine source of the universe itself.Alexander’s story is not a fantasy. Before he underwent his journey, he could not reconcile his knowledge of neuroscience with any belief in heaven, God, or the soul. Today Alexander is a doctor who believes that true health can be achieved only when we realize that God and the soul are real and that death is not the end of personal existence but only a transition.This story would be remarkable no matter who it happened to. That it happened to Dr. Alexander makes it revolutionary. No scientist or person of faith will be able to ignore it. Reading it will change your life.

Summary: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck


Mark Manson - 2018
    If you don't have time to read the whole book?then this Summary is for you!

Hurt People Hurt People


Sandra D. Wilson - 1993
    And they do so, the author tells us, because of the seemingly inescapable pain in their own lives.In Hurt People Hurt People, Dr. Sandra Wilson brings her years as a professional counselor to bear on a difficult topic that affects many of us.Let her warmth and insight lead you toward a heart of compassion and a ministry of healing for those who hurt others.