From miraculous pregnancies to dirty protests, and from violent attacks on prisoners to heartbreaking acts of self-harm, she has witnessed it all. In this memoir, Amanda reveals the stories, the patients and the cases that have shaped a career helping those most of us would rather forget.

    She had killed someone with a thought, spread untold disease, and ogled the bodies of other children. Only by performing an exhausting series of secret routines could she make up for what she’d done. But no matter how intricate or repetitive, no act of penance was ever enough.Beautifully written and astonishingly intimate, Because We Are Bad recounts a childhood consumed by obsessive compulsive disorder. As a child, Bailey created a second personality inside herself—"I" became "we"—to help manifest compulsions that drove every minute of every day of her young life. Now she writes about the forces beneath her skin, and how they ordered, organized, and urged her forward. Lily charts her journey, from checking on her younger sister dozens of times a night, to "normalizing" herself at school among new friends as she grew older, and finally to her young adult years, learning—indeed, breaking through—to make a way for herself in a big, wide world that refuses to stay in check.Charming and raw, harrowing and redemptive, Because We Are Bad is an illuminating and uplifting look into the mind and soul of an extraordinary young woman, and a startling portrait of OCD that allows us to see and understand this condition as never before.

    Now Alan Alda has written a memoir as elegant, funny, and affecting as his greatest performances."My mother didn't try to stab my father until I was six," begins Alda's irresistible story. The son of a popular actor and a loving but mentally ill mother, he spent his early childhood backstage in the erotic and comic world of burlesque and went on, after early struggles, to achieve extraordinary success in his profession.Yet Never Have Your Dog Stuffed is not a memoir of show-business ups and downs. It is a moving and funny story of a boy growing into a man who then realizes he has only just begun to grow.It is the story of turning points in Alda's life, events that would make him what he is-if only he could survive them.From the moment as a boy when his dead dog is returned from the taxidermist's shop with a hideous expression on his face, and he learns that death can't be undone, to the decades-long effort to find compassion for the mother he lived with but never knew, to his acceptance of his father, both personally and professionally, Alda learns the hard way that change, uncertainty, and transformation are what life is made of, and true happiness is found in embracing them.Never Have Your Dog Stuffed, filled with curiosity about nature, good humor, and honesty, is the crowning achievement of an actor, author, and director, but surprisingly, it is the story of a life more filled with turbulence and laughter than any Alda has ever played on the stage or screen.

    Reasons to Stay Alive is Matt’s inspiring account of how, minute by minute and day by day, he overcame the disease with the help of reading, writing, and the love of his parents and his girlfriend (and now-wife), Andrea. And eventually, he learned to appreciate life all the more for it. Everyone’s lives are touched by mental illness: if we do not suffer from it ourselves, then we have a friend or loved one who does. Matt’s frankness about his experiences is both inspiring to those who feel daunted by depression and illuminating to those who are mystified by it. Above all, his humor and encouragement never let us lose sight of hope. Speaking as his present self to his former self in the depths of depression, Matt is adamant that the oldest cliché is the truest—there is light at the end of the tunnel. He teaches us to celebrate the small joys and moments of peace that life brings, and reminds us that there are always reasons to stay alive.

    Taber shares memories of her childhood in the Southwest and Mexico as well as her married life and early pursuit of a writing career.

    . . A riveting and anxiety-inducing read. Mike Pond tells his story of recovery from alcoholism with a brutally honest, warts-and-all approach that makes you want cheer for him and simultaneously slap him upside the head.” – Vancouver SunPsychotherapist Michael Pond is no stranger to the devastating consequences of alcoholism. He has helped hundreds of people conquer their addictions, but this knowledge did not prevent his own near-demise. In this riveting memoir, he recounts how he lost his Penticton-based practice, his home, and his family—all because of his drinking. After scores of visits to the ER, a tour of hellish recovery homes, a stint in intensive care for end-stage alcoholism, and jail, Pond devised his own personal plan for recovery. He met Maureen Palmer and together they investigated scientific alternatives to the rigid abstinence doctrine pushed by Alcoholics Anonymous.

    Her vivid prose brings the reader into bustling hospitals, tense exam rooms, and Ofri's own life, giving an up-close look at the fast-paced, life-and-death drama of becoming a doctor. She tells of a young man uncertain of his future who comes into the clinic with a stomach complaint but for whom Dr. Ofri sees that the most useful "treatment" she can offer him is SAT tutoring. She writes of a desperate struggle to communicate with a critically ill patient who only speaks Mandarin, of a doctor whose experience in the NICU leaves her paralyzed with PTSD, and of her own struggles with the fear of making fatal errors, the dangers of overconfidence, and the impossible attempts to balance the empathy necessary for good care with the distance necessary for self-preservation. Through these stories of her patients, colleagues, and her own experiences, Intensive Care offers poignant insight into the medical world, and into the hearts and minds of doctors and their patients. These stories are drawn from the author’s previous books and one is from her forthcoming book, What Doctors Feel: How Emotions Affect the Practice of Medicine.excerpted from Amazon.com Book Description

    Jerri Nielsen, the only physician on a staff of forty-one people, discovered a lump in her breast. Consulting via satellite e-mail with doctors in the United States, she was forced to perform a biopsy and treat herself with chemotherapy in order to ensure that she could survive until conditions permitted her rescue. She was eventually rescued by the Air National Guard. Dr. Jerri Nielsens story of her transforming experiences is a thrilling adventure and moving drama. She has written a new chapter for this edition. Since the publication of Ice Bound in hardcover in January 2000, Dr. Nielsen has inspired people throughout the country, met hundreds of fans, received numerous awards including Irish American of the Year, which was presented to her by Hillary Clinton, as well as tremendous praise from the media.

    But then Saddam Hussein invaded Iran and sealed off Iraq's borders to every man of military age -- including Shant. Suddenly forced onto the front lines, his two-week visit turned into a nightmare that lasted for ten years. 1001 Nights in Iraq presents a human story that provides unique insight into a country and culture that we only get a hint of in the headlines. After surviving the horrors of the Iran-Iraq War, Shant was then forced to fight on the front lines of Desert Storm without being given the proper equipment, including a gun, but miraculously survived to be captured by the Americans and become a POW. He underwent starvation, heavy interrogations, and solitary confinement, but what broke him in the end was his love affair with a female American soldier. Yet throughout this whole ordeal, Shant never lost his respect for people, his faith in God, or his sense of humor.

    A story she wrote on a school shooting sparked a violent backlash, including death threats. Her newspaper failed to stand by her, and for the first time in her life she spiraled into clinical depression. She found herself unable to write, but the paper's management thought she was feigning illness, and fired her. Her insurer rejected her claim of depression, and her publisher refused to publish this book.Out of the Blue is a memoir unlike any other. It is the surreal, wrenching, sometimes hilarious, and ultimately triumphant story of one woman's struggle to come to terms with depression.

    The account begins in 1937 where a 17 year-old Neumann describes growing up in the Nazi era with all the propaganda and Hitler Youth activities preparing the nation for war, especially the young. Neumann joins the 5th SS “Viking” Division and fights on the Eastern Front, starting a few days after the start of Operation Barbarossa. The narrative covers the long fight to the edge of the Caucasus Mts., the seesaw battles of ’41 and ‘42 up through the failed attempt to rescue the encircled Sixth Army at Stalingrad. Neumann sees ferocious fighting and survives the long retreat in Russia to see his final battle in Vienna.

    Raised up from poverty by a determined single mother, the gifted and beautiful twins were able to create a private haven of splendor and merriment between themselves and then earn their way to a prestigious college and to careers as artists (a photographer and a writer, respectively) and to young marriages. But, haunted by childhood experiences with father figures and further damaged by being raped as a young adult, Cara veered off the path to robust work and life and in to depression, drugs and a shocking early death.A few years after Cara was gone, Christa read that when an identical twin dies, regardless of the cause, 50 percent of the time the surviving twin dies within two years; and this shocking statistic rang true to her. "Flip a coin," she thought," those were my chances of survival." First, Christa fought to stop her sister's downward spiral; suddenly, she was struggling to keep herself alive.Beautifully written, mesmerizingly rich and true, Christa Parravani's account of being left, one half of a whole, and of her desperate, ultimately triumphant struggle for survival is informative, heart-wrenching and unforgettably beautiful.Wall Street Journal, "Favorite Books of the Year 2013"Cosmopolitan, "Best Books of the Year for Women"Library Journal, "Best Books of 2013"Salon, "Best Books of 2013"

    Eighteen years old and eager to learn, she’s invigorated by the manic energy and knife-sharp focus of the crew. By day Hannah explores the Columbia arts scene, struggling to find her place. By night she’s intoxicated by boxes of heady truffles and intrigued by the food industry’s insiders. She’s hungry for knowledge, success, and love, but she’s also ravenous because she hasn’t eaten more than yogurt and coffee in days.Hannah is hiding an eating disorder. The excruciatingly late nights, demanding chefs, bad boyfriends, and destructive obsessions have left a void inside her that she can’t fill. To reconcile her relationships with the food she worships and a body she struggles to accept, Hannah’s going to have to learn to nourish her soul.

    . . The book soars." --"The San Diego Union-Tribune" Jamie Weisman was a patient long before she was a doctor. She was born with a rare defect in her immune system that leaves her prey to a range of ailments and crises and that, because it is treatable but not curable, will keep her a patient for life. In this probing and inspiring book, she brings her sojourns on both sides of the doctor-patient divide to bear on the issues of the flesh that preoccupy us all. It is a worthy addition to the best that has been written about our physical selves, a meditation on our extraordinary powers of healing and the limitations that leave intact the miracle and tragedy of being.

    Fox stunned the world by announcing he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease -- a degenerative neurological condition. In fact, he had been secretly fighting it for seven years. The worldwide response was staggering. Fortunately, he had accepted the diagnosis, and by the time the public started grieving for him, he had stopped grieving for himself. Now, with the same passion, humor, and energy, that Fox has invested in his dozens of performances over the last 18 years, he tells the story of his life, his career, and his campaign, to find a cure for Parkinson's.Combining his trademark ironic sensibility, and keen sense of the absurd, he recounts his life -- from his childhood in a small town in western Canada, to his meteoric rise in film and television which made him a worldwide celebrity. Most importantly however, he writes of the last 10 years, during which -- with the unswerving support of his wife, family, and friends -- he has dealt with his illness. He talks about what Parkinson's has given him: the chance to appreciate a wonderful life and career, and the opportunity to help search for a cure, and spread public awareness of the disease. He is a very lucky man, indeed.