The cause of anxiety and pain in our bodies can't be reduced to any one explanation. But in Jen Soriano's book, Nervous, she follows the threads of her own struggles to the personal, familial, cultural and intergenerational threads of her own physical pain and anxiety. Scientists are now recognizing that the traumas of our ancestors live on in us and can be felt for generations. How do we heal ourselves from all the injuries we carry. Jen makes a powerful case for the restorative properties of community building and recognition of what has happened to us and our communities. She makes a profound case for telling our stories and telling collective action. How can we begin to build a world that grieves and also heals? Join us for this powerful conversation.

Once, we were all children, incapable of protecting ourselves from the adults around us. If they were cruel and abusive, it laid tracks in us that made it hard to love and be loved, to see our own beauty and to become who we were meant to be. Wen Peetes knows this experience deeply, because it it her own. Recognizing what she needed to heal and speaking honestly about what has helped her find her way to a wonderful life led her to write Inner Child Healing. She encourages others to use the tools she has gained and to recognize that there is healing possible. What has helped her? What did she have to confront? And how does she help others to find their way?

Audrey is a fictional character who resembles her author, Gail Marlene Schwartz. They both suffer from anxiety. They have both lost friends to suicide when they were young. And they are both queer women constructing the families they dream of, with the nuanced questions that implies. In writing the book, what did Gail rely on from her own experience? Did writing it contribute to a better understanding of herself? And what does she hope readers will learn from the story?

Glenn Hileman's parents lived a love story for the ages. Their story ended together when the East Troublesome fire in Colorado took their lives and the home they had built and loved together. Their son, Glenn, needed action to go forward with his grief. He mobilized the community to begin rebuilding and wrote a book telling their story. Although true, their lives feel almost like a novel! Sometimes home is a place and sometimes, even when that place is lost it lives in the hearts of all the people connected to it! Telling their story cemented Glenn's love for his parents and continues to help him in carrying his grief. Theirs is truly a story of love and refinement.

Through his experience coming to terms with the death of both his parents by murder when he was just fourteen, Scott Stabile grew to commit to a life led by love. His commitment extended not just to forgiveness and compassion for those who perpetrate acts of violence violence or damage, but even more primarily to himself. As a strong advocate for self acceptance and love, he works tirelessly to encourage others to find a place of compassion for themselves, believing that this will lead to a greater compassion for others. He truly embodies the title of his book, Enough As You Are!

When J.J. Duncan's son died of cancer at the age of eleven, she fell into a deep grief she was unable to find her way out of. But as an executive producer and story teller, she jumped at the chance to work on The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning, a series exploring the wonder of the Swedish custom. Unlike her own experience, the Swedish cast members were able to walk towards death unflinchingly and J.J. found her work on the show ultimately healing, offering her a way forward from the worst. Since then she has become a staunch advocate for a change in the story Hollywood tells about the end of life and shares at every opportunity the many ways that a true and real story can help us find our way even when we don't know where we're going!

Adoption is a loss that often lives in the shadows, both in the world and inside of adoptees. Losing everything you've ever known before there are even words to name it, when you are an absorbent, unformed human being can take a lifetime to understand. But it is only by recognizing the loss that adoptees can claim their birthright; a life of beauty and meaning. Michelle Madrid knows this territory from both directions. She is an adoptee and an adoptive mother. She dedicates herself to helping other adoptees claim all the parts of themselves, including the ones they were before they lost their first family. Join us as we talk about all sides of the an adoption and how we can all support adopted people to claim every part of themselves.

Meghan Riordan Jarvis was a therapist specializing in grief and trauma. So maybe she and her highly trained friends and colleagues recognized just a little sooner that she was in trouble. After the loss of her father then her mother, she developed severe PTSD that required in-patient care. How does a therapist navigate her own extreme trauma? What does the experience teach her about supporting other people in the same situation? And how does it change her life and perspective? Join us as explore the science and human experience of trauma- and the lessons we sometimes find at the end.

When dementia comes for someone we love, how do we maintain connection and relationship? For Suzanne Finnamore it takes accepting that her mother, in her final stage of dementia, lives in another country; Suzanne has needed to learn the customs and accept the differences. When she can accept, there is room for magic, including the magic of living as if there is no death; where everyone we ever loved is still alive. Suzanne is able to see the ways in which her mother is still herself and still vital. She is able to see the beauty of her mother's marriage and the life she built out of loss and challenge. They are able to love each other in the present moment whether all is remembered or nothing is.

Facing illness at a young age unravels every plan you had. When Jennifer Cramer-Miller was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease at 22, she had to rethink what life would look like. Through kidney transplants, dialysis and a never-ending need for medical care, Jennifer slowly learned to find the joy anyway. Refusing the be defined by illness, she nonetheless became an advocate for many other people facing what she had. Over time, she was able to claim the title to her book, Incurable Optimist and the subtitle too: Living With Illness and Chronic Hope!