CONTRIBUTING AUTHOR
“Susan is a fearless writer. It is gratifying and rare to edit and publish the work of someone who’s mastered the art of shedding light on deep feelings, who can produce a balance of humor, poignancy, adventure, and those darker realities we too often work hard to avoid. ”
I'm a contributing author to the two books below, and am working on my first memoir.
An excerpt from my chapter…’Hooked on Healers’
For decades I have depended on alternative healers to help me get through, physically, mentally, and spiritually. And I’ve had the best….from New York to Ghana, Haiti to California, Ecuador to Paris, London to Viet Nam, and various stops along the way. Many of them have literally and figuratively helped save my life.
I’ve worn acupuncture needles over every inch of my body; been burned with moxibustion; spat on in an African libation ceremony by elder tribesmen; diagnosed via pendulums, pulse, tongue, eyes, and abdomen; taken full-moon baths in flower petals; stared at a colored light through a telescope-type gadget; been steamed with herbs in an I-Love-Lucy type box with just my head sticking out; drank special teas that included ingredients better for me not to know, that took hours to cook and days to expel the smell from my apartment; put off making decisions until consulting my astrologer and tarot card reader; drank customized concoctions of Bach flower remedies and potions; beat pillows while screaming and crying, followed by visualizing positive healing energy coming into my heart; and had an excruciating massage from an elder voodoo practitioner…
There was only one problem, and it took hitting rock bottom for me to see it…
An excerpt from my chapter: “It Only Took A Hyperthyroid, Malaria, and Near Death To Wake Me Up…”
When I opened my eyes, half-a-dozen doctors stood over me taking turns anxiously saying, “You just died. You’re allergic to xylocaine. You went into anaphylactic shock, your heart stopped.”…
I had a second near-death experience from severe malaria in Ghana where I was doing my Kundalini yoga teacher training program. A single mosquito from the universe of mosquitos flattened me…
A confluence of early influences and events led me to a lifetime of seeking the truth, my truth… The irony? I was a liar… The more damaging lies though, were the ones I convinced myself were true about me…
I swallowed my truth over and over and over again until my thyroid had enough; it had to get my attention, and it did. I developed a raging hyperthyroid (throat) and Graves’ disease (eyes). It was now the second time I potentially faced my mortality…