Allison Pataki, Author of "Beauty in the Broken Places"
[0:00]Hi, I'm Zibi Owens, and this is Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books.
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[1:22]I'm talking today to Allison Fataki, the author of the utterly amazing memoir Beauty in
[1:27]the Broken Places, a memoir of love, faith, and resilience.
[1:31]Allison chronicles her experience, coping with her husband's stroke at age 30, while
[1:35]she was pregnant with their first child.
[1:37]A novelist, Allison has written several best-selling works, including Sissy, The Traders
[1:41]Wife, and The Accidental Empress, as well as two children's books and a book she
[1:45]covered up with her brother.
[1:47]She graduated from Yale and now lives in upstate New York with her husband, Dave Levy,
[1:51]and their daughter Lily, aged you, and she is now pregnant with their second child.
[1:55]Allison, it's zibiowans, how are you?
[1:57]Hey, Zibi.
[1:58]I'm doing well, how are you?
[1:59]I'm good things.
[2:00]Thanks so much for doing this interview.
[2:02]Oh, thank you.
[2:04]Thank you for having me.
[2:05]Of course.
[2:06]I know you're shown on time, so I'm going to jump right into it if that's okay.
[2:10]Perfect.
[2:11]Yep.
[2:12]Ready when you are.
[2:13]Okay.
[2:14]Your book, Beauty in the Broken Places, was, it was just amazing.
[2:16]So moving, eloquent, relatable, honest, open, I just loved it.
[2:22]What did it feel like for you coming out with such a personal story after writing historical
[2:26]fiction?
[2:27]Yeah.
[2:28]It was, well, thank you, first of all, and it was really, it was not a book I ever intended
[2:33]to write.
[2:34]As you said, fiction was my jam.
[2:36]I had done four fiction books.
[2:37]I love historical fiction.
[2:39]I never really considered nonfiction, but obviously it was also not an experience that
[2:45]Dave and I ever intended to live through, at least in the way that we did.
[2:49]And so it really started as a very personal thing.
[2:53]It started with just the letters that I was writing to Dave that really were intended
[2:57]for our family and for Dave and to preserve the memories that he couldn't make on his
[3:02]own and to communicate with Dave in a really dark moment in our lives when I couldn't
[3:07]communicate with my actual husband.
[3:10]But that was the person, my partner, with whom I wanted to speak.
[3:14]I figured I would write it all down and I would write it to Dave in the hopes that someday
[3:20]if he came back, he would be able to read and understand what we had been through.
[3:25]And from there, as with all of my books, the writing project sort of took on a life of
[3:30]its own and in some ways it became the book that even though I hadn't intended to write
[3:37]it, it became sort of a compulsion and I realized, yes, this is actually the next project
[3:42]that I feel like I should, I need to be working on.
[3:46]I loved when you wrote the following in your book.
[3:49]You said, I love stories.
[3:50]I love weaving narratives with the written word, my whole life.
[3:53]I've been driven by a desire to learn people's stories, to get to the bottom of who they
[3:57]are and how they got that way, to ask questions and seek to understand what a person
[4:00]seems important.
[4:01]I mean, I totally agree.
[4:03]I could have written them myself.
[4:04]I'd be like, yeah, how do you think that that inherent interest in others really informs
[4:08]your writing?
[4:09]When do you find that most useful?
[4:11]Absolutely.
[4:12]So I initially thought this would lend itself to a career either in detective work or
[4:20]in people's office that I should be a lawyer or I thought journalism.
[4:24]I thought interrogating people, asking people, trying to get to the bottom of the story.
[4:29]And so that was the first path I went down, was journalism for several years.
[4:34]I worked on that when I was in college on campus and then those were my first internships
[4:39]and then those were my first full-time jobs in New York City.
[4:42]But I realized journalism is a very specific type of writing and particularly the type of
[4:50]of journalism I was doing.
[4:52]There was so much emphasis on deadline and live and breaking news and advancing the story
[4:58]to move it forward.
[5:00]And what I was craving was depth and time to explore, as you said, to get to the bottom
[5:07]of the story as opposed to just scraping the service, giving the people the bullet points
[5:12]and moving on.
[5:14]And so I realized that actually that exploration of character and personality and plot and
[5:22]conflict, all of that I could actually do much more satisfying and gratifying way to
[5:28]me through the longer form of fiction writing and character development and plot development
[5:34]and storytelling and narrative in a fictional capacity.
[5:38]Well, it's nice to be the beneficiary of that decision of yours.
[5:43]I'm actually a beneficiary of it as well because it's a way better lifestyle than breaking
[5:47]news.
[5:48]So I have to tell you I also went to Yale and the descriptions he gave completely brought
[5:54]me back to that time and place.
[5:55]I was literally in that same hall where you were memorizing slides for schoolers or history
[5:59]class.
[6:00]You took back class?
[6:01]I did.
[6:02]I took the same class.
[6:03]I was standing there memorizing how am I supposed to memorize a million slides just up on
[6:06]the wall like that with so many other people around me.
[6:10]But knowing that that's where you and Dave really noticed each other for the first
[6:13]time.
[6:14]It just like reading the book.
[6:15]It just gave me goosebumps.
[6:16]I could picture it so well.
[6:18]And even how you wrote when you went back to the Harvard Yale game, you know, that had
[6:22]Dave not made it so far out of recovery that how you would have felt going back versus how
[6:27]you did end up feeling.
[6:29]So I was just wondering with your experience at Yale as an English major.
[6:33]Do you feel like that, that what you learned at Yale helped with your writing career?
[6:37]Was it more the people and people like Dave and your friends and all of all of the interpersonal
[6:42]things that sort of shaped who you became as a result?
[6:46]It was both.
[6:47]It was absolutely both.
[6:48]I think you could make a very strong case for the fact that I've never been more inspired
[6:54]and motivated and intimidated than in some of those small higher level English major seminars
[7:03]just by the classmates around you.
[7:06]The way they think and the way they investigate language and ask questions and the way
[7:13]you really have to explain or sort of reason through how you arrived at your conclusion.
[7:22]You know, it's a hard-fought conversation or paper or whatever it is that you're presenting
[7:29]as an English major at Yale because you really are going to be challenged and motivated
[7:33]by your peers and your professors.
[7:35]So I think it was absolutely in an academic setting where I was inspired to sort of go deeper
[7:42]into text and language and analysis and character and story.
[7:47]But then I also think that so much of the education that you reap at Yale is through the
[7:52]osmosis of just being there on the campus with your peers as you said.
[7:56]Your friends, you know, in my case, Dave, who was my significant other, just the passive
[8:01]sort of learning that happens from being surrounded by these people all around you where
[8:07]it's cool to be curious and it's cool to be inquisitive and it's cool to be a nerd and
[8:11]it's cool to like school and to like the books that you're reading for your English homework.
[8:16]And so I think it was all of that.
[8:18]That was really Yale for me.
[8:21]I went and not know what I wanted to be an English major, but I was so inspired by just
[8:25]the courses and the professors and my classmates that that was really where I fell in love
[8:30]with the story, both as a reader and as somebody who could then, you know, now what I do in
[8:34]my life is right about it.
[8:37]That makes sense.
[8:38]Yeah, it was, I was telling my husband, you know, I read now two books a week as I'm doing
[8:42]this podcast and I was, and he's like, how are you going to keep this up?
[8:45]And I was like, well, you should see me in college.
[8:47]This is nothing.
[8:48]You know, the amount we had been in college though.
[8:50]You know, I felt so privileged when we got to Yale, I was like my full-time job now is just
[8:54]that I have to read and that I have to be a student and that was, obviously, I worked on campus
[8:59]too.
[8:59]I worked all four years.
[9:00]But really, your main priority every day is to read as an English major and I thought, gosh,
[9:06]what a great good fortune.
[9:08]This is what I'm supposed to be doing.
[9:13]And I'll just, I want to jump ahead to parts of your book now.
[9:17]So, well, first you want to just tell listeners who might not know exactly sort of a synopsis
[9:24]of what happened with you and Dave on the airplane and what followed after that.
[9:28]Yeah.
[9:29]So at five months pregnant, Dave and I took a last flight, a baby moon, sort of become,
[9:35]first becoming, before becoming parents, sort of a last trip to take just as a couple
[9:40]before this new season of our life and our marriage.
[9:43]And on the plane, my husband, who is 30 years old, healthy, a doctor, an athlete, healthy
[9:50]eater, he turned to me and he said, is my right eye look weird and his right eye looked
[9:54]freakishly weird.
[9:55]His pupil was so dilated, but just in one eye.
[9:58]And so it was a very bizarre.
[10:00]thing and a few minutes later Dave lost consciousness and we were at 35,000 feet
[10:05]in the air. We had no idea what was going on. I have thrown out the worst case
[10:09]scenario thinking that it would be, you know, quickly debauves as Dave had an
[10:14]stroke. But the answer was very quickly, you know, yes, this might be very
[10:18]serious. This might be a stroke, this might be life threatening. So we made an
[10:22]emergency landing. We had been flying from Chicago towards Hawaii, so we made an
[10:26]emergency landing near Stairport, Fargo, North Dakota, and Dave was in a
[10:31]coma. And it took a while to deduce what had happened because it was such a rare
[10:36]life-threatening stroke, particularly in a patient of Dave's age and profile.
[10:41]But Dave did eventually wake up and what happened was when he woke up his mind
[10:46]had been wiped clean. He was, his brain was less functional than a newborn. And so
[10:51]he was completely in a state of amnesia. So I began writing to Dave in this
[10:57]desperate sort of effort to talk to my husband, but also because I knew he
[11:00]couldn't make new memories and had no understanding of what was going on.
[11:03]And I also had no understanding of what was going on really. And so I just kind
[11:08]of worked my way through this with Dave by writing to him. And that became sort
[11:14]of a skeleton of this memoir about our experience of regrowing Dave's mind,
[11:19]regrowing our marriage, regrowing our family. And just what happens when at
[11:24]age 30, the life that you had planned for and thought that you had worked for
[11:29]and we're going to be able to have just completely crumbled around you what
[11:34]happens through the process of rebuilding.
[11:37]I have to say I'm just, I'm so sorry that you had to go through this
[11:40]experience. I just, my heart goes out to you. I'm just just had to say that. I'm
[11:44]sorry. Throughout most of the book, you were this just stalwart, optimistic,
[11:51]go get her caregiver. Always there for Dave running the show, sort of managing
[11:56]your own pregnancy, just totally dealing. And then one of my favorite parts of
[12:00]the book came later when the, when the drama, the adrenaline of the crisis had
[12:03]ebbed a bit. And you and Dave and the baby were back at home and you went from
[12:07]what you called, quote, the cool calm that comes with being in the eye of the
[12:10]hurricane and perhaps even from being in a state of semi shock, to quote the
[12:14]deep freeze of dark January, adjusting to life with a new baby and facing a
[12:18]new year when your patients began to fray. And you thought, quote, was this
[12:22]going to be my life forever? Was this going to be my marriage forever? And it
[12:25]was just such a relatable moment that's that feeling of, okay, is this, is this it
[12:29]now? So can you tell me more about how you felt during that time and then what
[12:33]helped you through it? Yeah. So after the stroke, the moment you're talking
[12:37]about, this was about seven, eight, nine months later, the adrenaline wears off and
[12:44]we're through the acute physical crisis. Dave survived the stroke. He's going to
[12:50]survive. Physically he will be okay, sort of the support network that had
[12:55]initially rallied around us that had been by our side every step in the
[12:59]beginning. Everyone had kind of, you know, moved on. Dave, Dave was seeming to
[13:04]be doing pretty well. And physically he was strong. And everybody kind of had
[13:10]to get back to their lives. And including us, we had to settle in to our new
[13:15]normal. But brain injury is such a long devastating non-linear road and
[13:23]recovery. And so yes, months after the fact, they looked healthy and, you know,
[13:29]people's on and said, oh, Dave, it's so good to see you back to yourself mentally,
[13:33]emotionally, cognitively. Dave was not himself. And that was what was so hard
[13:38]for Dave and for me was exactly the question you pointed to as I thought, is this
[13:45]going to be our life? No, is this going to be our marriage? And, you know, I
[13:48]mentioned earlier, Dave had to start from newborn, less than newborn. You know,
[13:51]he couldn't swallow. He couldn't breathe. These are things that newborns can do
[13:55]on their own. Dave couldn't when he woke up. So he had to literally regrow his
[13:58]brain from from minus from negative. And and then, you know, where we were in
[14:04]the moment where you say that the deep darkness of January, Dave was that about a
[14:10]high school student in terms of his brain and cognitive function. And he didn't
[14:15]have executive functioning. He couldn't manage his life. Think about high school
[14:19]students. They don't have the thoughtfulness to pick up their dirty clothes or
[14:23]to get a job or to manage their own life. So imagine you have a newborn whose
[14:29]brain is growing from zero. You have a husband whose brain is growing from zero. You
[14:34]don't want your partner to be sort of an inconsiderate sort of reckless,
[14:39]thoughtless teenager at that moment in your life. You know, that was not the
[14:44]ban I had married. And there was sort of this also this very hard tension at
[14:49]that point where, like with many teenagers, Dave thought maybe that he was doing better
[14:54]than he was. And so it was a very difficult position for me to be in a sort of
[14:57]wife who wanted to encourage him and and believe in him and respect his the
[15:03]hardship of his recovery. But also sort of still have to be this caregiver. And
[15:08]now my caregiver to a person who resents having to be cared for. And so
[15:11]there's sort of that that tension of, you know, Dave sees it as nagging. I see it
[15:16]kind of trying to help him continue to push his recovery forward. But that
[15:21]was actually when I learned a very operative and helpful term that's kind of
[15:26]relevant to all of us, executive functioning. That's something that everyone gets
[15:29]maybe senior year of college, maybe mid-20s, executive functioning where if you
[15:34]think about it, you just sort of click into being the manager of your own life
[15:38]at that point where you're not necessarily like that at 18 or early on in
[15:42]college or in high school. And Dave was not there yet. And so it was a very hard
[15:47]position for us to be in. I was caring for a newborn. I had some postpartum
[15:51]depression. I was exhausted. I was scared. I didn't know what they, you know,
[15:59]career hopes would or could be. I didn't know if I was going to be taking care of
[16:04]Dave and this newborn on my own forever. I was lonely. You know, it was winter in
[16:09]Chicago. It was like 12 degrees out on a good day. So we weren't going outside.
[16:13]It wasn't safe to take a newborn outside. We were cooped up in this new apartment
[16:17]that we had just moved into just the three of us and our little family really
[16:21]struggled in that moment. And yeah, I was very honest and open about that
[16:26]because this, if we were going to tell the story, we were going to tell it
[16:29]truthfully. And it was not all roses and triumph and running on treadmills and
[16:33]healing and recovery. It was lumpy and there were moments that were not
[16:37]pretty. And so Dave and I were very adamant that we were going to be honest
[16:42]about those moments as well. You know, you also had great advice for friends who
[16:49]were trying to help you or or not or not knowing how to do it the right way.
[16:52]Yeah. You say in the book how you grew tired of comments like I could never do
[16:57]what you're doing or I don't know how you're doing it or we're worried about
[17:01]you because they just were, you know, in vain attempts to help. So tell me how
[17:06]you wanted to respond to those comments and what would have been most
[17:09]helpful for you to hear like how could friends have helped you through this
[17:12]more so that, you know, we all know if we have any, you know, how to respond
[17:16]better the next time to be there for people we care about. And this is such a
[17:20]learning experience for me because it's so well-meaning when people say, you know,
[17:26]oh, I admire how you're getting through this or I couldn't do it myself or how do you
[17:29]do it. But as you said, it just, it doesn't really help in that moment. And what I
[17:34]wanted to think was, well, you could get through it if it landed on you because I
[17:39]didn't choose it. And it's not like I have some grand plan and I have any idea what
[17:43]I'm doing. And I know how to get through it. If you had to get through it,
[17:47]you'd have to get through it just the way I had to get through it and then choose it.
[17:51]Really probably what would have been most helpful was for someone to just
[17:54]remove any of the burden on me saying, you know, how are you doing it or how are you doing
[18:01]and just say, I'm coming over, I'm dropping off this dinner. I'm going to come over and hold
[18:06]your baby for an hour so that you can take a shower or so that you can take a nap or I'm going
[18:10]to drive Dave to rehab this day so that you can stay home with the baby. Or, you know, just,
[18:14]I think when people are struggling and just getting through every day on the calendar,
[18:21]sometimes the greatest act of grace is just the practical hands and feet helping on the ground.
[18:26]Like, you don't have to worry about this one logistic of your life because you have so
[18:30]many things on your to-do list, let me take that one off your list. You know, so whatever that is,
[18:35]whether it's, I'm going to bring over some milk and groceries or I'm going to take you out to coffee.
[18:41]For me, that was what was most helpful was when the person sort of removed any burden of asking
[18:45]me what I needed or telling me that they were worried about me and instead just sort of taking
[18:50]the active role where they're like, I'm going to take this one thing off your plate. I appreciate
[18:54]it does moment. I feel like in times of loss or injury or any of these stressful situations,
[19:01]there's a group of people who kind of instinctively ends up knowing what to do and then a much
[19:05]bigger group that feels unsure of how to interact or sort of afraid. Like, I feel like people
[19:11]say like, oh, well, I'm afraid to get in the way or, you know, a friend loses out someone and I know
[19:17]like in my life when I've had, you know, losses as we all have, like, no one gets in the way,
[19:23]you know, you don't have to know it, you know, and like, you still check email, you know, that's
[19:27]the other thing I find people, I don't know if you went through this, like people say, oh no,
[19:30]and in times I'm going to leave this person alone because they're going through so much, well,
[19:34]for me, at least I don't know about for you, like that doesn't help, like, you know, if you want to be
[19:40]that's so true. And so I appreciated in the middle of the crisis when I was being flooded,
[19:45]people putting in their emails don't respond to this right now, but I wanted you to know I'm
[19:49]thinking about. And then here's their email and they send you their words of love and support,
[19:54]but they sort of remove the burden of you needing to do anything in return. I appreciated that,
[19:58]but I completely hear what you're saying.
[20:00]And I agree.
[20:01]And I know from my perspective too, grief or hardship or conflict, it can be so awkward
[20:07]and difficult to know how to react.
[20:10]And I completely get that too because I've been on the other end too where I've wanted
[20:14]to provide support or sort of lend my shoulder, but then I don't really know how.
[20:19]And so it's very difficult, so I think just the most important thing is like making
[20:24]yourself available, but just with no strings in cash, no expectation.
[20:29]Like I appreciate the people who reached out and were like, you don't need to respond
[20:33]right now, but I'm here as soon as you're ready for as soon as you need me.
[20:37]And sort of just made the open offer and even just like the check-in, like I'm thinking
[20:42]about you and here, let me know if you need anything.
[20:47]I would emphasize just like removing the burden on the person, but just extending sort
[20:52]of the support and the love and the offer because it means so much, it really helps
[20:57]and it matters.
[20:58]And it can be awkward when you're in the person on the receiving end.
[21:02]I was very uncomfortable with sort of being so vulnerable and open about my needs and
[21:07]about being the one who needed and was vulnerable.
[21:10]And I didn't like being in that position where I felt like I was being the taker.
[21:16]And I felt like I was putting people out or imposing on them.
[21:20]So it's helpful to hear from your tribe and your support network that they want to be
[21:25]there to help you in whatever way you need.
[21:28]And that, you know, you're not putting them out because we're those tables turned.
[21:34]They call on you as well.
[21:36]Right.
[21:37]You said a little bit later in the book during one of your dark moments.
[21:42]Have you ever wanted to just trade lives to say, I can't do this anymore?
[21:45]Can someone take over for me?
[21:48]When did you feel like this the most and how did faith help you pull through this difficult
[21:52]time?
[21:53]Yeah.
[21:54]I felt that probably nine or so months out when I had a newborn and I had a husband
[22:01]who physically looked good but was mentally, emotionally, cognitively, still not himself,
[22:07]still not my partner, still not the man I had chosen.
[22:10]And I was just tired.
[22:14]And I just, in the crisis, I think you sort of go into like hyperactive overdrive and
[22:20]you're running on adrenaline.
[22:22]And then once that dissipates and saves a little bit later, you begin the process and
[22:26]the blindness of the crisis come off and you just think, oh my goodness, like that was
[22:32]when I sort of took stock and assessed it was like our life is just unrecognizable from
[22:38]what we thought it would be.
[22:39]And, you know, our hopes for what David worked for for the past decade of his life, you
[22:46]know, went up and smelled with all of the work he'd put into pre-med and medical school
[22:49]and residency.
[22:52]And we just didn't know how that would affect our family and how that would affect
[22:57]just really like our trajectory or plan A. And that was when I really thought, you know,
[23:03]this is when faith gets real.
[23:05]Safe by definition is something that you can't prove and that there's no evidence for.
[23:10]And so yeah, I could go around saying, life is good, God is good, everything is good.
[23:15]But really up until that point in my life, that wasn't really safe.
[23:18]That was just agreeing with the overwhelming evidence, right?
[23:21]This was the moment when things didn't look good and when I was scared and alone and sad
[23:25]and confused that I had to decide, you know, do I believe that life will get better?
[23:31]Do I believe that God is good?
[23:33]Do I believe that Dave and I, you know, are going to stay in this marriage for better
[23:38]for worse?
[23:39]Do I believe in the vows that we made in sickness and in health?
[23:43]That's when it really all kind of got real and where the rubber met the road for how I felt
[23:47]about my faith, my family and my position in this marriage and in motherhood and in our
[23:52]life together.
[23:54]And that was, you know, that was when we really took stock and were like, okay, we have
[23:58]to rebuild from here.
[24:00]The foundation has sort of come down and we're in the rubble now and now we begin to
[24:05]rebuild.
[24:06]And now just to go to more, you know, nuts and bolts type question, the structure of your
[24:13]memoir.
[24:14]And I'm sorry not to be talking about your other amazing novels, but I'm just focusing
[24:18]on this one the most.
[24:19]But how did you pick the structure?
[24:22]Because I think it worked so well how you, you know, weave to the story of your relationship
[24:27]as it went on and grew into this beautiful marriage.
[24:30]And then at the same time, you know, the passages where you're in, you know, in the hospital
[24:35]and dealing with the day-to-day and all the medical things, like how did you decide on that
[24:39]and to make it work so well?
[24:42]Yeah, well thank you.
[24:44]So the reader loses Dave the character pretty early on because he has his stroke and
[24:49]loses consciousness, you know, first chapter.
[24:52]So in order for the story to work and for the reader to know, you know, what it was that
[24:58]we lost in Dave and in our relationship and in our life in our marriage, we had to provide
[25:02]some context and some backstory.
[25:04]And so that was why we had the idea to sort of weave in the past and the moments of our
[25:09]meeting and our courtship and our marriage and sort of what had gotten us up to that point
[25:14]when Dave's eyes shut and he lost consciousness.
[25:18]And so we interwilled the story from the past with sort of the present and the crisis
[25:23]and moving forward from this stroke.
[25:27]And what I've heard from readers is that it works sort of because you need a little bit
[25:30]of a break from some of the more intense moments of dealing with, you know, near death and
[25:37]some of the real like physical and emotional hardship of the stroke, it's good to have
[25:41]a reprieve every few chapters that was something that's a little bit more light and
[25:45]a little bit more positive.
[25:48]And really ultimately this is like, this is our specific story in terms of Dave's stroke
[25:53]and the circumstances of our life and our marriage and, you know, our journey through healing
[25:58]and recovery, but really what we wanted it to be was more universal than that.
[26:04]You know, this is sickness and healing.
[26:08]This is fear and hope, this is love, this is family, this is parenthood, this is marriage.
[26:14]And so that was what we really tried to do with both aspects of those stories.
[26:21]So you've learned a lot obviously not by choice necessarily about traumatic brain injury.
[26:27]I know you are, you know, crusading for this cause more now.
[26:30]Are there organizations you found or something that readers at home can do to support
[26:36]others in this situation?
[26:38]Yeah.
[26:39]So one of the big things we learned about, which I have had no idea prior to the stroke
[26:42]was this concept of neuronal plasticity, which is something that we all have.
[26:47]This is not just relevant to stroke and brain injury survivors.
[26:52]And that's the fact that our brains are plastic, which is that our brains are changing
[26:56]and our brains have the ability to adapt and heal and recover and that, you know, we
[27:01]use such a small percentage of our brain so that when part of it is battered and bruised
[27:06]by injury, whether it's stroke or something else, the neurons have the ability to heal
[27:14]and recover and build new bridges.
[27:16]And so the brain is the least understood and most remarkable organ in the body.
[27:21]And so that's why he was so important.
[27:23]The brain, obviously, is that that's why it's so devastating when your injury affects
[27:28]the brain.
[27:30]But the brain also has this capacity for miraculous healing in a way that no other part of
[27:36]the body does.
[27:37]And so to stimulate neuronal plasticity after injury, it's so important to try to trigger
[27:44]those neurons to fire up and come back online and form new connections, you know, anything
[27:51]that forces you out of your routine and forces you out of sort of the road rhythms of
[27:55]your life, it's going to stimulate neuronal plasticity.
[27:57]So this is not just for stroke survivors, but even just turning the doorknob with your
[28:01]non-dominant hand or taking a shower with your eyes shut or brushing your teeth while
[28:06]standing on one leg, these are all things that are going to tell and the brain and stimulate
[28:10]neuronal plasticity.
[28:11]And so we learned that that was our buzzword, our lifeline, our mantra throughout dates
[28:16]recovery.
[28:17]And so just I think that's important is like the educational aspect of life after stroke,
[28:23]or life after brain injury, it's just that you can do these things on your own to sort
[28:28]of trigger your own neuronal plasticity.
[28:30]And that even those who haven't suffered from strokes can also just know this about brain
[28:35]health and know this about keeping your brain young and fit and active and agile.
[28:40]And so, you know, it's so scary after an injury because what do we do?
[28:45]You open up your computer and you go on Google and you go down this rabbit hole of research
[28:49]and information and you don't know what's credible and you don't know what's bogus.
[28:53]And so I almost sort of tried to not do too much of my own independent research unless
[29:00]it was like through doctors who were reliable and vetted.
[29:04]But the American stroke association is incredible and so is the national stroke association
[29:13]and we were really, really fortunate that his rehab at Shirley Ryan ability lab in Chicago,
[29:18]which is also in the national presence, they were wonderful.
[29:22]And so yeah, now Dave feels very strongly about speaking out and speaking to survivors
[29:28]and caregivers and supporting those who have walked sort of the harrowing road that
[29:35]he walked himself.
[29:36]And how is Dave doing now?
[29:39]He's doing so great.
[29:40]He is back at work.
[29:42]We're freers out.
[29:43]We're celebrating Dave's a live day.
[29:45]This is the University of the Stroke in just a couple of weeks and he's back to work
[29:51]in medicine.
[29:52]He's not practicing orthopedic surgery but he's in medical consulting and he's also
[29:56]very, very adamant about writing and speaking with stroke survivor.
[30:00]And he just spoke with the American Stroke Association
[30:03]last week.
[30:05]And we're expecting our second baby, which we honestly,
[30:09]I didn't even know if they would survive to know our daughter.
[30:13]You know, when I was pregnant and he almost died,
[30:15]I thought, gosh, well, even if I lose days,
[30:18]thank God a piece of some little lip on in our daughter,
[30:21]who will be born in a few months.
[30:23]I was so grateful that they survived to know his daughter
[30:25]and that my daughter knows her father.
[30:28]But I never thought we would be able to grow
[30:30]our family and have another child.
[30:32]And so we just considered a set of pregnancy,
[30:36]just such a blessing.
[30:37]And a few weeks ago, we hit the 22-week mark,
[30:40]which is exactly where we were when they had a stroke.
[30:44]And that night, we just sort of sat and day wept.
[30:47]And we were like, from here on out,
[30:48]you're experiencing this pregnancy for the first time.
[30:51]You never made it at all.
[30:52]We could be the last time around.
[30:55]And I'm experiencing it for the first time as a partner.
[30:58]And so thank you.
[30:59]He's doing very, very well.
[31:00]His brain, you know, the brain is miraculous
[31:02]if he's made a miraculous recovery.
[31:05]So happy.
[31:06]Just last question, what are you going to do next?
[31:09]And do you have any quick advice to aspiring writers?
[31:13]Yeah.
[31:13]So I'm turning to fiction next, which after sort of dwelling
[31:18]in this world, they've stroke and recovery
[31:21]and speaking and meeting so many stroke survivors
[31:24]and amazing people with their own stories
[31:27]of the club of the bad thing.
[31:28]Fiction feels like jumping back into a hot-fudge Sunday
[31:32]or something.
[31:33]So I'm working on my next historical fiction,
[31:37]which I will be able to speak about very soon.
[31:41]Because my next most immediate launch,
[31:43]obviously, is our second baby who's do this summer.
[31:47]And yeah, my advice to aspiring writers
[31:50]would be what was so helpful for me to hear
[31:53]when I was an aspiring writer, which is do it.
[31:55]You can story, sit down and write it.
[31:57]If that means writing at night after work or writing on weekends
[32:01]or writing when you have time off,
[32:03]put pen to paper and tell your story
[32:05]and be forgiving with yourself and work and draft.
[32:09]Don't expect this to be perfect with your first draft.
[32:12]And Allison, if you could just go back in time
[32:14]to the gate before you boarded the airplane
[32:16]on which Dave had his stroke and tell yourself one thing
[32:18]that would help you get through it all,
[32:20]what would you have said to yourself?
[32:22]Oh, my goodness.
[32:23]I would have myself and I would say it will be hard,
[32:28]but you will be okay and your family will be okay.
[32:30]I promise you that.
[32:33]That's so beautiful.
[32:35]Well, thank you so much, Allison, for sharing
[32:37]not just your story, but your time today
[32:40]and being so inspiring and just thank you so much
[32:44]for creating this work of beauty.
[32:47]Thank you.
[32:48]And I'm sorry that my voice is breaking a little bit.
[32:50]I get a little bit emotional still.
[32:52]No, of course you do.
[32:53]It's completely understandable.
[32:55]I mean, how could you not?
[32:56]How could you not?
[32:58]Thank you for telling my story.
[32:59]Of course.
[33:00]All right.
[33:01]Thank you.
[33:02]Bye bye.
[33:03]You took bye.
[33:05]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have
[33:07]Time to Read Books, sponsored by Bobble Botanicals,
[33:10]B-A-B-O Botanicals.com.
[33:13]Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.