Brain Heal Thyself: A New Approach to Recovery from Stroke Aneurysm and Other Brain Injuries

When Eve suffered a near-fatal brain aneurysm, Madonna Siles, her housemate and friend, too quickly found herself making critical short- and long-term medical care decisions without any help. When the insurance and financial resources ran out and the conventional therapy providers discharged zombie-like Eve to the homecare of a solitary caregiver, both their futures seemed hopeless.

Instead of giving up, Madonna Siles drew on life experience and her marketing career to develop a rehabilitation program that harnessed the power of the subconscious mind. Using motivational techniques borrowed from the advertising world, she appealed to Eve's subconscious to bypass the brain damage and restore normal functioning. In three short years, even the doctors were amazed at Eve's recovery and return to a near-normal life.

Part memoir, part recovery manual, Brain, Heal Thyself is a guidebook for thousands of shell-shocked individuals who suddenly find themselves having to make life and death decisions for those they love. With humor, warmth, and arresting honesty, Madonna Siles's lively narrative closely examines not only the patient's recovery, but also the crucial role of caregivers--and the emotional, financial, and practical pressures they face.

EUREKA! MEMORIES AND MOTIVATIONS and BRAIN, HEAL THYSELF are based on Madonna Siles's experience as the caregiver of her best friend, Eve, the survivor of a near-fatal brain aneurysm (a level 5 cerebral hemorrhage). Eve's "insured" recovery spanned six months in ICU, a nursing home, another hospital, a month in a rehabilitation hospital and three months of intensive out-patient physical, speech, cognitive, psychological and occupational therapies. After all that, Eve was still the shell of a functioning human being.

Desperate to help her friend, Siles developed a holistic, home rehabilitation plan based on the belief that Eve's subconscious mind would do whatever it takes to help Eve survive.

As the days passed into months, Siles realized that if she didn't start practicing relaxation and stress control for herself, she would be of little help to Eve.

In developing her "home rehabilitation program-for-two", Siles drew from her experience as a practitioner of the 12-step program, her knowledge of subconscious communication techniques, and her experience with motivational techniques gleaned from a career as an advertising communicator. She learned about the subconscious mind's amazing powers, and the various methods to invoke its help in the healing process, while working as a public relations consultant for Lawrence J. Beuret, M.D.

Siles is a Certified Professional Coach specializing in caregiver life coaching. She devotes her free time to artistically expressing the natural beauty of Door County, Wisconsin, a tourist destination nestled between the sparkling waters of Green Bay and Lake Michigan. She is a graduate of the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, with a B.S. in Communications. Her web site is: Eurekamaster.com; e-mail: mms (at) eurekamaster.com