Hope Is the First Dose: A Treatment Plan for Recovering from Trauma, Tragedy, and Other Massive Things

A practicing neurosurgeon and award-winning author shares his roadmap to finding hope and even happiness when the worst happens—by placing trust in God—in this powerful memoir of personal tragedy, grief, and recovery.

“There are no empty platitudes in these pages. No helium-filled, empty promises. Look elsewhere for plastic smiles. But look here for genuine hope.”—Max Lucado

The question isn’t whether you will face the hardest thing. It’s what to do when it’s staring you in the face.

Because whether in your past, present, or future, trauma will reconfigure your life. And it will do so as your massive thing: someone left, someone cheated, the biopsy was bad, the baby didn’t have a heartbeat, a loved one died, you suffered abuse, or your dreams ended abruptly. The devastation is both immediate and ongoing, leaving a wake of emotional, spiritual, and even physical pain.

Dr. Lee Warren, a neurosurgeon and former combat surgeon in Iraq, knows this firsthand. A medical doctor with more than twenty years’ experience wrestling with the tensions between faith and science, he faced unspeakable tragedy in losing his nineteen-year-old son.

In Hope Is the First Dose, Dr. Warren offers tender empathy and hard-won insights to give you tangible hope. No matter what you’re facing, it doesn’t have to be the end of you. Let Dr. Warren help you find your way back to a new season of hope, faith, peace—and even happiness.

The first dose is hope—and it comes in the form of grace from the skilled hands of the Great Physician.

W. Lee Warren, MD, is an award-winning author, brain surgeon, patent-holding inventor, and Iraq War veteran. He is the author of I’ve Seen the End of You—winner of the ECPA Christian Book Award—and No Place to Hide. In addition to his full-time practice as a neurosurgeon, Dr. Warren hosts a podcast exploring the complex interplay between faith and science in unlocking the secrets of the mind, body, and spirit for better living and for making sense of faith in difficult circumstances. He and his wife, Lisa, have four adult children and four grandchildren and live in North Platte, Nebraska.