This Fall Is For Shinah

The Fall of 2006 was all about promoting my newly self-published memoir  called These Painted Wings. The Fall of 2007 was about doing a full Cross-Canada tour to celebrate the launch of the Harper Collins version of Wings ( and the much more complete version) called A Promise of Hope. This Fall is all about Shinah House - A brand new charity promoting healthier families and healthier women. 

Sharon Unger, the founder of Shinah House plans to build houses and ranches where women can go to work their way through the toughest parts of healing and become really well . . . well enough even to go home and help their families to avoid the pit falls of the mental illnesses that are becoming a plague on our society. Shinah House will be another great step in changing the face of mental illness.

 

When I think of the concept of the  Shinah Houses, I think of my mother. I know it would have been a place for her to heal and not be ashamed. I think it would have saved her life. I know it will save many others a lot of agony. 

The first events we are planning for Shinah House fund raisers are going to be beautiful. Albertan singer/songwriter Deborah Gregson and I are partnering with community foundations to plan intimate evenings where I will share my story through dramatic readings from "A Promise of Hope" punctuated with Deborah's haunting and hopeful live performances of her music.  

Earliest performance dates include November 4th, 5th and 6th in Southern Alberta locations. Watch my website for confirmations of dates and for ticket sales! Hope to see you there!

~Autumn 

17 years and the miracle of discovery

Dana and I are on the road with the family once again, this time in the USA instead of Canada. We have been placing books along the way and setting up book events that will be posted soon on the site as confirmations come in. 

We are sitting out tonight in the warmth of an Idaho night enjoying the sound of kids in the pool and campfires crackling in the distance. Our own three girls are snug in their camper beds and James is off with friends. Tomorrow, Dana and I will celebrate our seventeenth wedding anniversary! What started out as a nightmare for me and a rescue mission for Dana has turned into a beautifully balanced life full of successes and joys and our fair share of oddities. But all in all, life after the life I wrote about in A Promise of Hope has been blessed and I am so grateful. 

I get letters by email every day. Some readers are afraid or skeptical or both and they want to know that the story of A Promise of Hope is true. It is true. I was horribly ill and I did lose my mother. The personal parts and the political battles represented in the story are accurate, most recorded in newspaper and court reports, and because of my father and David Hardy's ingenuity and  a whole lot of blessings from above, I was given a second chance at life through what has now become the Truehope program. 

In spite of my exuberance about my story, I hope that there is never the thought after reading my book that taking a pill or a nutrient combination is enough to make the rest of life work like magic. Balancing chemistry, perhaps healing the brain is a great way to begin the healing process, but after clarity of thought and stability of mood replace mania and panic and depression, there is still work to do. 

On this anniversary, Dana and I plan to start writing about the work that we have done over the last twelve years to grow and change as a couple as I have grown and developed into a healthy, stable woman. We have overcome habits and knee-jerk reactions that were formed as survival or escape mechanisms in the first five years of roller-coaster bipolar marriage, and we have developed strategies to deal with memories and situations that trigger panic in me. We all have a past. Anyone who has read A Promise of Hope knows that mine has been colorful enough to inspire panic, even in a healthy body - once in awhile.

I pray every day that through the telling of my story many people who are suffering now will find hope and healing and eventually health through the miraculous discovery that has led me to this place, celebrating  a family and a marriage and a healthy life. I believe that there are miracles yet to be had and discoveries yet to be made that will forever change the face of mental illness. I'm glad to be a recipient of that grace and a beneficiary of the miracle of progress and discovery! 

Autumn

Free to Choose

Dana and I got back from speaking at the Chicago Health Freedom Expo just in time to join our kids for July 1st Canada Day celebrations. We thrilled at the games, the pony rides, the water fights and the fireworks. I kept telling my girls this was a celebration of Canada's birthday and that we celebrate because we are free. Across the border, Dana's family is busy preparing for tomorrow's July 4th American Independence Day celebrations. Another great celebration of freedom.

Tonight I got on my knees by my bed to give thanks for all the blessings I could count, and freedom was the first to come to mind. I am thankful to live in a country where, in spite of differing opinions and troubles we have had over the years concerning the right to choose a healthy alternative to standard bipolar drug therapy, I am still free to have an opinion; still free to express it, to protest when my government gets heavy handed or over-excited about regulation of the health 'industry'. I am thankful to have the right to life and safety. I have been blessed with both a new chance at life and the safety that comes with great mental health and I pray that in spite of governments who may be pressured to do otherwise, the rights to health and safety and choice and personal freedom might always be preserved on these good lands. "God Keep Our Land" and "God Bless America." 

Goodnight,

Autumn

My Father is a Hero

Father's Day is a real celebration for me. Today I celebrate the gift of being a daughter to a real Canadian hero. My father was only 20 years old when I was born, the second daughter among his many children. I adored him all through my childhood. He was fit and strong and a hard worker. He was smart and funny and good. He was in love with my mother.

 

Life was hard and things got bad and after my mother's long illness and eventual suicide I thought I had lost my father, too. He was broken and so very sad. But Dad has a way of seeing things that goes beyond the expected, he has a faith that could light bushes and divide great waters. When he realized that my brother and I were both firmly on our mother's path to bipolar suicide he devoted himself to his family and pleaded with God for relief. For two years he did his part and then, one day he was given the answer.

 

The simple truth that Dad discovered in a conversation with a swine feed expert who has since become his best friend, changed my world, lifted me from the deepest cavern of mental illness and set me up for a successful, happy life. More than twelve years later I remain free. Symptom free and drug free. 

Now, in the face of a new adversary, he fights again, pleads again, and will do anything to ensure that I remain free to choose the gift of health that I've been given.

Today I celebrate my father and his gift of life to me, twice over; his example of resilience in tough times, his faith, his persistence when he knows he is right, his willingness to help his neighbour, to feed the hungry and care for the lost and the broken in our society and in his family.

 

Thanks Dad. I love you. 

Anyone who has read my story, "A Promise of Hope" knows that what began as my father's desperate (and incredibly successful) attempt to save my life has become a firestorm of politics and controversy in Canada. Dad never imagined that after losing two family members to bipolar suicide, the government would have a problem with him finding a natural answer for my severe bipolar illness. He was wrong. As soon as the first medical journal submissions were published showing that people could respond to nutrient therapy and no longer require drug interventions for bipolar, Health Canada officials began a process of seizure and restriction that eventually led all of us to court. Health Canada lost the case and the judge's decision set a new standard of freedom, putting Canadian lives ahead of bureaucrat's policies.  Thanks to Romarie who wrote to me after reading my book, asking me to post the judge's entire decision on my site. While I'm waiting for my webmaster to post it, I'd like to provide the link to Judge G.M. Meagher's written decision. 

Happy reading Rosemarie!

~Autumn

New Site!

Welcome to my new blog  and website! Dana and I have been working hard to update the site and provide more information about bipolar and better help for visitors. Let me know what you would like to see on the site, what information is most helpful and if you have read my book, what you thought of it. Thanks to all of the readers who send me messages of encouragement every day. Knowing that "A Promise of Hope"  is giving hope and help to so many is a blessing and a joy to me.

Autumn