Identity Theft

Debra Meyerson, a Stanford University professor, shares her emotionally powerful journey to rebuild her identity and redefine herself after suffering a debilitating stroke. She effectively blends her expertise about personal identity with her own journey and that of other survivors into a story that can help and inspire anyone robbed of capabilities that challenge their sense of self following injury. In 2010, Debra Meyerson suffered a severe stroke in which she lost all speech and was paralyzed on her right side. Identity Theft centers on Debras experience: her stroke, her extraordinary efforts to recover, and her journey to redefine herself. She draws on her skills as a social scientist and conversations with dozens of fellow survivors, family members, friends, colleagues, therapists and doctors to paint a new picture of the emotional journey through the identity-based challenges born from stroke and other accidents and illnesses that rob people of important capabilities. She shares amazing personal stories and uses them to illustrate lessons we can all learn from. Who are you after a stroke? How do you grieve the loss of you? Who do you become during your recovery? This is not a how-to book for recovery, nor will it tell you what you'll experience or how you should deal with the loss of ability, but it's a book full of hope for stroke survivors. It gives them and their support network a broad picture of what might lie ahead. And it explores some critical questions that, in the more prevalent focus on physical recovery, are all too often overlooked in the effort to help people who have lost capabilities from stroke or otherwise: What is really important to me? How do I fit in? Who am I now? How do I define myself in the face of my more limited abilities?