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Body Broken: A Memoir (2014)

by Lynne Greenberg(Favorite Author)

3.44 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

1299261043 (ISBN13: 9781299261044)

languge

English

genre

Memoir & Autobiography

publisher

Random House

review 1: Lynne Greenberg realistically, honestly, and poetically describes her life of chronic pain, the result of an auto accident when she was 19. She thought she was healed, but twenty years later, when her life was full of love, husband and children, and her career as a professor at Hunter College, she was dramatically besieged by searing, excruciating pain up her neck to the top of her skull. Her life became consumed by doctors, treatments, experiments, medications, pain management attempts--and eventually she faced the reality that she must learn to live with pain as a permanent guest in her life. This book will speak for many who live with chronic pain. It will also help those who care for them or who are bystanders to gain insight and empathy regarding such a condition. ... moreGreenberg's love of poetry is evident in her use of portions of poems to introduce each chapter, poems that concisely capture emotion and thought related to pain and what it does to the mind and soul of a person. Beautifully written.
review 2: When the author was nineteen, she broke her neck in a car crash, but miraculously recovered. Then, many years later, the pain in her neck returned with a vengeance. She relates the many different things she tried to make it stop, including a cocktail of drugs, many medical procedures and surgery, utilizing many different specialists along the way to varying degrees of success. However, nothing makes the pain go away completely.This book does give a small glimpse of how a life in chronic pain affects all relationships, especially family life. Primarily, it illustrates very well how self-focused and isolated the sufferer can beome. But what it does best is show how the author, a poetry professor before her disability hit, mostly finds solace with poems which seem to describe her experiences for her. As such, I felt less like I had read a memoir than I had a lesson in great poetry. She doesn't offer platitudes or inspiration learned from her journey, but frankly, the fact that she was able to actually write a book while in constant pain is inspiration enough. less

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