For Chavez, an elementary school librarian and mother of two boys, the signs of mounting anxiety and depression had been present for a while, though she had done her very best to ignore them. Then, one night, while her husband was away on business, Julie found herself locked in a debilitating panic attack that threw her life into a tailspin. The terrifying aftershocks left her grappling with questions about the origin of her anxiety and where it would lead next. What follows is a funny, unflinchingly open account, offering an intimate portrait of how one woman found her way back from the edge.

Based on O’Connor’s own trailblazing neuroimaging work, research in the field, and her real-life stories, The Grieving Brain combines storytelling, accessible science, and practical knowledge that will help us better understand what happens when we grieve and how to navigate loss with more ease and grace.

Alisha’s “What If” year reveals that she can achieve success on her own terms by embodying the spirit of the intern: never stop learning, be flexible, and understand that failure is a prerequisite for growth. For anyone who’s ever felt stuck in a rut, My What If Year proves that it’s never too late to say yes to second chances and explore the roads untraveled throughout your life.

In 1957, when Amy Turner was four-years-old, her father had to be talked down from a hotel ledge by a priest. The story of his attempted suicide received nationwide press coverage, and he spent months in a psychiatric facility before returning home. From then on, Amy constantly worried about him for reasons she didn't yet fully understand, triggering a pattern of hypervigilance that would plague her into adulthood.

What if your first love was a forbidden one? At 23, Felice Cohen was--like other recent college grads--hesitant about entering the real world with the added stress of coming out in the early '90s. Focused on how to land a full-time position as a writer, falling in love was the last thing on her mind. But fall in love she did. With her boss, a woman 34 years older.

Dr. Gregory Weber appears to have an enviable life. He's a renowned clinical psychologist residing in an elegant home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with his wife, Liv, and their two kids. But Gregory feels increasingly disconnected. His marriage is strained, his children are distant, and he can’t stop fixating on an unforgivable mistake he made when he was seventeen. Something no one else knows about.

Most of us are born with the ability to breathe freely and naturally, but as the years go by, our breathing becomes labored—compromised by fear, disappointment, trauma, and pollutants. So we contract our breathing body and create ways that feel protective of our vulnerable selves but actually constrict the oxygen intake and thus the nourishment our body receives. In The Breathable Body, Robert Litman shares the insights and practices he has discovered during more than 30 years of professional experience in conscious breathing and movement.

A few years ago, Kris Carr’s world was falling apart. Her father was dying, she had to pivot her business because of the pandemic, and she was on the verge of reaching her twenty-year milestone of living with an incurable Stage IV cancer diagnosis. While sitting in a CVS parking lot, she broke down, finally allowing herself to feel the massive stress and sadness she had been suppressing in order to seem strong for those around her, and for herself. And then she asked herself, “If embracing my intense emotions helped me feel even the slightest bit better, why was I so determined to avoid them?"

When Jane, a world-famous Harvard oncologist, suddenly collapses at work, the medical team resuscitating her makes a shocking discovery: she has advanced breast cancer that she’s been hiding for years. The results are catastrophic. In Sickness shows how even the most rational people can be nearly destroyed by their irrational fears. Tragic, moving, and wryly funny at times, this is an unflinching portrayal of a complicated marriage and its secrets.

When Melissa Gould’s husband, Joel, was unexpectedly hospitalized, she could not imagine how her life was about to change. Overwhelmed with uncertainty as Joel’s condition tragically worsened, she offered him the only thing she could: her love and devotion. Her dedication didn’t end with his death. Melissa soon realized that her and Joel’s love lived on. Melissa found she didn’t fit the typical mold of widowhood or meet the expectations of mourning. She didn’t look like a widow or act like a widow, but she felt like one. Melissa was widowish.

If you are feeling bewildered and lost in grief, this book is the companion you need. At some stage, everyone experiences grief. Whether you consciously experience it or not is a choice. In Conscious Grief, you’ll discover ideas on how to support yourself as you grieve through self-care practices, therapies, modern mourning, spiritual seeking, and navigating triggers that abound in the sensitive mourning state.

As a child, Jory Fleming was wracked by uncontrollable tantrums, had no tolerance for people, and couldn’t manage the outside world. Slightly more than a decade later, he was bound for England, selected to attend one of the world’s premier universities. How to Be Human explores life amid a world constructed for neurotypical brains when yours is not. But the miracle of this book is that instead of dwelling on Jory’s limitations, those who inhabit the neurotypical world will begin to better understand their own.

When Stephanie Land set out to write her memoir Maid, she never could have imagined what was to come. Handpicked by President Barack Obama as one of the best books of 2019, it was called “an eye-opening journey into the lives of the working poor” (People). Later it was adapted into the hit Netflix series Maid, which was viewed by 67 million households and was Netflix’s fourth most-watched show in 2021, garnering three Primetime Emmy Award nominations. Stephanie’s escape out of poverty and abuse in search of a better life inspired millions.

Dana Trent is only a preschooler the first time she uses a razor blade to cut up weed and fill dime bags for her schizophrenic father, King. While King struggles with his unmedicated psychosis, Dana’s mother, the Lady, a cold and self-absorbed woman whose personality disorders rule the home, guards large bricks of drugs from the safety of their squalid trailer. But when the Lady impulsively plucks Dana from the Midwest and moves the two of them south, their fresh start results in homelessness and bankruptcy.

The planet is burning, friends and family are falling to cults and QAnon, and we’re all living through the collective trauma of a global pandemic. Among therapists and healers, burnout is rampant; hopelessness and despair are, too. In The Grieving Therapist, psychotherapists Larisa Garski, LMFT, and Justine Mastin, LMFT, give voice to the difficulties of therapising in today’s world—and offer a grief-informed framework for taking care of yourself as you take care of others.