The Marvelous Transformation. Emily A. Filmore
CHAPTER SEVEN
Love Handles, Moon Face, and Body Image
CHAPTER EIGHT
Adults Say the Darndest Things
CHAPTER NINE
Seeing the World in Technicolor
CHAPTER TEN
Sage
CHAPTER ELEVEN
They’ve Always Got My Back
CHAPTER TWELVE
Downward-Facing Dog
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I No Longer Fear Death, Nor Am I Inviting It In
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The Disease Does Not Define You
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Reality Check
APPENDIX
BIBLIOGRAPHY AND SUGGESTED READING
You are about to read one of the most inspiring, practical, and helpful books you could ever hope to lay your hands on. It is a book about an autoimmune disease, yet it is not about a specific illness so much as it is about a specific kind of healthfulness.
Emily’s story is a striking and encouraging example of how anyone can be mentally, emotionally, and spiritually healthy, even as they are physically unhealthy. This is a powerful kind of healthfulness that can even minimize the effects of physical disease. That is, it can be the greatest healing device, the greatest medicine, of all.
Yes, we’ve heard this before, but here is a living, breathing example of it that makes real all that we’ve been told about the power of the mind and spirit. These pages demonstrate the strength of the human spirit in the face of enormous challenges, the capacity of humor to transform difficult circumstances, and the immense resource that a partnership with the soul can provide to the body and the mind in the most testing situations.
You’ll find plenty of smiles and a few out-loud laughs here, along with a list of remarkably useful tools and strategies for dealing with a health condition that receives little attention by the national fundraising community, but which profoundly affects the day-to-day lives of millions of people.
My life has been deeply enriched by knowing Emily personally. She stands as a continual inspiration to me, and I am grateful to her for sharing her experience in such a personal way. It has given me strength as I meet the tests and trials of my own life. I know her story can affect you in the same way. On behalf of all of us, thank you, Emily Filmore, for your transformative transparency. We are blessed in you.
Neale Donald Walsch
New York Times best-selling author of Conversations with God
To Neale Donald Walsch: This book would not exist were it not for you, your mentoring, and your encouragement. Your work inspires me and our friendship warms my heart.
To Scott: Your dedication to this project has been inexhaustible. Thank you for reading the manuscript countless times, for allowing me to wake you in the middle of the night to rework a passage, and for always being you, my perfect companion.
To Rickey and Sage: The light and humor in our home is evident in the pages of this book. Thank you for your patience in dealing with a lack of groceries, a messy house, and my long hours of introspection.
To Mary and Dave Meehan, Tom and Marti Boling, and Jane Filmore: Your belief in me is unmatched. Your parental love and support gave me the courage to share this story.
To Drew, Laura, Lucas, Wendee, Grandma, Yvonne, Jaime, Amy C., Jon, Katie, Amy B., Laurie—all of my family members and friends: You have cheered me on, listened to me cry, helped me laugh, dissected details, read drafts, and always had my back. My life is made better by you, as is this book.
To Jaye Schnell, Bob Hansen, Wayne Zade, and Carl Helfrich: You, my most treasured teachers, helped shape who I am today. Each of you in your own ways have instilled in me a love of learning, the ability and desire to help people, the enjoyment of writing, and the skill of expressing myself more efficiently. I hope you find your hearts and souls reflected within these pages.
To Jami Lynn Sands: Your invaluable advice and expertise will help ensure my message goes far.
To Bill Gladstone: Thank you for finding the right publisher at the right time to get this work out into the world. I am forever grateful for your efforts.
To Central Recovery Press—the entire editing, design, and marketing team, and especially my editor, Eliza Tutellier: Thank you for believing in my story, and in my vision of hope and transformation. Your guidance has been invaluable.
And lastly, to Autoimmunity: Thank you for your gifts. I may not have chosen you, but I believe you and I are making the best of a difficult relationship.
You Can Heal Your Disease and It Can Heal You
“The concept ‘you create your own reality’ is the single most dangerous idea in spirituality today.”
The speaker was Neale Donald Walsch, the New York Times best-selling author on spirituality. I was sitting in Neale’s family room for a three-day brainstorming and writing session when he asked me how I was doing. Not in the passing sense as you might ask a friend on the street, but “How are you doing?” with emphasis on the “doing.”
I had been working for him for nearly three years, so he knew I had an autoimmune disease. He also knew I had almost missed this trip to his house due to multiple back-to-back infections.
As I launched into how I was doing, he stopped me and asked me to start from the beginning. He asked me to tell him how I became sick, what my exact diagnosis was, and what “they” were doing to help me. He wanted to hear the whole story.
An autoimmune disease can be loosely described as any one of numerous types of hypersensitivity or inappropriate immune responses the body has to substances normally present in the body itself. It is, in brief, an attack by the body on the body and is not fun.
Over eighty illnesses are caused by autoimmunity, and if you have any one of them (a significant portion of the population does), you know it. You certainly know you are miserable a lot of the time, even if you don’t know to call it an autoimmune disease.
When I was done telling Neale about all of this, he said, “Wow, you could write a book about that, and it would probably help a lot of people.”
It had never occurred to me that my disease could be of help to someone else. What I do know is that I would have given my eye teeth for a book on what I’ve been going through these past decades . . . something that would have told me what was going on, why it was happening, and how I should deal with it—even how I could celebrate it. Because now, after many years of struggle and suffering, I do experience my autoimmune disease as a springboard to personal happiness.
Yes, I said it: happiness.
Not