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Last winter, Dr. Ann Millett-Gallant introduced some ideas for her upcoming memoir. You can read about that and see some artwork in a post on this blog from December 6th, 2012. I had just started to become familiar with Ann’s work through her writing and her short film called Basilisk. I love how dedicated she is to turning common ideas into unexpected possibilities. Great stuff!

Now her memoir is published. It’s called “Re-membering: Putting Mind and Body Back Together Following Traumatic Brain Injury.” This is a memoir about being physically disabled from birth and experiencing traumatic brain injury as an adult.  Ann writes about her accident, recovery, and discoveries along the way she made by doing research and writing. Each chapter has personal narrative, examples of her art, research on brain injury and art therapy, disability studies and other theories, information from her medical records, and voices from other relevant memoirs. She talks about the vital roles of family, friends and art in her recovery. The book provides hope and direction for others with a brain injury by sharing one survivor’s first-hand experiences.

So you can see why I love that she published this book. Art and brain injury: the heart of this documentary film! She’s even hosting an exhibition at The Art Therapy Institute in Carrboro, North Carolina, to celebrate on October 11th. The exhibition has paintings and collages that you’ll find in the book.

I think this one is very unique because of Ann’s lifelong personal experiences around disability and her professional experiences examining disability in art and teaching at The University of North Carolina, Greensboro. Having physical impairments her whole life, she has quite some beautiful things to say about acquiring impairments later on that people can’t see or might not notice right away.

I’ve just ordered the book online today. I’ll post a review here when I’ve read it. Stay tuned! And buy your own copy on Amazon at www.amazon.com/dp/1490524738.