As with every show we present on Birth2Work Radio, we are extremely proud and honored to welcome today’s guest. One of the notable things about today’s guest though, is that you’ve probably already crossed paths with her in the general media. Oprah, Time Magazine, and a New York Times best-seller all tend to get a person’s name and story into the public consciousness pretty fast! But it was not for her notoriety that I was humbled to speak with Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor for today’s show - the fifth in our wide-reaching health series- it was to hear the words of a scientist describing how her mother helped her to heal after technology had done all it could.
Dr. Jill (as she likes to be called) repeats parts of her deeply personal and profound story about her eight year journey to recovery after experiencing a severe hemorrhage in the left hemisphere of her brain in 1996.
On paper, Dr. Jill’s recovery would tend to read more as fiction for a large part of the world’s scientific community, not because of a lack of understanding for the possibility of some stroke recovery, but for the extent of her recovery. After brain surgery to remove a tumor the traditional medical view for anyone having a stroke of her magnitude was to leave them without much hope for a life of any value. There was not much more they could do for her with known technology.
So everyone moved on, except her mother, who, when confronted with her daughter’s limp body, responded with a biological instinct. She wrapped her arms around her as she did when Jill was a baby, and went back in time. Jill, she thought, needed to move and rebuild her brain/body connection just as she had done when she was a child. Movement was mandatory.
Her mother’s instincts and her commitment were spot on. Dr. Jill’s recovery is now a sparkling ray of hope for millions. Eight years later, with only some loss of memory serving as a daily reminder of something physical that was taken away, Dr. Jill has stepped onto the public stage to tell her story of her physical recovery. (Watch the taped presentation she did for a recent TED conference to get the full story. It’s linked to below here in our media section.) What happened to her professionally, in her own scientific community, though, is a different story.
Our conversation yielded an “ah hah” for Dr. Jill, as well. “What if,” I asked her, “other mothers used the same process she put you through for your brain recovery to optimize their own babies growth and development? What might happen?” Dr. Jill hadn’t thought about it and expressed delight at the opportunity to consider it. “No one else has every asked me that question!” That's the type of question Birth2Work asks.
Because of her re-established ability to articulate, as an adult, what her brain went through to become whole again, Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor has been able to give language to processes and stages of development in the growth of the relationship between brain and body that mothers and care givers have intuited throughout time.
At Birth2Work, we believe that Jill Bolte Taylor's recovery is a fantastic story of how technology can technically help some someone to stay alive and how biology and a mother's instinct can help someone to truly live.
If you miss this show airing live today, you can stream or download the archive from our website, http://www.birth2work.org/radioshow.php. Talk with us at www.birth2work.org and/or through e-mail, info@birth2work.org. VOTE for your preferred location for upcoming Stakeholder Leader Workshops now being planned for 2009! Stay tuned to Birth2Work Radio, the Voice of the Community Stakeholder Leaders. .
Featured Guest
New York Times Best Selling author on Birth2Work Radio With Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, Neuroanatomist
Co-Hosts Elane V. Scott and Rick Stephens welcome Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor, one of TIME Magazine’s reigning “100 Most Influential People in the World,” to anchor Birth2Work Radio’s wide-reaching Health series. Given a research “opportunity” few would ever wish for, Dr. Taylor actually studied her own stroke as it was happening. It took eight years for Dr. Taylor to successfully rebuild her brain. She did so with the support of her mom who essentially took her daughter home from the hospital and cared for her as if she were an infant all over again. Dr. Taylor’s return to full functionality was dependent, just as the initial growth of children is, on everyone around her offering continuous gentle, positive reinforcement. Today, through her bestselling memoir, “My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey” and the YouTube video sensation of her 2008 TED Conference presentation, Dr. Taylor has become a powerful international voice for brain recovery. Please join us!
Media Links
Here are links that we found relevant to this show.
Brain researcher Jill Bolte Taylor studied her own stroke as it happened -- and has become a an internationally recognized voice for brain recovery. Watch her powerful presentation: Jill Bolte Taylor's Powerful Stroke of Insight
Dr. Jill was the premiere guest on Oprah's Soul Series webcast. Watch it here!
The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential The Institutes is a nonprofit educational organization that serves children by introducing parents to the field of early child development. Parents learn how to enhance significantly the development of their children physically, intellectually and socially in a joyous and sensible way.
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