When a two-hundred pound glass partition fell on Donna Fado Ivery’s head resulting in brain injury, disability, and chronic pain, she could no longer count on walking, speaking, thinking, or caring for her young children and husband. In her eighth year as a pastor, her ministry, too, seemed terminally compromised. With words awash, she painted her prayers and discovered in the images her path toward healing.
This inspirational memoir shares her struggle through medical, social, and church prejudice, and her support through the loving bond of family, community, and spirit. It was only through faith, prayer, and a new understanding of the miraculous ways that the Holy Spirit can work in our lives that she was able to eventually rise, function, realize, and share a newly refreshed and ever-unfolding relationship with God. Sleep, Pray, Heal: A Path to Wholeness and Well-Being charts the path through hardship and despair and offers a map—through scripture, theology, poetry, painting, and storytelling—to faith, healing, recovery and well-being.
In the twenty-five years since her injury, Donna Fado Ivery has served as featured preacher, painter, speaker, and lecturer at conferences, seminaries, workshops, and retreats across California and the United States. Sleep, Pray, Heal: A Path to Wholeness and Well-Being reflects the clarity and authenticity Donna brings to seekers of spiritual support and faith development. Last year a portion of Sleep, Pray, Heal: A Path to Wholeness and Well-Being placed in the William Wisdom-William Faulkner competition.