SILENT SURVIVAL: Finding Myself in the Shadows of a Life I Didn't Choose is a powerful memoir about the invisible battles of caregiving for a disabled child, the quiet loss of identity and health, and the relentless effort to function in a world that doesn’t fully understand.

For years, keeping silent was how Lisa survived. As a mother raising a medically complex, disabled child, she learned to keep going by pushing down her own needs, fears, and struggles in order to stay strong for everyone else. What started out as a form of protection eventually became harmful. With no one to turn to and nowhere to be fully understood, the weight of everything she carried slowly began to show in her body, her relationships, and her sense of self.

The version of Lisa that she once knew no longer existed. She became “the special needs mom,” the advocate, the caregiver, the strong one — while the woman she had once been disappeared behind responsibility and exhaustion. What everyone saw was her strength. What they didn’t see was the cost of that strength: relentless hospital stays, the trauma she endured, the strain on her marriage, her relationship with alcohol, and years of unprocessed grief and stress she carried alone.

When her body reached its limit and started to fight back, Lisa was forced to confront what she had spent decades avoiding. She then faced her hardest battles yet — choosing sobriety, rebuilding her health, and learning how to find herself beyond survival mode while still coexisting with the ongoing chaos.

Written with rawness, sarcastic humor, and a lot of heart, Out of the Shadows is a story of special needs parenting, enduring the unseen, accepting what cannot be changed, and finding light after years spent in survival.

This book is for every caregiver and mother who has ever felt invisible inside of her own life. It is a reminder that your own life matters just as fiercely as the one you fight for.