In 1989, Trisha Meili went for a run in Central Park at night. She was assaulted and beaten. She was in a coma for nearly two weeks. Trisha explains due to a traumatic brain injury she had to relearn everything. Through therapy she had to relearn to walk, to do simple math, and other things, so she could return to her job as an investment banker. She kept her identity a secret for 14 years, because of extensive publicity and she was reluctant to tell anyone she was the Central Park jogger. She came to believe in spiritual healing and how prayer can make a difference in the recovery process. If you like survival stories this book is for you. ( )

i know when i put this book on my to-be-read list back in 2007 that it was because i was working at a rape crisis center and the author writes about trauma recovery. today, though, that's not the story of hers that i wanted to read about. she was more than halfway through writing her book about recovering from a traumatic injury and assault when the people found guilty of her crime were initially exonerated (although still not thought innocent) and when the true perpetrator was found. she had no idea who they were or if they'd hurt her or not, because she has no memory of the incident, and never will because of the brain injury the attack caused. so this wasn't about them at all. this was just about her and her life and her recovery and in the end, about how best to help heal. and it's a decent book for that, but it's not what i was most interested in reading. i always find memoir hard to rate when the author tells a story that i'm less wanting to hear over another that they have and have every right to tell instead. it's not fair as it wasn't her purpose at all, but i would have liked to have read more of that other story, which she only glosses over. also, she writes that she hated how almost immediately the trials became about race when the issue should have been simply about a crime and its after-effects. perhaps it's just that i know the truth and have the benefit of knowledge she didn't, but that seems like white privilege screaming from the courtroom and a complete lack of understanding of how people of color are scapegoated in matters of "justice". so i found a lot lacking in that sense, in that awareness, but i don't honestly know that she should have known those things at that time. (i mean, she was told, and she believed, that these boys committed this major crime against her.) still, it made it a less interesting book to me.

i also feel like, because of the comprehensive national news coverage of her injuries and recovery at the time, and all the outpouring of support she was getting from strangers all over the country (world?), that she took for granted that the reader was already sympathetic. of course most will be, but i mean she doesn't work to connect the reader to her story in a way to keep them engaged beyond the headline that we already know if we're picking up this book. the story past the story, this is what i feel is partially missing here.

that said, it's always a good message - even for someone who isn't recovering from brain injury, but maybe is just aging or has had an illness they haven't 100% come back from - to remember that it's not just about what you can't do now that you used to be able to do, but it's also about what you can do now and sometimes even what you can do now that you couldn't before. but to always keep in mind that even if there are deficits and things aren't like they used to be, that there are other triumphs and things that you can still do and enjoy. it's where you lay your focus on those things that matters and that makes a difference both in your attitude and mood, and also, in the end, in your abilities. it's a message that i actually could use right now, so for that i'm glad i read it.

i do think, though, also that the lack of memory of the actual trauma is something that makes it easier for her (harder, too, i acknowledge, in other aspects) to move past than for people who have flashbacks and body memories and things like that. she will never have any idea what happened, other than what she read, and while usually i'd think that was awful, mostly in this case it seems a blessing. so the parts where she talks about what happened, because it's all taken from news reports and things she read, she tells with such a detached voice, it's almost another report about it. it doesn't feel like it was her, because she doesn't feel like it was her. that makes for an interesting way to write a book about recovering from that incident. it doesn't take away from what she's saying about her recovery and her message about mindfulness and refocusing, but it does make me wonder if or how her recovery would be different if she had any memory of the trauma itself.

this isn't an entirely satisfying (or unsatisfying!) a read. she's not a bad writer but she's not a skilled one either. (she's not a writer-writer. she's writing this to tell this story, not because she's a writer.) again, like the focus of the book, it's fine. wasn't great and wasn't what i usually gravitate to, but it's serviceable. it's not a bad book; i never minded picking it up after having put it down, it's just not what i was currently most wanting it to be. ( )

the story of her attack and its after effects is well done, her attitude is admirable but her story with its emphasis on JOGGING and other exercise is ultimately boring. ( )