Koi Who Climbed the Waterfall: A Memoir of Medical Self-Advocacy, Survival, and Learning to Be Heard

You know something isn't right.

But no one is listening.

Born with achondroplasia, a type of dwarfism, she entered the medical world before she could even speak. By the time she was a year old, doctors didn't expect her to survive. But survival was only the beginning.

What followed was a lifetime of hospitalizations, surgeries, and moments where being heard could mean the difference between life and death.

From a mother who refused to stay silent...
To becoming a patient who learned to speak up...
To fighting for her own daughter in a system that didn't always listen...

The Koi Who Climbed the Waterfall is a powerful memoir of resilience, survival, and the hard-earned skill of medical self-advocacy.

Through deeply personal experiences-including being dismissed by doctors, navigating life-threatening complications, and making critical decisions in real time-this book reveals what every patient, parent, and caregiver needs to know:

• How to recognize when something is wrong-even if others don't see it
• When to trust your instincts and push back
• How to communicate in a way that gets results
• Why choosing the right doctor can change everything
• What it truly means to advocate for yourself and the people you love