Siana's Publications
COMING SOON!
The Sweet Spot:
Breathwork and Embodied Self-Care for People Living with Diabetes
by Siana J. Wood, RN
Our health care system does a solid job of instructing folks on the tasks required to manage their diabetes: check and track blood sugar, measure food, count carbs, take insulin or medication, check blood pressure, have regular eye, kidney, and foot exams, keep supplies on hand for the inevitable low and high blood sugars, attend appointments. As a nurse and diabetes educator, I have had the honor of helping many patients learn that extensive and often unwanted job description. But as both a patient and a clinician, I've seen (and lived) the "missing links" in modern diabetes care: a genuine discussion of how enormous (and stressful) the job is, and self-care strategies that are as multi-faceted as we are asked to be about our diabetes management. Diabetes, which both requires pain (fingersticks, injections, medications) and can cause it, can be uniquely disembodying – causing us to no longer feel at home in our bodies. This separates us both from our own innate selves and the ability to thrive, relax, and enjoy the many other parts of our lives. In this first-of-its-kind guide, I welcome you to explore embodied practices to help ease and shift the emotional challenges and stress of diabetes, reconnect you to your inner wisdom, and build a holistic self-care routine that supports and restores you and incorporates the voice of best diabetes expert there is: YOU.
The Exceptional Nurse:
Tales from the Trenches of Truly Resilient Nurses Working with Disabilities
Edited by Donna Carol Maheady, ARNP, EdD
Siana contributed a chapter about her experiences working as a nurse with Type 1 diabetes to this inspiring anthology. Read on for a brief description. They’re strong. They’re persistent. They’re resilient. They’re exceptional nurses. Read the true, inspiring stories of nurses with disabilities who overcame significant odds—managing physical and mental challenges on the job—and continued to be a nurse through it all. You’ll read of a nurse who has a learning disability and developed his own system of accommodation. You’ll find out about a nurse who experienced an amputation after many conservation surgeries and found a way to keep working. You’ll learn about a nurse who worked through a terrifying hurricane and developed mental illness, and learned important lessons about herself to help her conquer it, and continue being a nurse. You’ll hear the stories of what it’s like to lose hearing while on the job as well as develop vision deficits while nursing. In all these stories, the nurses’ resilience is what helped them pull through adverse situations, made them stronger and more effective nurses in the end. Also included is practical information on how to navigate the vocational rehabilitation system including a guide to requesting services, a sample accommodation request letter to share with an employer, as well as information on how to best disclose a psychiatric disability. Whether you’re a nurse or a student with a disability or you care about a nurse with a disability, this book will leave you inspired and prepared to be an exceptional nurse yourself.
Reflections On A Life With Diabetes:
A Memoir In Many Voices
Edited by Diane M. Parker
Siana contributed a poem about being diagnosed with diabetic retinopathy to this anthology by a group of writers living with diabetes. In this candid anthology, the authors take you on a tour of their experiences living with diabetes. This is not a technical or scientific book but one that exposes the tender emotions of living with this chronic disease. There is humor, warmth and compassion in these poems and stories written by diabetics, their families and friends. Lisa Haynes talks affectionately about her mother's feet in her poem, "Feet Like Small Children"; we learn what it's like for a mother to discover her young daughter has diabetes in Anne-Leigh Parrish's, A Whole New World"; Wilson and Kartonis take us into their playful fantasy about food in, "Living the Sweet Life"; and Cheri and Jade Brooks give us different perspectives on the same hypoglycemic episode in, "Inferno," and "Mirrors in the Sun." These are but a few of the narratives you'll find in these pages. This is the first book of its kind to introduce you to the emotional workings of diabetes from a creative nonfiction point of view. It incorporates all aspects of diabetes, from diagnosis, to complications and, finally, survival.