Saving Sammy: Curing The Boy Who Caught OCD – TLC Book Tour

When Saving Sammy: Curing the Boy Who Caught OCD by Beth Maloney arrived for review, I picked it up and very nearly didn’t put it down until I finished it.

I don’t think I’ve blogged about my obsessive compulsive disorder much if at all, and the worst of it was when I was younger, but reading this story about Sammy, a seemingly average boy who suddenly began to slip into a progressively worsening case of OCD, brought back so many memories of my own.

In Sammy’s case, he became severely afflicted, nearly to the point of madness. His mind forced him to move through an impossibly intricate series of compulsions for each and every action he wished to take. If anything disturbed the sequence, he would have to start all over again. Just the act of getting in the car or changing rooms could take hours, and leave him in a state of total exhaustion.

His mother, Beth Maloney, took it upon herself to find a way to help cure her son. She fought tirelessly and mercilessly to find a cause, and when she discovered that the strep virus could possibly be connected, she fought against a medical community that would not support her. Finally, she found two doctors who believed in the connection, and they worked together to cure Sammy.

What struck me most beyond the manifestation of the disease itself, was the love and devotion of his mother. A mother’s instincts are her most powerful weapon, and Beth Maloney followed hers with a conviction unlike anything I’ve ever seen.

Thank you to TLC Book Tours for sending me a copy for review and allowing me to participate in the Saving Sammy book tour.