April Brenneman
April Brenneman has resided with her husband in Tigard, OR. over 30 years where she home educated and raised her five children. With the diagnosis of cancer in her youngest child in 2004, she embarked on a personal and spiritual quest to understand the impact of her son’s medical journey on herself as well as her family. The trauma of childhood cancer, the chronic physical and emotional issues of survivorship led her to the process of writing, blogging and creating art with her son’s x-rays. Seeing the value of these practices she attended the 2014 Columbia University Narrative Medicine Workshop in New York. After returning home, she reached out to OHSU physician, writer and Director of Narrative Medicine, Elizabeth Lahti, to collaborate on creating a similar workshop in her beloved pacific northwest. Her work has been published in The Intima.