Susan Beth Thomas was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. She was diagnosed at age ten with scoliosis, a curvature of the spine, and endured surgery for a spinal fusion at age eleven, but she still persevered through many of her early life challenges, including depression. During childhood and young adult life, she attended the Mt. Lebanon UP Church, which was a Godsend to her, as she learned she did not go life alone. Upon graduating from high school, she worked with small children over the course of twenty-five plus years, working in preschools, including with special needs children at a therapeutic preschool, and then she took a sabbatical to work with individual care as a full-time nanny for several families. Throughout the course of these pursuits and at the forefront to all her dreams and desires, compassion for children was her main focus. Susan never stopped listening to her heart.
Susan decided to pursue a college degree in education at age forty-two and attended Carlow University in Pittsburgh, in hopes of graduating and teaching in the state of Florida. She attended Carlow for three years and then transferred to Lynn University. Upon arrival at Lynn University, she changed her major to social work, thinking of pursuing that area of work with children. She graduated from Lynn University in 2010. Susan worked for two years with the elderly, and much to her surprise, she found compassion could still be at the core of her work and her life. She decided to pursue a master's degree in psychology and counseling, as they were closely related fields and would lead to her desire to be a child counselor. However, while in the third semester of her master's program, Susan was diagnosed with her disease, autoimmune hepatitis, which led her to research and to being able to fully write this book on living with a chronic disease daily. She now runs a support group in the community at large called Togetherness Helps and is the administrator and facilitator of the group, with most people attending twice monthly. Her own motivation and strength are what spur her on to want to help others in the same boat. She also has a website connected with the support group, www.Togethernesshelps.com. Even with this disease, Susan tries to lead a highly active life.
With compassion clearly present in this book, she gets it, she's lived it, and she knows "It is what it is-until faith changes everything."
