Pilgrimage: A Doctor’s Healing Journey
MEDIA KIT
Donna Chacko is available for interviews on podcasts, blogs, radio, television, virtual book clubs and more. To book Donna, please contact us here. You can access information about the book and author using the menu links below.
Press Release
(University Park, MD, July 2022): CATHOLIC MEDIA ASSOCIATION PRAISES PILGRIMAGE: A DOCTOR’S HEALING JOURNEY BY DR. DONNA CHACKO AS A TOOL TO HELP EACH OF US HEAL [pdf]
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NOTE: To download the headshots, please select from these links: Print Versions | Web Versions
Book Cover
2. Awards & Critical Acclaim
Amazon Best Seller
2022 Catholic Media Association-First Place in Marriage and Family, First Place in Self Published Books, Honorable Mention in Self Help and Healing
2022 Illumination Book Awards—Gold Medal Winner
2022 Reader Views Literary Awards—Gold Medal Winner
2022 Readers’ Favorite-5 Star Winner
Professional Book Review in Family Medicine, STFM Journal, Oct. 2022 https://journals.stfm.org/familymedicine/2022/october/br-oct22-huntington/
“Readers will come away with a broader understanding of health, the power of prayer, and the many paths toward personal and spiritual fulfillment.” — Kenny Lin, MD, MPH, deputy editor, American Family Physician
“In this extraordinary memoir, Donna describes the pain, sorrow, loss, and hope she experienced as she tried to understand who she is, to whom she belongs, and where she is going. Her words are a witness to all of us, as she encourages us to make our own journey, with God at our side, to new happiness, peace, and life.” — Janelle Goetcheus, co-founder of Christ House
“She gently opens her heart and our eyes to the healing power of self-reflection, prayer, and self-care.”—Lisa Banks-Williams, psychiatric nurse practitioner, educator, and pastor
“By drawing on her professional experience, family story, and faith, Dr. Chacko offers a compelling path to wholeness of body, mind, and spirit.” — Jem Sullivan, author and educator
3. Book Summary
Every Journey Starts with a Single Step.
On the outside, it looked like Donna Chacko had it all—lucrative and rewarding career, beautiful family, comfortable home. But inside, Donna was in turmoil. Her marriage was on the brink, crises were brewing, and her home felt like her heart— about to break.
In Pilgrimage, Donna lays her life bare as she digs into her upbringing, relationships, life choices, and fears in a deeply personal journey toward healing and wholeness. Join her as she surrenders her control and discovers that serenity and health are most easily grasped when our hands and hearts are open to what God longs to give us.
Packed with hard-won insights, this inspiring memoir includes practical advice for beginning your own pilgrimage toward health in mind, body, and spirit.
4. Author Bio
Donna Chacko is a medical doctor who loves to share what she learned about healing during her decades practicing medicine and her long difficult marriage. Donna practiced radiation oncology and later family medicine. She and her first husband raised three daughters in Florida. After his death, she moved to Washington, DC, where she cared for the poor until 2013. Now retired, Donna lives in Maryland with her second husband and works in the ministry she founded, Serenity and Health. In September 2021 she was designated a Changemaker by the Institute for Lifestyle Medicine. Her book Pilgrimage: A Doctor’s Healing Journey, has won several awards including the 2022 Catholic Media Association book awards 1st Place, Marriage & Family Living; 1st Place, Self-Published Book; and Honorable Mention, Healing & Self Help.
5. Interview Topics & Sample Questions
Interview Topics
What Does Faith Have to Do With Health?
Since the mind, body, and spirit are connected, one cannot enjoy whole health unless all three parts are healthy and balanced. In my medical practice and my life, I witnessed and experienced suffering and learned the many ways the mind, body, and spirit can work together to create abundant health and closeness to God.
Three Keys to Being Holy, Happy, and Healthy
We all want to be more holy, happy, and healthy. I share my formula for improving these three areas of your life. 1. You control your health more than you think you do. 2. Experience the Miracle of Tuning In [staying in the moment, listening]. 3. Know that God is Linked to Your Health
2 Prayer Practices that Transformed My Life and Can Transform Yours
How is your prayer life? Do you make time for God? I didn’t always. Once I learned these two prayer practices, I was able to connect with God more regularly and deeply. The first is a meditative prayer in which I savor God’s presence during a dedicated period of silence. The second is an on-the-go prayer which I describe as God-centered mindfulness.
Moving from Medicine to Ministry: Why I Had No Choice and What You Can Learn
Though I loved my profession, I learned that, for me and many others, abundant or whole health cannot be achieved without a deep and trusting relationship with God.
You have More Power Over Your Health Than Your Doctor Does
We too often downplay our profound ability to influence our own health. Instead of dealing with the many steps we can take to heal our minds, bodies, and spirits, we surrender the power and responsibility to our doctors and rely on pills and procedures to make us feel better. I show you how to reclaim power over your own health.
5-Step Rx for Less Stress and More Resilience.
Are you snapping at your children or partner, sleeping poorly, or hurting? Feeling overwhelmed with your life? Drowning in negative media and bad news? We all face stressful situations that make us feel trapped. I share my proven 5-step Rx for Less Stress and More Resilience. Make a commitment to build your resilience. Make time for silence. Retrain your brain. Retrain your body. Turn to a higher power.
Fours Steps to Make Asking for Help Easier…and More Rewarding.
Do you find it hard to ask for help? Do you feel like you are imposing or admitting weakness if you seek help? Asking for help can be hard, but it can also be necessary—and rewarding. The key ingredients are building community; giving and receiving; creating opportunities for personal growth, and networking. I elaborate on the key ingredients and how each of us can benefit ourselves and others by asking for help.
I Was Programmed to Always Work Hard—What I Lost and Finally Learned
Do you work too hard? Is hard work tied to your virtue and sense of self-worth? I grew up considering only the benefits of working hard. It took many years, personal and family suffering, psychotherapy, and writing a memoir to help me recognize the losses.
Sample Questions
When you started out with this book idea, did you intend to write a memoir?
What made you decide to study medicine?
When did you and your first husband get married? How old were you?
Your first marriage had its ups and downs. Were there any warning signs while you were dating ?
What was it like to put your life down on paper? Were some moments harder to tell than others?
What message do you hope that your readers will take away from your book?
After being a successful cancer doctor, you made an unusual mid-career decision to retrain as a family doctor. What drove you to do this?
What is Christ House and how did you end up working there?
In Florida, you had a certain type of lifestyle—large home on the water, girls in private schools, lavish vacations, and help. What was it like when you moved to Washington, DC to work at Christ House?
How big of a role did your faith play in your life as it was in Florida compared to what it is today?
You have a faith-based mission called Serenity and Health. How did it start?
What is the mission of Serenity and Health, the blog, website and programs that you offer?
If you were to write a second book, what would it be about?
6. Purchase Information
$14.99 paperback | $7.99 Kindle
Amazon and Barnes & Noble
ISBN: 1643886525
PUBLISHER: Luminare Press, LLC
7. Social Media and Contact Information
Twitter: @DonnaChacko
Facebook: facebook.com/serenityandhealthdc
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/donnachacko
Email: dc@serenityandhealth.com
Book Page: SerenityandHealth.com/pilgrimage
8. Excerpts
Crisis and Quicksand
“…during the crisis in my marriage I was participating in a powerful battle between God, me, and the devil; between my true self and my false self; my will and my conscience; and, paralyzing indecision about what to do. This created an agonizing quagmire of conflict and confusion—like quicksand.”
Faith is a Decision
“Somewhere along the line I discovered the amazing fact that faith is a decision…it is not some powerful wave of emotion that overcomes an unsuspecting unbeliever.”
A Tangled Knot
“Suffering is so much more than a list of diseases. I know how much my family suffered because of the marital strife between Jacob and me. I saw in the family medicine clinic how stress from relationships and difficult life circumstances aggravated pain, blood pressure, and diabetes. I was starting to appreciate how suffering of the mind, body, and spirit could become so tangled as to create a hard knot that was very difficult to unravel.”
God, the Great Physician
“As I found my own path to abundant health, I realized it was much broader than the traditional path I’d been promoting as a doctor. I reflected over the preceding few years and saw how I had experienced firsthand what I had observed so often in the clinic and at Christ House, namely that stress can devastate health because of the complex interplay of mind, body, and spirit. Now I had to take advantage of this interplay in order to heal. Most significantly, I also was realizing the many ways my faith contributed to my well-being. God, the great physician, was definitely walking with me.”
Face the Pain
”Honestly admitting to and facing the pain is the first step to change and growth. When the pain we allow ourself to fully experience is greater than the pain and anxiety we think that change will bring, we will take our first brave steps to change.”
9. Book Trailer
YouTube link: https://youtu.be/33o-5qGritg
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