The Hard Work of Healing

By Brandon Gimbel M.D.

Reflections on grief, acceptance, and the quiet work of change.
Healing is rarely quick or simple. It is not about erasing pain or fixing what feels broken. It is about staying present with what hurts, and finding meaning and connection in the midst of it.

The Hard Work of Healing brings together twelve contributors from across the healing professions to explore what healing really looks like in practice. These essays are not about quick fixes or polished success stories. They explore moments of rupture and repair, the slow process of staying present with suffering, and the ways healing can emerge through attention, compassion, and connection.

Some chapters are clinical, others spiritual, and many deeply personal. Together they offer glimpses of a shared truth: that healing often begins not with solving pain, but with the willingness to stay with it.

Contributors include:
Michael Blumberg, L.C.P.C.
Carl Jerome
Tory Krone, A.M., L.C.S.W.
Reverend Katie Snipes Lancaster
Alan J. Levy, Ph.D.
Rabbi Steven Stark Lowenstein
Tovah Means, M.S., L.M.F.T.
Nancy Perlson, L.C.S.W., R.Y.T.
Jason Price, L.M.F.T.
Jean Schwab, M.S.W., L.C.S.W.
Courtney Wells, Ph.D.
Brandon Gimbel, M.D. (Editor)

Spare and reflective, this collection highlights the depth and humanity of healing work across disciplines. It serves less as a manual than as an invitation: to pause, to witness, and to trust that healing is possible in the difficult and ordinary places of life.

Edited by Brandon Gimbel, M.D., founder of North Star Behavioral Health, a psychiatry practice based in Northbrook, Illinois. Dr. Gimbel also curates North Star Conversations, a video interview series with local clinicians and community leaders.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0FR2V8HCH
• ISBN13: 9798999948502
• Release Date: September 2025
• Publisher: North Star Behavioral Health
• Length: 80 Pages
• Weight: 0.26 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.2" x 6.0" x 9.0"