My Children, Listen [Hardcover]

Catherine Helene Toye M.D. (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 15, 1998

Dr. Catherine Toye was at the pinnacle of her career. A graduate of one of the nation's top medical schools, she was a partner in a successful radiology practice. Without warning, she fell victim to a rare form of Meniere's disease. In an instant, life as she knew it was over. A scientist by training, Dr. Toye had not relied on faith for answers. This book is her story of how, in the depths of physical pain and emotional anguish, she found God. Through journal excerpts and personal anecdotes, follow the author on a mystical journey that spans seven years. The extraordinary phenomena she witnessed, the words and messages she heard, defied her scientific training and became her way of life. "My Children, Listen" is a chronicle of courage. It is a story about finding our way home, a parable of hope and faith, and a love story.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...the book is extremely powerful and shows the face of a wonderfully compassionate and understanding God. Even if one does not believe in Toye's mystical experiences one will be inspired by this book. For those who do believe it will be a comfort." -- Peggy Weber; Catholic News Service; Author: Weaving A Family

"This is a majestic account of how illness and spiritual understanding often intersect. Anyone doubting the role of spirituality in health and illness should read this inspiring book." -- Larry Dossey, M.D.; Author: Be Careful What You Pray For; Prayer Is Good Medicine; Healing Words;; Executive editor, Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine

A busy physician and mother, Dr. Catherine Helene Toye woke up one morning to find herself the victim of a disabling illness that left her unable to practice medicine. Little did she know how this tragic occurrence would bring her to God and give her a new purpose: to participate in the healing of the world. -- Father Paul Keenan, Author: Good News For Bad Days: Living A Soulful Life, Radio Host, As You Think (WOR) and Co-Host, Religion on the Line (WABC)

A dramatic and authentic account of her experience of God reaching through her sickness to give her sustaining mystical experiences...^T -- Morton Kelsey, The Other Side of Silence

I am struck by the high drama of the story...I admire the courage of this remarkable woman and found that her narrative was articulate and inspirational. -- Stanley Krippner, PhD, Saybrook Institute0

From the Publisher

My Children, Listen by Catherine Helene Toye, M.D. is an inspiring autobiographical account of extraordinary mystical experience and God's sustaining love in our human struggle. In that struggle, at the depth of feeling powerless, the power in being powerless manifest itself in Catherine Toye's life--transforming: agnosticism to faith, despair to hope and grief to joy.

She was a busy physician, and single mother of two, but Catherine Toye awoke one morning to find her world shattered. She writes, "I was 38 years old, happy, successful... Suddenly it was all over. One December morning I simply could not get out of bed... The room was spinning round and round..." It was her first episode of Meniere's disease, an inner ear disorder affecting balance and hearing. It was the beginning of life with chronic disabling illness that would involve more than her ears, and it was the end of her medical practice.

Devastated at her losses, anguished, wondering how she would physically care for her two young children, she sank into despair. Five weeks into illness, still bedridden, broken in body and spirit, she had her first mystical experience. She writes, "I heard a voice but I did not just hear it. I saw and felt the words spoken... Immediately, in a familiar, entirely commonplace manner, and without fear, I recognized the presence speaking to me as God." The force of this encounter, immersed in our Creator's boundless love, transformed her life--a spiritual world had opened all around her.

She told her grandmother first, "The God you've been praying to all these years is really there!" Her mystical experiences left her with the certainty that there is meaning and purpose in every aspect of our lives, even illness and loss.

Faced with chronic pain, constant loud ringing in her ears, nausea, dizziness, and fatigue, often bedridden by vertigo, she struggles to raise her children despite on-going setbacks and suffering. However, an awesome spiritual reality sustains her. My Children, Listen chronicles this powerful story over seven years in a combination of prayer journal excerpts and personal anecdotes.

Many entries are poignant and deeply moving, such as healing the sense of loss caused by her father's death when she was four; or facing medical complications that threatened to leave her own children motherless. The intensity of her experience is lightened by a winsome ability to find humor in her difficulties, such as a visit to the vet with an injured, talking parrot.

The mystical experiences she describes range from profoundly simple and beautiful to incredible, startling and fascinating. My Children, Listen includes many "locutions." The author describes these as communications from God, "... `heard' not with my ears but within my heart."

Whether you believe or not, upon reading the book through, there is a clear sense of an on-going and deepening relationship between the author and a distinct other Being.

She is the first to acknowledge those who will doubt her. She writes, "I do not have a theological background. Until the day I had a spiritual experience myself, I did not believe in their existence. There had been no room in my analytical, scientific, medical thinking for such an occurrence... To those skeptical of what I relate, I can only say, I understand." Her background as physician lends a unique perspective to her new life as patient and a disarming credibility to her account of mystical experience. In an eloquent but matter of fact style, devoid of self-pity or effort to embellish the dramatic events that unfold, she lays bare the shared bonds of our humanity.

The honest portrayal of our human frailty does more than document our common struggles and the questions that plague us about suffering and death. It is a compelling response--a manifestation of God's love for us in all our human weakness. At the least you will be inspired by the courage of one person in the face of adversity. But if you are receptive, you will hear God speaking to all His children, and feel the comfort and transforming power of His love for each of us in the pages of My Children, Listen.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 360 pages
• Publisher: Caritas Communications Inc (August 15, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0966308808
• ISBN-13: 978-0966308808
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,154,992 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A true story of faith and courage, January 6, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: My Children, Listen (Hardcover)

This book is gorgeous. It's amazing to think that something like this could happen in our lifetime -- that a working mom, a doctor no less, could wake up one morning and not be able to get out of bed. From one day to the next, her life changed. And then God spoke to her. The book is a quiet and humble account of her personal relationship with God. You can feel unconditional love as you read it.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book is extraordinary--and so elegantly written., January 24, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: My Children, Listen (Hardcover)

"My Children, Listen" is amazing. It was uplifting to me in a time of deep distress, and will do the same for everyone. This book is extraordinary and its message is conveyed with elegance by the author. Worth reading again and again.

3.0 out of 5 stars Not enough information on Meniere's disease, May 25, 2010

By 

B. Burleson "goldenoldie" (Thomasville, Pa USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: My Children, Listen (Hardcover)

Small amount on information on living with the disease and options on healing. Large book but not much on Meniere's.If you really want help on the disease, read Meniere's Disease-What You Need To Know by P.J.Haybach.