Together A Memoir of a Marriage and a Medical Mishap

Novelist and poet Judy Goldman's inspiring account of the mishap that left her husband paralyzed, how it tested their marriage, and their struggle to regain their "normal" life.

When Judy Goldman’s husband of almost four decades has a routine spinal injection to alleviate back pain, he is instantly paralyzed from the waist down—a phenomenon no doctor can explain or undo. She’s forced to take over, navigating the byzantine medical world they suddenly find themselves in. Her husband is forced to give in. This is the starting point for Together, which looks at the changes every couple faces—the slow, ordinary ones brought about by time and the sudden, dramatic ones that take us by surprise. Identities shift; roles switch. How do we adjust?  How do we let go of the if-onlys? Together is a deeply honest story about the life we dream of and the life we make—an elegant and empathetic meditation on what happens to love, over time and all at once.

JUDY GOLDMAN is the author of two memoirs, two novels, and two collections of poetry. Her work has appeared in USA Today, Washington Post, Real Simple, Literary Hub, Southern Review, Gettysburg Review, Kenyon Review, Crazyhorse, Ohio Review, Shenandoah, Prairie Schooner, and elsewhere. She received the Hobson Award for Distinguished Achievement in Arts and Letters, the Fortner Writer and Community Award for "outstanding generosity to other writers and the larger community," the Irene Blair Honeycutt Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Beverly D. Clark Author Award from Queens University.