Embodying Empathy
Posted on August 5, 2022 by College Communications in Alumni Stories, Featured.
A version of this article originally appeared in the fall 2022 issue of STILLPOINT magazine.
From the full 26.2 miles to fun runs, marathon week in Boston means thousands of people are achieving meaningful, personal goals. For Cross Country alumna Keanna Smigliani ’21 (international affairs), a 5K charity run in April was not only a return from near-complete physical disability, but a symbol of overcoming trauma.
As Smigliani ran, she wasn’t thinking about getting a record time or a place on a podium. Instead, she thought of the incapacitated patients for whom she cares as a practice assistant in the Division of Trauma, Burn, Surgical Critical Care and Emergency General Surgery at Brigham and Women’s Hospital—a providential job after her own medical mystery was solved there.
Nearly overnight in 2019, a rare condition confined the lifelong athlete to bed and filled the proceeding years with excruciating pain, frightening symptoms and seemingly endless tests at hospitals. But before she was finally diagnosed with autonomic neuropathy/dysautonomia with preload failure and small fiber neuropathy, Smigliani encountered unexpected lessons on healing while studying abroad on the Balkans Semester for the Study of War and Peace.
The war victims who Smigliani met in Croatia often viewed their post-traumatic stress disorder as an affliction of the mind and body. “Any time people would talk about their trauma, they would describe it in a physical sense,” she says. “People’s bodies really absorb a lot.” Addressing conditions like PTSD, some found healing in physical, meditative practices like yoga.
The approach resonated with Smigliani, whose dysautonomia and neuropothy—a dysfunction of the nervous system that can be caused by physical trauma— may stem from the physical toll of the thousands of miles she has logged running. When she tried yoga for herself, Smigliani was amazed to find even more relief from physical symptoms like shaking and the inability to control her limbs.
Now equipped with a deeper understanding of how pain affects the whole body, Smigliani is discovering how her own experience of confronting and overcoming trauma has built empathy. “I think I’ve been given this gift of being able to carry really heavy burdens with a lot of grace,” she says.
“What intrigues me about trauma is how people heal from it—they take horrible things that have happened to them and turn them into something inspiring,” says Smigliani. “I want to bring together my experience as a patient and my experience understanding people with trauma. I have been the patient with trauma, and I still am the patient with trauma. I’m trying to be the person I wish I had on the other end of the phone.”
Share
- Share on Facebook
- Share on X (Formerly Twitter)
- Share on LinkedIn
- Share on Email
-
Copy Link
-
Share Link
Categories
Categories
Archives
- April 2025
- March 2025
- February 2025
- January 2025
- December 2024
- November 2024
- October 2024
- September 2024
- August 2024
- July 2024
- June 2024
- May 2024
- April 2024
- March 2024
- February 2024
- January 2024
- December 2023
- November 2023
- October 2023
- September 2023
- August 2023
- July 2023
- June 2023
- May 2023
- April 2023
- March 2023
- February 2023
- January 2023
- December 2022
- November 2022
- October 2022
- September 2022
- August 2022
- July 2022
- June 2022
- May 2022
- April 2022
- March 2022
- February 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- May 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2021
- December 2020
- November 2020
- October 2020
- September 2020
- August 2020
- July 2020
- June 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- March 2020
- February 2020
- January 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- October 2019
- September 2019
- August 2019
- July 2019
- June 2019
- May 2019
- April 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- January 2019
- December 2018
- November 2018
- October 2018
- September 2018
- August 2018
- July 2018
- June 2018
- May 2018
- April 2018
- March 2018
- February 2018
- January 2018
- December 2017
- November 2017
- October 2017
- September 2017
- August 2017
- July 2017
- June 2017
- May 2017
- April 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- January 2017
- December 2016
- November 2016
- October 2016
- September 2016
- August 2016
- July 2016
- June 2016
- May 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
- January 2016
- December 2015
- November 2015
- October 2015
- September 2015
- August 2015
- July 2015
- June 2015
- May 2015
- April 2015
- March 2015
- February 2015
- January 2015
- December 2014
- November 2014
- October 2014
- September 2014
- August 2014
- July 2014
- June 2014
- May 2014
- April 2014
- March 2014
- February 2014
- January 2014