A Daughter's Story

I recently sat with Woodbury resident Joan Judson and spoke to her about her first book, “A Mother’s Heart: Beverly’s True Story.”(Authorhouse/$22.49 or $13.49 in paperback) Mrs. Judson tells the story of the horrific night her daughter Beverly was severely injured in a car accident in 1977.

“I faced all parents’ worst fear. I answered a knock at our door to find a police officer standing there. He had come to tell that almost two hours earlier the car our precious 19-year-old daughter was driving had been involved in a head-on collision,” Mrs. Judson relays in her book.

Ms. Judson told me in a recent interview at the Woodbury Public Library, where she will sign books on July 9 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m., that over the years there was much that prodded her to write her daughter’s story. 

“I truly believe it was a miracle. I think we all have little miracles that happen in our life, but if we don’t tell them to people. They just dissipate,” said Mrs. Judson, who became serious about writing the story three years ago.

Mrs. Judson began taking writing classes through Woodbury Parks and Recreation.

“I finally just decided I had to get busy and do it. For some reason my birthdays were going the wrong way and I was getting older,” joked Mrs. Judson. “I just had this really strong feeling it was supposed to be told.”

Mrs. Judson feels it is important to tell her daughter’s story and wants people know what she has been through and how far she’s come. 

“Beverley is an incredible woman for everything she has been through. She still has this sparkle—she has this secret that nobody else knows, and her secret is that life is good, live every day,” said Mrs. Judson.

Ms. Judson said she found her experience with writing very hard.

“I put my whole self in here. I said, ‘People are going to know me more than I ever wanted them to,’” Mrs. Judson said. “You will find a strong religious thread throughout [the book] but I think the people I would like to reach with this book, if it were too religious, would put it down. That is why I toned it down a couple times.”

Since the accident, Mrs. Judson’s daughter has not had it easy. She contracted Lyme disease, which went undetected for more than a year.

“The Lyme disease had gone into every part of her that was injured in the accident,” said Mrs. Judson. “She is still under constant medication and is no longer able to work. It is from the Lyme disease and arthritis attacking all the parts of her body that were hurt.” 

Mrs. Judson said her daughter had a spinal cord injury and severe internal injuries from the accident that left her with limited lung capacity. She has no memory of her childhood: for her, memory of life begins as she recuperated from the accident.

“The moral of the story is that you don’t give up,” said Mrs. Judson. “The doctors are in a hard position. They cannot simply say, ‘Well, we think she is going to be okay.’ They don’t always give you the best picture. Life’s a mystery answered after death”

Mrs. Judson believes she is the most unlikely person to write a book but added, “Since I started doing this, I started getting some really good feedback.”

“I wanted to keep it very factual. This is really what it is. My hope—and Beverly’s hope, too—is that somebody will read it and get help from it,” said Mrs. Judson.

Mrs. Judson continues her new love for writing by working on a new fiction book called “The Mirror.”

She has four children, Beverly being the youngest. 

“A Mother’s Heart” can be ordered directly through the publisher at www.authorhouse.com. The book is also available through Amazon.com, on Kindle and the Hickory Stick Book Shop in Washington Depot and at The Woodbury Library.