About Laurel

Laurel Braitman is a bestselling author, speaker, educator, and a trailblazer in the field of medical storytelling. She aspires to be the human equivalent of a casserole you bring people when the wheels fall off.

Laurel inspires healing and mental wellness through her books and her work as the Director of Writing and Storytelling at the Stanford School of Medicine’s Medical Humanities and the Arts Program and the Laurie J. Girand Center for Biomedical Ethics at Stanford. She is also the Founder of Writing Medicine, a global community of writing healthcare professionals. Her work has taken her to unexpected places from studying grizzly bears in Alaska, to stream ecology research in the Orinoco and Amazon. She’s made coffee for the Hell’s Angels, been a backpacking instructor, interned at NPR, taught high school in Colombia, done environmental conservation work in DC, gotten her PhD at MIT, and volunteered with grieving kids.
Today, as a thought leader in mental health, Laurel writes and teaches about healing, grief, and emotional wellbeing for all of us—humans and other animals—as reflected in her New York Times-bestselling Animal Madness and her memoir What Looks Like Bravery, about resilience born from loss. Her current book looks at women, horses and power and the ways that women riders, and their hidden histories, have shaped the world.
Laurel has reached millions of people via her workshops, keynote talks, books, and courses, guiding participants to write their own paths toward healing. In her teaching she encourages those who have experienced loss and other trauma—including and especially healthcare professionals– to communicate bravely and vulnerably in service of their own well-being and that of their patients and colleagues.
She lives and writes on her family’s ranch in Southern California, where she is also learning to shoot balloons at a gallop (aka cowboy mounted shooting).

Are you introducing Laurel on stage? Check out the media kit.

Image of New York Times Bestseller, Laurel S. Braitman, smiling

FAQ

Nope! Just kidding. Send an email to info@laurelbraitman.com and we’ll send you a list of resources.
Not really because Laurel doesn’t know how she managed to do that stuff herself (except the avocados, that was her parents’ thing first). But she does teach writing (look at the teaching page) and she is headed around the country to meet folks in person (look at events).
The best way to get her feedback is to enroll in a class or workshop Laurel is offering.
Okay, no one actually asks this question. Laurel just wishes they did. She does what she does because she thinks it’s pretty lonely to be a human being. And when we share our stories, and encourage other people to do the same, we all feel less alone. Cheesy, maybe…but true.