Erica falls in love with her Navajo students—along with their enchanting land, healing ceremonies, and rich traditions. She witnesses many miracles during this time and experiences her own miracle when the elders pray for her healing. She survives fearsome encounters with a mountain lion and a shapeshifting “skin walker.” She learns how to herd and butcher sheep, make fry bread, weave traditional rugs, and more.
Erica returns years later to serve the Navajo people as a medical doctor in an under-funded and under-staffed clinic, where she treats myriad ailments, delivers countless babies, and performs emergency procedures. When a medicine man offers to thank her with a ceremony, more miracles unfold.
About the Author:
Erica Elliott is a
medical doctor with a busy private practice in Santa Fe, New Mexico. A true
adventurer, she has lived and worked around the world. She served as a teacher
for Indigenous children on the Navajo Reservation in Arizona and in the
mountains of Ecuador. In 1976, she was one of the first American women to climb
Aconcagua, the highest mountain in the western hemisphere. She taught rock
climbing and mountaineering for Outward Bound and, after her first year of
medical school, she led an all-women’s expedition to the top of Denali in
Alaska. In 1993, Erica helped found The Commons, a cohousing community in Santa
Fe where she continues to live. She gave a TEDx talk about living in cohousing.
Referred to affectionately as “the Health Detective,” she treats patients who
come to her from all parts of the country with mysterious and
difficult-to-diagnose illnesses. Erica is a frequent radio guest and has given
workshops at various venues, including Esalen and Omega Institute.