You Might
Live Twice
A surgeon's journey from stroke to self-mastery: a roadmap that may change your life too
You Might Live Twice is the raw, candid account of how Simon Kirby rebuilt himself from the brainstem up, and what he learned that anyone can use.
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He died on the gurney.
Then he rebuilt everything.
A surgeon's account of surviving a brainstem stroke, and the unconventional roadmap he used to reclaim his mind, his career, and his sense of self.
In January 2004, Simon Kirby was a facial plastic surgeon at the top of his field. By midnight, he was clinically dead. Ten days in a coma, three brushes with death, and a phone call that ended his surgical career forever, none of it broke him.
What he did next is the real story.
A physician who had to become his own patient
From a St. John's ICU to a pathology residency at forty-five.
You Might Live Twice is part memoir, part practical framework, written by a physician who had to become his own patient.
Kirby traces his path from a St. John's ICU to a pathology residency at forty-five, from clinging to the boards of an empty skating rink to publishing research at the intersection of AI and medicine.
Along the way, he developed what he calls smart neuroplasticity: a self-directed approach to recovery built on neuroscience, adaptive thinking, and a clear-eyed reckoning with who he was before the stroke.
The four pillars he outlines — spirit, mindset, movement and diet — are grounded in his own experience and designed to be adapted by anyone facing reinvention, not just survivors of catastrophic illness.
What happens when the person who fixes others can no longer function?
In You Might Live Twice, a facial plastic surgeon survives a catastrophic stroke and discovers that recovery begins somewhere medicine rarely looks: the spirit.
What if your greatest setback isn't the end of the story?
You Might Live Twice is for anyone who has ever had life change unexpectedly.
For anyone rebuilding. For anyone wondering what comes next. And for anyone who suspects that the most meaningful chapter of their life may still be ahead of them.
Book details
Title
You Might Live Twice
Subtitle
A surgeon's journey from stroke to self-mastery: a roadmap that may change your life too
Author
Simon Kirby, MD
Publication date
September 17
Formats
Paperback, Hardback & eBook
Price
Paperback = $26.99 CAD / Hardback = $36.00 CAD / eBook = $12.99 CAD
Extent
171 pages | 40,548 words
Publisher
Simon Kirby MD Media
ISBN
Paperback: 978-1-0679529-0-7
Hardback: 978-1-0679529-1-4
eBook: 978-1-0679529-2-1
You don't need a near-death experience to benefit from one.
Readers who found their way to this book are often at their own inflection point. If that is where you are, this is the right time to read it.
Pick up You Might Live Twice and read the story of a man who lost everything medicine had given him, and built something more honest in its place.