Brian Shaughnessy

BRIAN - QUADRIPLEGIC, WIDOWER, ATTORNEY, WRITER, DIRECTOR, PARENT OF SPECIA NEEDS SON, DEATH SURVIVOR & HAPPIEST MAN ALIVE!

Squeakywheelbook.com

The single word to describe Brian Shaughnessy is, "resilient." At age 14 Brian was hit on his bicycle by a car driven by a nurse. She left him to die in a ditch. He spent a month in the hospital and then began high school in a neck brace. Ten years later, Brian began to get numbness in his right arm. Three weeks of testing revealed a cyst in his spinal canal. He was assured surgery would help. He awoke from an eight-hour surgery quadriplegic. He worked tirelessly in rehab for four months. A month later, the numbness began to spread and another eight hour surgery was less than futile and decreased his function and he moved to an electric wheelchair.

But Brian returned to school and a RICH life. He has been involved in all aspects of theatre for better than 25 years. He holds an MFA and is a writer, director, actor and author of The Squeaky Wheel -- An Unauthorized Autobiography, his story of waking from surgery paralyzed from the neck down, and the incredible trials and triumphs that followed. A screenplay is in development and a film is pending.

Brian was founder and Artistic Director for Open Door Theatre - one of the first theatre companies by, for and about persons with disabilities. He received his JD from William S. Richardson School of Law, married, adopted a son with disabilities, Amadeus, and works in disability rights. He was director of the Education Assistance Program at the Disability Rights Legal Center at Loyola-Marymount School of Law. Brian's wife, Amy, was diagnosed with cancer and died in 2007.

Brian lives in Honolulu with his son, Amadeus, and CAME BACK FROM DEATH on June 15, 2006 to tell the story of his JOY to live this singular life.