Of Monkeys and Dragons: Freedom from the Tyranny of Disease
Michele Longo O'Donnell is a health care provider, minister and counselor. For the past twenty-five years, she has devoted her life to ending the suffering of disease through spiritual and metabolic healing. She currently pursues her passion as the director and founder of the Holistic Health Care Center in San Antonio, Texas. Her book, Of Monkeys and Dragons: Freedom from the Tyranny of Disease, was conceived to empower individuals to take control over the course of their illnesses. One of the book's main goals is to enable readers to order their lives so that they can live out of the range of disease.At seventeen, Michele entered a Catholic nursing school program and went on to become a registered nurse. One year later, she attended Case Western Reserve University where she completed two years of post-graduate work. Afterward, she worked as a critical care nurse in various hospital units, ranging  from the pediatric intensive care unit to the emergency room.In 1971, Michele left hospital nursing care for three years to attend a bible college at a non-denominational theological teaching center. During this time, she also provided health care to the center's three hundred members.Michele moved to San Antonio to help start a bible school in 1974. It was at that time she experienced a radical shift and ideological departure from Western medicine to holistic healing. A culmination of prior life experiences, witness to spiritual healings and a disenchantment with conventional therapy resulted in a growing belief in holistic treatment for the relief of disease-related suffering.Michele started the Holistic Health Care Center in San Antonio in 1976 for the treatment of degenerative disease. Her clinic combines spiritual and emotional healing with physical and metabolic treatment. She has treated thousands of patients, many of whom have been cured of a variety of degenerative diseases such as breast cancer, multiple sclerosis, asthma, lung cancer, lupus and many others.Michele currently resides in Canyon Lake, Texas with her husband, George O'Donnell. She has two daughters, Linda Longo and Lara Silva.