Author Maria McCutchen

Maria McCutchen is the author of It’s all in Your Head, her memoir telling her story of what she endured after being diagnosed with a rare brain cyst, followed by multiple surgeries, complications, and her quest to regain her health and life. It is a moving book that helps bring awareness, not only to other people living with a brain cyst, but to the medical community who do not fully understand this rare phenomenon.

Growing up in a medical family gave Maria her love of medicine. She worked for many years in the medical field, working in physician’s offices, but left the field thirteen years ago to become a fulltime mom. During her first years of motherhood, Maria developed her skills of writing and started her freelance writing career. She has never looked back.

Maria grew up in Atlanta with her father a family physician and her mother a nurse.  She lived in several cities throughout her life; including, Orlando, Albuquerque, and Chattanooga, and currently resides in North Carolina with her two beautiful boys, and her equally as beautiful, Standard Poodle, Murphy.

It’s All in Your Head – A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain by Maria McCutchen

Click on image to buy from Tate Publishing

Maria McCutchen did not have time to be sick. With a husband who had just lost a job, two young sons, and a cross-country move on the horizon, who had time to be sick? Maria didn’t have time for a common cold, let alone a major medical condition. But one day while shopping in the grocery store where she had shopped hundreds of times before, she couldn’t find the milk. It was then she knew what she was feeling was more than just stress or exhaustion. There was something very wrong.

After consulting a few doctors, Maria discovered she had a rare brain cyst known as a posterior fossa arachnoid cyst—a very large brain cyst. Hearing these cysts were normally asymptomatic was of little comfort, especially because she felt her mind and body slipping away more and more every day. Normal mental and physical functions were becoming harder to control. Even if the doctors didn’t believe the cyst was a problem, she knew it was.

It would take months of living inside a shell of a person that she’d become, months of living in a mental fogginess and sometimes even physical pain, before she would finally get the medical attention she needed. It’s All in Your Head chronicles her harrowing medical odyssey and her attempts to regain some sort of semblance of her old life after treatment.

Maria McCutchen’s Recent Posts

• How to get a Night’s Sleep with Brain Problems by Maria McCutchen
  A contribution by Maria McCutchen, author of "It's All in Your Head - A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain" Sleep is precious to me, today. Because I typically only get 3-5 hours a night, and some nights, less, I will feel like I hit the jackpot when I get [More...]

• Could Your Story be a Memoir? by Author Maria McCutchen
  A contribution by Maria McCutchen, author of "It's All in Your Head - A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain" It seems like we all have a story to tell. Most of us have something that has happened in our life that is worthy of sharing with others - something [More...]

• Mothering With a Chronic Medical Condition by Maria McCutchen
  A contribution by Maria McCutchen, author of "It's All in Your Head - A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain" I had looked forward to being a mother all my life. I couldn't wait to have kids and start living the life I had always dreamed of. The day came [More...]

• There Is Hope For Dealing With Your Loved One’s Medical Ordeal by Maria McCutchen
  A contribution by Maria McCutchen, author of "It's All in Your Head - A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain" What is it that you are going through that you feel like there is no end? What is it that has you questioning, "Why must I endure this?" Whatever it [More...]

• Maria McCutchen: Making Peace With Your Chronic Illness
  A contribution by Maria McCutchen, author of "It's All in Your Head - A Life of Mental Fogginess And Physical Pain" I was in a good place in my life; happy - maybe too happy. With my two little boys, I was enjoying spending time with them and just being a [More...]

[See all of Maria McCutchen's posts...]