Terry Healey

Biography

Terry Healey is a cancer survivor who endured over thirty surgical procedures in an effort to reconstruct his face, which was disfigured by a fibrosarcoma when he was only a junior at UC Berkeley. Through a long and arduous process, Terry realized that the scars on the inside had become far more disfiguring than the scars on the outside ever were.

Today, at the age of 45, twenty three years after becoming disfigured, Terry is a professional speaker, author, businessman, member of the Leadership Council of The Wellness Community (SF-East Bay), and honorary board member of The Cancer League, Inc. Terry is President of Ridgeview Consulting, a firm that provides strategic marketing and sales program development consulting services for high technology companies, including Cisco Systems, Inc. Prior to consulting, Terry was the VP of Marketing for two high technology companies that both went public.

His popular program, Navigating Life's Road Blocks: Attitude, Focus, and Teamwork, is presented to companies and groups nationwide. He is the author of At Face Value: My Triumph Over A Disfiguring Cancer, released by Caveat Press in January 2006, and is a contributing author to two other anthologies. He has also been published in Psychology Today, The San Francisco Chronicle, Guideposts, and Coping Magazine. Terry has appeared on dozens of national and local TV networks, and has been interviewed on more than 75 radio stations across the U.S. and Canada.

Terry captivates and educates audiences on how to take control of their lives, identify and overcome challenges, build trust and teams, embrace change, and learn the value of tolerance and acceptance. He views the lessons he learned in life as gifts, and believes his greatest reward is being able to teach others how to overcome adversity and celebrate life.

Publications

AT FACE VALUE
My Triumph Over a Disfiguring Cancer
Twenty years old and a junior at the University of California, Berkeley, Terry Healey had seldom faced adversity or difficulty. He was confident and not concerned about his appearance. Then a lump formed behind his right nostril. Cancer. He fought it and survived, but multiple surgeries and radiation treatments left Terry to deal with what would become his greatest struggle for years to come—the resulting disfigurement.

At Face Value explores the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual challenges forced upon a young man by a disfiguring cancer. It's a story about tragedy, obstacles, and ultimately, triumph.

Titles

Navigating Life's Road Blocks: Attitude, Focus, and Teamwork
Based on his book with the same title, author Terry Healey takes you through his harrowing personal ordeal and what sustained him and enabled him to focus on the positive aspects of his life that weren't only lessons he learned, but gifts that he could impart to others struggling with their own personal challenges.

Turning Points and Survivor Kits
Through some personal storytelling, Terry conveys the importance of taking note of ‘potential' turning points in life and how to ensure that you create your own personal survival kit that will help you with career challenges, personal discovery, or physical challenges that may change the way you interact with others.

Dealing With Adversity and Taking Control of Your Life
Based on Terry's extreme experience with adversity in his own life, Terry shares with us the lessons he learned about how to deal with adversity and how being focused and taking control of your life are the keys to making those difficulties not only tolerable but also valuable in our personal growth and development. Terry encourages the audience to confront things head on and to embrace, rather than fear our world that is constantly changing.

Embracing Our Differences
Terry focuses this interactive presentation on how truly different each and every one of us is, and demonstrates how we frequently make judgments of people that are oftentimes incorrect. Participants will walk away with a better appreciation for why we need to embrace diversity and strive to be more tolerant.