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Insistent
A Traumatic Brain Injury. A Fluffy White Service Dog. A Fight That Changed Everything.
After a devastating accident left Joey Ramp-Adams with twenty-three broken bones, a traumatic brain injury, and severe neurological impairments, she lost her ability to speak, understand language, and even function in the outside world. Isolated in a world of pain, confusion, and despair, she saw no way forward—until one soft-eyed Golden Retriever named Sampson showed her otherwise.
With Sampson by her side, Joey didn’t just rebuild her life—she rewrote the rules. Determined to understand the science behind her injury, she returned to academia to study neuroscience, becoming the first service dog handler to demand full access to scientific laboratories. Faced with systemic bias, discrimination, and doors slammed shut, Joey refused to back down. Instead, she and Sampson became a force for global change.
Insistent is a powerful memoir of resilience, advocacy, and the unbreakable bond between a woman and her service dog. Together, they shattered barriers, reshaped policies, and sparked a movement that reached from classrooms to Congress.
This is not just a story about survival—it’s a story about transformation, purpose, and the courage to challenge a system stacked against you.
Joey fought for her life. Then she fought for others. With Sampson leading the way, she proved that determination—like love—never gives up.
After a devastating accident left Joey Ramp-Adams with twenty-three broken bones, a traumatic brain injury, and severe neurological impairments, she lost her ability to speak, understand language, and even function in the outside world. Isolated in a world of pain, confusion, and despair, she saw no way forward—until one soft-eyed Golden Retriever named Sampson showed her otherwise.
With Sampson by her side, Joey didn’t just rebuild her life—she rewrote the rules. Determined to understand the science behind her injury, she returned to academia to study neuroscience, becoming the first service dog handler to demand full access to scientific laboratories. Faced with systemic bias, discrimination, and doors slammed shut, Joey refused to back down. Instead, she and Sampson became a force for global change.
Insistent is a powerful memoir of resilience, advocacy, and the unbreakable bond between a woman and her service dog. Together, they shattered barriers, reshaped policies, and sparked a movement that reached from classrooms to Congress.
This is not just a story about survival—it’s a story about transformation, purpose, and the courage to challenge a system stacked against you.
Joey fought for her life. Then she fought for others. With Sampson leading the way, she proved that determination—like love—never gives up.
340 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 26, 2025
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August 15, 2025
I will first state I have been a follower of Sampson the Service Dog for many years and am part of the service dog world. I was very excited for this book for many reasons, and I wasn’t disappointed. The short of the review is this: anyone who is thinking of becoming a service dog team should read this. Anyone with a family member or friend with PTSD or a TBI, or trauma in general if not a diagnosed one, should read this book. Each person’s manifestation of their disability is different, but this book touches on so many things that it will reach out to you and help.
And everyone else should read this, to see that even when it feels like the demons are winning, there are still trinkets of hope to find. To see that smiling at a stranger is a throw away to you, but may just be that trinket of hope for the other person. That you never know how you can impact someone’s life with a smile, or a poor choice of a few words that seem harmless.
Right from the start, this book grabs your attention and keeps it, making you feel. I felt the anger and frustration that the disability advocate felt; the heat of the wood on her palms in Pueblo; the outrage that adults would think it allowable to feed a SD under the table, literally, and the embarrassment all handlers go through when their SD has a biological incident. Each chapter takes you on a high and low, much like the author must have felt during those times in her life.
I did struggle a little with the timeline and “time in between” from accident to school. The chapters and book are chronological, but within each chapter the author would span the gap between then and now, so many times I got stuck trying to figure out her age or timeframe and it took me out of the story, but could easily fall back in it.
The “I can do it attitude with, well, maybe a dash of stupidity” is my new motto. I’ve said many times that Mrs. Ramp-Adams is making a difference, and this book is just one more way of doing that. Good job, and thank you for being a voice for other teams and the disabled community.
And everyone else should read this, to see that even when it feels like the demons are winning, there are still trinkets of hope to find. To see that smiling at a stranger is a throw away to you, but may just be that trinket of hope for the other person. That you never know how you can impact someone’s life with a smile, or a poor choice of a few words that seem harmless.
Right from the start, this book grabs your attention and keeps it, making you feel. I felt the anger and frustration that the disability advocate felt; the heat of the wood on her palms in Pueblo; the outrage that adults would think it allowable to feed a SD under the table, literally, and the embarrassment all handlers go through when their SD has a biological incident. Each chapter takes you on a high and low, much like the author must have felt during those times in her life.
I did struggle a little with the timeline and “time in between” from accident to school. The chapters and book are chronological, but within each chapter the author would span the gap between then and now, so many times I got stuck trying to figure out her age or timeframe and it took me out of the story, but could easily fall back in it.
The “I can do it attitude with, well, maybe a dash of stupidity” is my new motto. I’ve said many times that Mrs. Ramp-Adams is making a difference, and this book is just one more way of doing that. Good job, and thank you for being a voice for other teams and the disabled community.
Displaying 1 of 1 review