I cover news and human interest with a focus on mental health, social justice, and crime.
With 500+ bylined pieces, my work has appeared in People magazine, the Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, the Today Show digital, O magazine, and the Washington Times.
As the American field producer for several Scandinavian TV networks, I contribute to stories and docs that bring trending news to Europe with features on politics, business, and culture.
My first book -- Full of Heart, with J.R. Martinez -- was a New York Times bestseller. I'm a member of the Washington Post Talent Network, and my Post feature on liver transplants received the 2018 Health Writing Award from the American Society of Journalists and Authors.
I'm represented by Robert Guinsler of Sterling Lord Literistic, New York.
alexafleming@gmail.com
"We figured, if we're already doing this for one kid, what difference will another one make?" says parent and teacher Josh Dougherty Everyone has seen children's tantrums, but when first-time parents Alicia and Josh Dougherty welcomed 4-year-old foster child Alex into their home, they soon learned that his were titanic by any standards.
In 2003, 19-year-old Private J.R. Martinez was on a routine patrol when the Humvee he was driving hit an antitank mine in Iraq.
It's time for outdoor pup play group at Lost Dog and Cat Rescue Foundation. As with most everything at this Falls Church, Va., pet refuge, it's a team effort. "Don't forget to bend your knees!" says Suzanne Petroni, warning her cadre of helpers that to stand rigidly in the play yard is to risk being bowled over by exuberant dogs as they gallop past.
In Saroyal Booker's life, it seemed it was one thing after the next. At age 10, it was her single mother, addicted to drugs and unable to care for her. So Booker was sent to live with a grandmother in a home already jam-packed with other family members.
In addiction phraseology, it's often called "rock bottom." It's a state of mind known as the nadir of suffering, an overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. Sometimes it's a jumpoff point at which misery is traded for normalcy and meaning, where one life ends and another begins.
"We're destroying way too many communities and families," says Legend of what he believes to be a flawed system "We need to really rethink our criminal justice system," the musician told PEOPLE Friday at Politico 's An Evening with John Legend panel discussion in Washington, D.C. "We've ratcheted up penalties for everything.
How the opioid crisis is changing the American family.
"Accept it, analyze i, and let yourself feel what you feel," Kaylee Muthart tells PEOPLE almost a year after the incident that resulted in her blindness Nearly a year ago, Kaylee Muthart horrified the world when she gouged out her own eyes during a meth-induced psychotic episode. Hallucinating wildly during the Feb.
"Brian has been dead for 136 days," says his mother, Vicki Bishop. "I watched him die over many years, and it was a long, slow, horrible death." Her son's decades-long battle with opioids blotted out the sun in her own life, says Bishop, 65, of Clarksburg, Md.
Beth Schmidt always begins her opioid-awareness sessions by introducing her boy. At one such event, she motions toward his photos - the solemn baseball-team picture, his sweet, clean-cut middle school portrait, the cheek-to-cheek selfie of mother and son - as she tells a hushed audience of about a dozen how Sean fought and lost his battle with opioid addiction.
As a kid, he never read books. Now he's writing the stories that he missed growing up.
The young mom was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 33.
In America, someone dies of an overdose every 10 minutes. Stories of families shattered by the heroin epidemic and the heroes saving their communities.
For nearly a decade, Rachael Kinder's life had been ruled by heroin. But last year, after repeated attempts, the Milton, West Virginia, native managed to break her addiction via a mix of counseling and methadone, the medication-recovery drug.
The Facebook post about Jordan Roche was startlingly frank: "As you may or may not know, my son Jordan passed away September 26th from a heroin overdose," his mother wrote. "Jordan was a sweet young man with a great big heart.
Kathy Mitchell wants to share something with you. She's not proud of it, and it's not a behavior she hopes you'll emulate. It's just the truth: As a teen, Kathy drank alcohol while pregnant with her daughter, Karli. It was a perilous if unwitting mistake that has defined both of their lives.
The burning death of a 19-year-old girl has broken hearts and baffled investigators in a small Mississippi town.
Two young journalists are fatally shot by a disgruntled colleague -- on live television.
After the shocking shooting deaths of nine church members, grieving loved ones express their anguish -- and forgiveness.
I m here to look into the eyes of America s youth and say, You matter, Stewart said at the event in D.C. As a child, Whitney Stewart didn't believe her life was worth living. In fact, she didn't think she'd make it past the age of 14.
After being rescued in Iraq 12 years ago, the former POW is embracing life as a mom and educator.
1,500 Members of 1st Battalion 6th Marines from Camp Lejeune, N.C., were among the first to deploy for the new surge in Afghanistan. On the eve of a seven-month tour, some of the young men and their families share their hopes and fears.
In December PEOPLE Met a Group of Marines from Camp Lejeune, N.C., Just Hours Before They Left for Helmand Province.
The burned girl. Since she was a young child, that has been Zebonie Lopez's designation. It is more than a description- it's a shroud, keeping Zebonie, 16, of Lake Wales, Florida, and girls like her from believing in themselves and thinking beyond their skin.
If I had known that every day I would lose a piece of Jason, a lot of our days might have been different.
There was never a defining moment - no attached tick, no rash - at least none that any of us can recall.
When Jennifer Trubenbach met a teenager in Zimbabwe whose face had been disfigured by a land mine, her life -- and his -- would never be the same.
Barack and Michelle Obama attended the 38th annual Kennedy Center Honors on Sunday amid the prime-time Oval Office speech Obama dipped into the White House's East Room shortly after hosting a reception for five of the six honorees, Carole King, Cicely Tyson, Rita Moreno, George Lucas and conductor Seiji Ozawa - the sixth honoree, The Eagles, have postponed their participation until 2016.
I hand-picked my newest son from a catalog. His name is Simon, and he's from a town north of Hamburg, Germany. He loves sports (especially soccer, but he's learning about American football, baseball and basketball) and plays the classical guitar. He says, "That sounds great!"
During the shooting, Cox waited outside the room where his coworkers huddled on the floor beneath two desks, holding hands Tara McGee and her coworkers had just settled in for their "Power Hour" - that final 60-minute push of the workday - when someone shouted the words McGee never thought she'd hear: "Live shooter!"
On Feb. 20, Marine Sgt. Matt Roberts, 23, deployed to Iraq for the third time in as many years. Staying behind is his wife, Patricia, 22, and their sons Isaiah, 3, and Joseph, 2. People spent four days with the family at home on Marine Corps Air Station New River, N.C., as they prepared to part.
She was a typical teen who liked Facebook and country music -- and then she joined a convent.
The 13 men who worked together in the Sago Mine of West Virginia depended on family, friends -- and each other. Here is the story of how they lived -- and their final desperate hours.
Two months after her eldest shipped out to Iraq in 2006, Mary Conboy of Philadelphia got a call. "Mom, the bunks stink. Can you send sheets and pillows?" asked Marine Lance Cpl. Adam Conboy, 21.
Bullied at their old schools, junior high kids of every stripe find a welcoming haven in Milwaukee.
Can an intellectually disabled mom raise a gifted daughter? It's working so far for Myra and Bonnie Brown.
Even Lynndie England seemed to find it hard to look. In a small courtroom at Fort Hood, Texas, on May 3, Army prosecutor Capt. Chris Graveline projected 20 pictures of the abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison onto a 12-ft. screen.