Greater than Gravity
Buy the Book
That started the UACT movement, “Greater Than Gravity.” All profits go to the UACT Foundation.
Greater Than Gravity: How Childhood Trauma is Pulling Down Humanity
By Michael J. Menard
What if everything we think we know about America’s health crisis is wrong?
Hidden in government data lies a shocking discovery: childhood trauma is responsible for 1,401 American deaths every single day—more than tobacco, accidents, or stroke. Among the 11.4 million Americans who experienced severe childhood trauma, every one will die 24 years too soon. Nearly 90% of teen suicide attempts trace back to adverse childhood experiences. And this epidemic costs America $14 trillion annually—roughly 60% of our entire GDP.
We’ve been counting the bodies wrong. When someone with severe childhood trauma dies of a heart attack at 55 instead of 75, we record it as heart disease. When they overdose, it’s addiction. When they take their own life, it’s suicide. But these aren’t separate epidemics—they’re symptoms of the same hidden crisis that’s been destroying
lives for generations.
Michael J. Menard knows this crisis firsthand. Growing up one of fourteen children in a 900-square-foot home below the poverty line, he watched childhood trauma ripple through his family—claiming two brothers to addiction and leaving invisible wounds across generations. Yet from these origins, Menard rose to become a world-renowned inventor with fourteen patents, advising NASA and the United Nations, and serving as Vice President of Worldwide Engineering at Johnson & Johnson.
Greater Than Gravity isn’t just another trauma book. It’s a meticulously researched exposé that connects dots no one else has connected—revealing how childhood trauma alters brain development, ravages the immune system, and creates cascading destruction across mental, physical, spiritual, and social dimensions of life. Menard brings his engineer’s mind to humanity’s greatest unaddressed public health crisis, transforming cold statistics into compelling human stories while offering concrete pathways to healing.
With endorsements from leading trauma experts, including Dr. Glenn Schiraldi, this groundbreaking work serves three audiences: survivors seeking hope and healing, loved ones who want to understand, and anyone ready to join a movement to end this epidemic.
The numbers are irrefutable. The suffering is real. The time for action is now.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael J. Menard is a bestselling author, inventor, and social advocate whose
extraordinary journey proves that childhood adversity need not define our destiny.
Born one of fourteen children in Kankakee, Illinois, Menard grew up in a 900-square-
foot home marked by poverty and dysfunction. Despite these challenges, he channeled
his experiences into extraordinary achievement—earning fourteen patents that
revolutionized global manufacturing, rising to Vice President of Worldwide Engineering
at Johnson & Johnson, and advising both NASA and the United Nations.
But his greatest discovery came later. While writing his memoir, The Kite That Couldn’t
Fly, Menard uncovered a devastating pattern: childhood trauma was claiming lives
across his family and millions more worldwide—including his brothers Patrick and
Adam, who died from addiction. What began as a personal revelation became intensive
research, ultimately revealing childhood trauma as America’s leading cause of
preventable death.
Today, Menard is the founder and president of UACT (United Against Childhood Trauma), a
nonprofit dedicated to ending this hidden epidemic through awareness, healing, and
prevention. He brings the same systematic thinking that transformed industries to
humanity’s greatest public health crisis.
Menard lives in Tennessee with his wife, Emilie. Greater Than Gravity is his fourth book.