This Week’s Book = Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence – from Domestic Abuse to Political Terror
I’m just going to say it – this book gave me flashbacks to university textbooks…to the point where I shuddered every time I went to pick it up. That probably sounds harsh, but it’s definitely the truth. I think that I spent more time flipping ahead in the book to see how many pages were left then I did reading the actual text…which is probably why it took me over4 months to read a measly 247 page book. 4 months!! That’s unheard of when it comes to me and books. But I persevered…and I did it all for you.
Let me explain. Well into month #3 of reading this book, I caught myself thinking how horrible it would be if one of my clients (or anyone dealing with a traumatic event in their lives) picked up this book in an attempt to help themselves. This book is so infused with jargon and academic-style writing that I felt like it would scare the hell out of them! To add to the concern, I discovered that this book tends to show up in the top 10 listings when searched on Chapters and Amazon. I had the overwhelming desire to share my concerns with the world…and hence, this blog was born. I’m not even joking.
Ok, so here’s a bit of information about this book – it is very comprehensive in its analysis of trauma and coverage of the stages of recovery. It includes tons of examples from real people who have experienced trauma and lots of references and research. I appreciated the structured set up of the book, as it progressed nicely from history to symptoms of trauma to the therapeutic relationship to stages of recovery. It had good flow in that sense and each section was very thorough.
This book really is a great resource for professionals – not necessarily the style of writing that I can latch onto, but I digress. As a professional, I did manage to absorb some important information about the therapist’s role in treating trauma and steps of safety, remembrance, mourning and reconnection. As a regular person, I wanted to unceremoniously burn the book. I feel like the way it is written could potentially drain a person’s hope if they picked up the book to help with their recovery. It provides an overwhelming amount of information in a somewhat inaccessible way.
So, I encourage people to take solace in the title of this book –there can be recovery from trauma. Let the professionals read this book, decipher its message, and then bring it to you in a counselling session. I truly believe that there are much better books out there that you could all be reading, but if academic writing is your thing, this may just be the book for you.
Interested in buying the book? Click here!
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