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Summary: Review of J. Herman's book
Review: As a clinician, I found this book to be very comprehensive. It provides a framework for understanding how to treat clients with PTSD. This book is a valuable tool for anyone working with these clients. It also provides a historical over view of PTSD.
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Summary: Trauma & Recovery by Judith Herman, Md
Review: As a psychotherapist for the past sixteen years I can readily attest to the wealth of information in this book, so much so that I had to purchase it for my permanent book collection.All too often, victims in my experience have been given the labels of Borderline Personality Disorder, or Masochistic Personality Disorder to the detriment of the invidividual's sole purpose of healing. Dr. Herman's book states otherwise with sound research, excellent clearly understandable style of writing and certainly
will aid in comfort, knowledge and recovery to those who need it the most. As an author of "SILENT BIRTHS: FRUIT OF THE WOMB (1STBOOKS.COM)
I can certainly attest to the wisdom in this book enabling those who are voiceless and helpless to come to mastery over not only their perpertrator, but within themselves - thereby becoming fully committed to health and healing and their Soul retrieval.
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Summary: Yawn... More mainstream psychology
Review: Counsellors will love this. Psychologists will love this. Psychiatrists will love this. If you are one of them, buy this book, you will love this. I guarantee. But anyone who has actually lived through any real trauma is going to roll their eyes. Mainstream psychology seems to be completely based on books written by people who had never experianced the things they are writting about! It's terrible! If any other author were to write a book on say, what it is like to like is Paris, when they have never lived there before, we would all laugh. But yet psychologists seem to get away with this all the time. And the usual therapy sheep have not yet been able to see this. The book is neatly written, and convincing, so that's all that matters. But this is not a debate people -you are working with people's lives here! There are consequences to getting it wrong! There are so many people out there who seem content on taking advice on trauma from those that had never been through it. You would not take lessons on how to drive a car from someone who has never been in one -only watched others -so why is this any different? Take a moment to think about it! The answer may shock you! I first read this book when I was 18, as a means to understand myself. But as I have grown up, this books seems increasily immature and shallow. Much of it is incorrect -as anyone who has been through trauma of any kind can tell you. It has all the ingredients to be popular with therapists though. But if they were to actually take a closer look away from the well-written text, they would see that the world around them is not like this. It is not catorgorisable and predicatable. And these are not the answers to why people act this way. Time to tune into your logic and instinct here! I certainly hope the author of this book is able to one day admit how egotistical it really is to claim such knowledge over topic she has not experainced. It honestly makes me quite angry that such a complex topic as trauma has been water-down to just this thin text that does nothing really to actually help anyone. Do you disagree with me? Well, someone that hasn't been through trauma themselves has no right to sing the praises of this book, so sit back down please. Beacuse I can tell you from a very personal point of view, that this book only begins to scratch the surface of the topic it claims to cover. Very kindergarten level. Really only belongs on the shelf -next to the latest science fiction title.
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Summary: Very insightful and extremely well written .
Review: For anyone who has suffered trauma, this book gives insight into the effects of trauma and gives it language, a way to speak from the trauma and to be understood, by yourself and others. I have read no other book that is written in this area as well as this book.I would recommend it to all people who are dealing with this in their lives or are helping someone to recover. It is the best.
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Summary: Excellent
Review: Great book - could not put it down, very interesting.
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Summary: A Note for Victims...
Review: I bought this book on the basis of the lengthy and highly positive reviews posted on this site. In many respects, what they say is true and the book most certainly has its merits. However, it has several significant drawbacks which seem have gone uncommented upon here and which were sufficient to make the book, for me, largely unreadable. Since there are more than enough comments about what is good, I will confine myself to what is bad about this book. Judith Herman not writing from a neutral perspective: she is both a feminist and an insufficiently critical devotee of psychoanalysis. She is candid about her agenda and about the fact that her perspective on trauma has a decidedly feminist and psychoanalytic bent. If you agree with her views and are interested in exploring her thesis, that is, if you are interested in approaching the issues of abuse and trauma from an academic perspective, then this is an intellectually stimulating work with a clear sense of direction. If you are a survivor of trauma then Dr. Herman's political and academic agenda seriously undermine the helpfulness of this work. It is wordy (even more wordy than this review), full of feminist, modernist, and psychoanalytic jargon, and not a book that I would recommend for anyone who is in the early stages of RECOVERING from trauma.
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Summary: An excellent book
Review: I have bought the new German translation of this book and it has been a great read. I can only subscribe to all the praise in the other reviews and think about what I can add to it.
I love that it is a political book as well as a psychological one. It calls Crime and Evil by their names and says that healing is not only personal, but includes the whole community - in the third and last step to healing means to go out and work for a better community.
It is a compassionate book that makes all the symptoms of Trauma suddenly make sense. It has taught me to be more compassionate towards myself and e.g. accept my "issues with trust" - accept that I take longer than other people to decide whether someone is trustworthy or not.
It is written in an understandable and clear way - not dry at all - just the right balance between clarity and objectivity and passion - passion against crime, passion to help the victims.
It has been a great help as well when other people ask me for help as friends. I won't push them any more to confront their traumata, nor will I prevent them from doing, but I just say: Take your time: First find stability and happiness, than look at the past. And I have learnt to be very careful - always leave control and responsibility with the person who asks for advice. (I am no therapist, just as everyone sometimes friends ask me for help and advice.) And I always recommend this book.
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Summary: most thoughtful book for anyone who has experienced trauma
Review: i have read this book cover to cover twice and it remains rife with thoughtful, insightful and helpful information. for anyone who has suffered a traumatic event in their lives, whether recent or long past, this is a voice that understands, and can make sense of the thoughts, feelings and behavior that may have altered and tortured you life.
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Summary: An excellent book and a valuable resource
Review: I think Judith Herman's book is terrific for several reasons. First - she playfully, eloquently, and clearly encapsulates some of the relevant history of psychoanalysis and looks at Freud and his contemporaries from a humanist and clinical perspective. Second - she writes with feeling. Third - she provides a useful bibliography and introduction to various studies of trauma in formulating her new diagnosis, to add to the DSM-IV, of complex PTSD, which is very richly descriptive and is clearly aimed at helping therapists and others work with survivors. I think the psych literature is best understood as a way to achieve some kind of cognitive understanding of trauma and its effects. But it's not predictive, not complete, and not ever going to be equivalent to individual person's unique stories, often told or remembered in fragments. If you are looking for a very succinct self help book, this isn't it. I would suggest something like Trauma a Workbook for Healing, or better yet a support group and/or individualized counseling. If you are having trouble affording counseling, think about taking an adult education/continuing ed course at a university. Campuses have a lot of counseling resources that are free or low cost. If you can't afford that either, have hope. You will one day. In the meantime, read whatever appeals to you and realize that the ultimate self help book will be one that you write in the way and speed that feels right to you, that feels possible.
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Summary: Best book on PTSD
Review: I was amazed at how much substantial information this book contained. Initially it covers victims of trauma that are adults (rape survivors and soldiers). Then it moves into the realm of child abuse and this is where the book shines. Acknowledging that an abused child doesn't have a "me before the trauma" it goes into great detail about the life and experience of an abused child. I have never read a book that gave me so much information and hit the nail on the head so astutely. A must have for those dealing with the aftermath of trauma.
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