
Helping You & Your Family Move Forward
Resources & References
Soo’s List of Recommended Emotional Support or Self-Help Books to Aid in Recovery from a Toxic Marriage with a Disordered Individual
Patrick Carnes, Ph.D. (1997), The Betrayal Bond: Breaking Free of Exploitive Relationships
Study of types of exploitive relationships that can lead to betrayal bonding or trauma bonding, and why these types of relationships create an intense bonding to the abuser that makes leaving so difficult. This book also has a good recovery or self-help section at the end.
Our thoughts: Great for all stages of healing, especially in the beginning, when cutting ties with the abusive other.
Bessel van der Kolk, M.Dl. (2015), The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma
Trauma expert discusses his experiences from treating trauma survivors and how trauma rewires the brain and can reshape the body. Trauma-focused treatments that focus upon the mind and body connection are key to reshaping the body and brain to help rewire the brain’s neuroplasticity. He discusses reasons why yoga, meditation, and trauma-focused therapy modalities, including EMDR, seem to work so well to help us with trauma.
Our thoughts: Great for all stages of healing, but it is geared more towards helping people understand combat veterans and their healing. It contains a great discussion of more physical types of trauma-informed therapy, like EMDR and yoga, but it is very clinical.
Judith Lewis Herman, M.D. (1992), Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence, From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror
A groundbreaking book that discusses psychological and physical trauma and their effects on our wellbeing. She discusses how we can heal trauma and what healing looks like.
Our thoughts: Great for all stages of healing. She does touch upon personality disorders, but she really focuses more on Borderline Personality Disorder. We all have some childhood trauma, but not at the levels that she discusses.
Arielle Schwartz, Ph.D., The Complex PTSC Workbook: A Mind-Body Approach to Regaining Emotional Control and Becoming Whole (1997)
Dr. Schwartz provides a great framework for helping us understand the nature of complex posttraumatic stress disorder and helping us understand what occurs when we walk around with unresolved trauma from childhood. She provides guidance and insight into the types of exercises that can help in resolving unresolved trauma.
Our thoughts: We haven’t used this workbook, but it was highly recommended by Dr. Barbara Smith, a wonderful clinical psychologist in Northern Virginia, when she came to speak with our group last year.
Gavin de Becker, The Gift of Fear: And Other Survival Signals that Protect Us From Violence (1998)

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