HI,

My favorite books are:

"Coping with Trauma" Jon Allen (Excellent!)
"Coping with Trauma-related Dissociation" Steele, van der Hart, Boon
"Healing from Trauma" Jasmin Cori
"The Emotionally Absent Mother" Jasmin Cori

All have helped me tremendously, and I go back to them regularly. Am reading Jon Allen right now.

Google Allan Schore, Jon Allen, Peter Fonagy as starters...they have written a lot on attachment and there are links to trauma.

Gotta run but hope this helps. Amber

Thanks Amber! I will definitely look into these. The Jon Allen book is at my library. I'll probably go get it later this week.

Hi Again HiC!

That is awesome they have the Jon Allen book at your library! He is really good and I think given you are interested in something on relational trauma, this book will be really helpful. He builds the case that chronic trauma of childhood is so often linked to relationship wounds. I did not find it inaccessible at all.

I also really liked Allen's approach to emotion. Instead of telling the reader to stifle emotions, he encourages getting in touch with it as so important to healing: "Healing from trauma requires cultivating emotion, not squelching it...healing from trauma entails feeling and expressing more, not feeling and expressing less...cultivating emotions--mentalizing emotionally--is the best path to avoiding emotional excesses...cultivating greater awareness of your feelings is preventive: you cannot influence what you do not know." This leads into his excellent treatment of regulation.

I did think of some other sources of web info:

http://www.trauma-pages.com/articles.php (has a ton of info)
http://www.sidran.org/sub.cfm?sectionID=4
http://www.istss.org/ForthePublic.htm

This will keep you busy for a while!!! Let me know what you think.
All the best to you! Amber

HIC,
Amber gave you some great suggestions! I also remembered an old thread I thought you might find helpful (my list of books is in that thread): Books on therapy/psychology that have helped you.

Also I would goggle John Briere, he's a trauma specialist and his website has some great articles, I would also search for him and Davic Wallin on Youtube, they both have some great videos.

AG

Hey AG,

Funny you should mention Wallin's book...I had thought about getting it out from the university library--I so love I have privileges there which is how I have had access to lots of great trauma and dissociation books, including Briere and Allen's books.

Anyways, I am super struggling right now with my own attachment related trauma and was wondering if you think Wallin's book would be helpful? I have no problem with heady reading (The Haunted Self is the headiest book I have read and yet it has also been invaluable for my own journey--another great book I have had out from the university for close to a year now!)

I really want something that will tie early developmental attachment trauma to the struggle to regulate. OMG it is often so hard, and when you add the whole dissociated parts thing, it can feel impossible to ever heal

Any feedback would be super appreciated, Amber

Hi Amber,
Can't recommend the Wallin book highly enough! I will admit that at times it was very heavy going, even to the point of just skipping some stuff, as it is written for clinicians BUT his understanding of attachment and how it is woven into healing from trauma was really helpful to me, especially his explanation of 'psychic space' our getting room between ourselves and what we are feeling and actual reality. Reading this book helped me to understand the necessity of having the feelings in the room. It also helped that my T had read it/ was reading it. We discussed a lot that was in there. We still occasionally refer to it. It gave us a shared vocabulary to shorthand some complex topics. I think it would be well worth your time.

AG

PS and I'm sorry Amber I know this stuff can be hellish to deal with.

PPS May I also recommend the Learning Developmental Skills: Emotional Regulation post on my blog? You might find it helpful also.

Hi AG,

Thanks for the caring response. Will check out the blog link and maybe write more later. Would really like to talk more in depth about all the attachment wounding and trying to heal, perhaps with a different post. It IS hell.

Amber

Back again.

Thanks for recommending those websites as well, Amber! I read the one on re-enactment compulsion from the trauma pages website last night. It was interesting. . . I could definitely see myself in some of that.

I love having access to a university library too-- that's where the Jon Allen book I'm aiming to pick up will be from. Thanks for posting that quote, btw. I loved it and now I want to read the book more. That's pretty much where I'm at now with what I'm trying to do re: emotions.

AG,
Thanks for the link to thread (as well as author recommendations)! Will read/google soon. Writing in a hurry so sorry if I missed anything. . .

--me

Hey, just wanted to say I've been reading the book by Jon Allen, "Coping with Trauma: A Guide to Self-Understanding." I'm only about fifty pages in, but I'm finding it enormously helpful already. Pulls a lot of things together and sets a good paradigm.