I was challenged to post 10 books which I love or have had an impact on me ( one a day). It is difficult to choose just 10! For Day One I chose the first book of Simone de Beauvoir’s autobiography which I first read at university many years ago. This book and the subsequent ones showed me that I could choose how I live – although choices have consequences.
For Day Two I have chosen “The Body Keeps the Score” by Bessel Van Der Kolk. http://amzn.eu/d/2xCjzvB. This is an incredible book which shows the impact trauma of any kind has on the body. Medication and talking therapies are not sufficient to change these physical imprints – in fact talking therapies have the tendency to strengthen the harm inflicted.
“Trauma constantly confronts us with our fragility and with man’s inhumanity to man but also with our extraordinary resilience”. There is no romanticising of trauma in the book – it is shown in all its horror and suffering. However, there is the recognition people endure terrible trauma and their symptoms are part of their strength, the ways in which they have learned to survive.
The book is concerned with trauma, with specific events which cause immense suffering. However, I was also reading it through the eyes of someone who knows and loves people with deep depression and anxiety which have not been brought about by specific events but are every bit as real and painful. It would seem to me that their experiences have also left physical change requiring an approach which recognises the whole person and the depth of the suffering.
23 thoughts on “Responding to a Facebook Challenge”