Reviews tagging 'Rape'

The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk

342 reviews

smw's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative inspiring medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Incest, Rape, and Violence

lou_o_donnell's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional informative slow-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Body horror, Body shaming, Bullying, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Incest, Mental illness, Panic attacks/disorders, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Medical content, and Car accident

lauries_library's review against another edition

challenging slow-paced

4.5

Dense and lengthy but insightful. Over 30 years of research into trauma is crammed into this work, and a lot of it makes for unbearable reading – it can be very neuroscience heavy and academic and there are very graphic descriptions of patient experiences. That said, I would still recommend it because our world is becoming an increasingly traumatic place. 

 

Pluses: I’ll be real. As a survivor of PTSD, this was an exhausting read. I found my body reacting very viscerally. Ideally, I should have processed it piece by piece and read it over a few months, but it was long overdue at the library, so I decided to just crank it out (bad idea lol). Totally worth it, as you can see from my stick notes, but not remotely easy. Even so, I think this is a must-read for everyone. In my master’s program application, I argued that trauma is the greatest threat to our national well-being. The more life I live, the more I see that we are all impacted, directly or indirectly, by trauma. And we are absolutely regressing – dare I say, failing – at addressing this public health crisis. Bessel is truly a pioneer and this book has fundamentally changed the way we study trauma. 

 

Wishes: 1. As with anything, especially a book written by a white man, it could have been more intersectional. It seems to be a glaring omission to talk about trauma without talking about intergenerational trauma, or the effects that oppressive social conditions have on psychology. It’s pretty shocking to be that he can spend so much time talking about the way that family units and early formative social experiences shape our psychology without paying ANY attention to the ways that other social forces like institutional racism and poverty likewise have an effect on people’s emotional lives. 2. The way he discussed rape victims put a bad taste in my mouth. 3. It felt disturbingly voyeuristic. It is not important that we know every detail of a person’s trauma in order to empathize or address it.

 

Teachers are not perfect, so I will take what is helpful and leave the rest.

 

I recommend this to anyone interested in trauma’s hijacking of the brain and body, and to anyone suffering from trauma or living with someone who is working with people that are. (So… basically all of us?)

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicidal thoughts, and Medical trauma

Moderate: Alcoholism

boyish's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Fatphobia, and Rape

_brittanyluna's review against another edition

informative inspiring reflective medium-paced

4.0

Super informative, multitude of trigger warnings! But overall, that’s what you can expect in a book dealing with trauma. I quite enjoyed the history of discovering methods other than medication to discover/address/treat trauma. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Alcoholism, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Eating disorder, Incest, Mental illness, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, and Antisemitism

mikaelaandherbooks's review against another edition

challenging informative reflective medium-paced

4.0

The Body Keeps the Score is incredibly informative on how a variety of traumas can impact both the body and mind through the balance use of actual case stories with the science and history of trauma research.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, and Murder

erenreads12's review against another edition

challenging emotional hopeful informative reflective medium-paced

5.0

Everyone I know who has had trauma and/or been in therapy has recommended this book and now I know why. Van der Kolk gives us an informative, in depth, balanced tour of the inner workings of trauma and the ways we can both treat and prevent it. As a trauma survivor it is a validating, enlightening read - as a hopeful therapist and current psychology student it is an essential piece of science. It is a guide to understanding yourself and others, and to protecting and safeguarding our children. 

What a wonderful read.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Emotional abuse, Incest, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Suicide, and Medical trauma

ctucker's review against another edition

dark informative reflective slow-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Minor: Addiction, Drug abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

naju's review against another edition

challenging informative inspiring medium-paced

4.0

I'd like to believe that anyone would benefit from gaining more information and empathy for the people going through it - and themselves.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Addiction, Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Domestic abuse, Drug abuse, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Incest, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, Toxic relationship, Violence, Grief, and Medical trauma

gorgeousgirl's review against another edition

one of focus patients was an army vet who went and killed and raped ppl bcz of war trauma and i really couldn’t stomach going on to read about how he ~healed or whatever

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Rape