Customer Reviews

Breaking Through Betrayal: and Recovering the Peace Within (New Horizons in Therapy Series)

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In a curious preface to this otherwise commendable work, the author is at pains to declare her undying loyalty to the DSM-IV and to discount the very ideas she later expounds upon, lest she provokes the ire of her peers and of the establishment. Such is the sad fate of innovators and original thinkers today that they strive to efface their contributions and vitiate their own creativity.

The book amounts to an in-depth (possibly the first such) study of betrayal in a variety of situations and as the root cause of numerous mental health conditions and disorders. As a "background" emotion, it is often overlooked by practitioners and well-meaning laymen alike. Betrayal is pernicious and all-pervasive. The author's use of a strong vocabulary ("dark", "cancerous") to describe it is justified: betrayal comprises the entire gamut of rejection and hurt. Nor is betrayal limited to the interpersonal realm: one can and is often betrayed by bosses, political leaders, pillars of the community, and institutions.

This book is the outcome of the author's own experiences as a marriage and family therapist and as a person who has been betrayed by a member of her family. When autobiographical epiphany gives rise to intellectual rigor, we usually have a winner and this book is no exception: as promised by the author, it is a riveting, well-written tour of hitherto largely uncharted waters, replete with numerous case studies, a systematization of the emotional and cognitive components of betrayal and its consequences, a plethora of self-help measures, and self-evaluation questionnaires. About half the book is dedicated to recovery from betrayal. It belongs in the libraries of mental health practitioners, people who suffer or have suffered from betrayal (and who hasn't?), and those who monitor intriguing and promising emergent ideas in psychotherapy and clinical psychology.Sam Vaknin, author of "Malignant Self-love: Narcissism Revisited".

Breaking Through Betrayal: and
Recovering the Peace Within
Author: Holli Kenley
Publisher: Loving Healing Press
ISBN: 978-1615990092

Betrayal. Just about everyone has felt let down by someone they care about. It's tough to deal with, and even tougher to move past it and put it behind you. Once someone lets you down, it's difficult to be sure they won't do it again. You probably find it hard to count on them for awhile. Now imagine someone you love does more than let you down or disappoint you.

The case that immediately comes to mind is that of Tiger Woods and his wife, Elin. Fortunately, most of us will never have to undergo so public a betrayal, so well known and discussed. Betrayal happening to anyone, regardless of their public stature, is extremely painful. Being out of the public limelight doesn't lessen the pain and disbelief that will follow. Betrayal doesn't just happen in romantic relationships. Humans can feel betrayed by friends, politicians, public figures, just about anyone. During the current rough economic times, you may feel betrayal at the loss of a job, foreclosure, or any number of other situations. Friends betray us, leaving us discouraged and distrustful. Betrayal leads to feelings of worthlessness, depression, anxiety and anger. You may be grieving over the betrayal, or feel obsessed by the thought of what happened, or cling more tightly to those around you that haven't betrayed you.

Holli Kenley has written a book that goes in depth to explain the how and why behind the feelings we have following a betrayal. By understanding more about why those feelings occur, one is able to validate them, understand the need for the feelings and offer encouragement and empowerment to move beyond betrayal and into a healthier, more peaceful mindset. Then recovery can truly take place.

Section I of this book covers the knowledge and awareness of exactly what betrayal is, why we suffer negative emotions because of it. She'll clarify the different forms and levels of trust we invest into various relationships, allowing the reader to fully discover their feelings about the individual betrayal and learn to recognize the true depth and degree of the emotions you feel and what you have experienced. You begin to understand the only way to be healthy and whole emotionally is to acknowledge the painful emotions and work through them.

In Section II, the discussion centers on other recovery considerations that may require attention. For example, codependency, which is basically overinvestment of personal resources into someone/something without an adequate return or replenishment. A level of codependency can complicate the journey to recovery. Grief is another recovery consideration. Grief is a natural outgrowth of betrayal, and to successfully recover from betrayal one must understand the degree of their grief and how to work to alleviate it.

Section III is where we move beyond the "prep" work into the actual recovery process. Kenley breaks the process down into five distinct parts, followed by extensive information and techniques for successfully moving through each of the five parts. She includes very specific exercises and instructions for completing each level of the process. Additional resources that offer support are listed.

Overall, this work will be extremely useful to anyone going through a betrayal personally, or trying to help a friend or loved one navigate their way through. Written in a style easy to understand and relate to, it offers help to anyone at any step of the recovery process.

Because the book is well written and detailed, those in a helping profession can utilize these steps and activities with clients of any age who may be experiencing betrayal in any of its many forms. A valuable handbook to maintain in any permanent reference library, this reviewer highly endorses this fine work.

Length:: 2:00 Mins

Holli Kenley's book provides a specific step-by-step healing process with lots of self-checking exercises and gauges along the way so you can see how you've progressed and take new ground. Whether you are an adult-child of an alcoholic, survivor of domestic violence, or adult survivor of child abuse, you have something to regain and this gentle method can help you restore it to yourself.

A very practical book with concrete examples about how to focus on yourself and regain 'control' in your life. However, very very repetitive and using several 'buzzwords', sort of words that for a non-native English speaker have no real meaning and it's hard to remember the basic ideas after finishing the readings.
The nook is full of examples, many of them useful, but many of them rather blurred or too general in my opinion.
It makes a good read and you can find some useful survival ideas, but most of them you can already find them freely on various blogs about betrayal and survival.