Customer Reviews

Climbing Out of Depression: A Practical Guide for Sufferers (Lion Body & Soul)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

A brilliant, informative book that is divided into small chapters, charts and activities. It is very reader-friendly, and can be used as a reference book rather than a read-back-to-front novel....
Sue Atkinson isn't a psychotherapist or doctor, but a regular person like you or me, who has experienced depression first hand and has lived to tell the tale and offer practical advice to sufferers. I found the activities particularly helpful, because they encourage soul-searching and self-understanding. Sue Atkinson encourages us to tune into our feelings, rather than masking them. She believes that hardships, both situational and emotional, should be brought to the fore and dealt with. She does not write in a condescending tone; and she is a highly literate author, especially considering this is her debut book.
My only problem with this book is the abundant references to Christianity, as the author of this book is a devout Christian. She means well, by telling us that religion was her savior and ray of light in the pit of darkness.....but I would find that most discouraging if I was Atheist or Agnostic. She preaches, ever-so-subtley, that Jesus saved her soul, and this comes across as blind faith rather than an intellectual realization, and is most inconsistant with the other messages in the book.
If you can look past her religious references, you will be rewarded with a very practical guide to recovery from depression. It is delivered with understanding, empathy, and hope. I recommend this book for any and all sufferers of depression, guilt, anxiety, and phobia, as well as those seeking to be informed about such conditions.

The book seemed about 3 times longer than it needed to be. What I got from it was that a lot of what I feel is normal for people with depression and I'm not the only one with these feelings. That was comforting, but it doesn't really get into why and how a person gets there without doing these odd activities. The activities don't seem like they would be helpful unless you had a professional working with you on them. I'm a do-it-yourselfer and like to take on activities on my own, and I found these confusing.
I would say you can read the first chapter and see if this book is going to be helpful to you. I read the whole thing waiting for something to kick in and it didn't really happen to any notable degree. If you don't feel like you relate to her, you don't need to read the entire book. You'll know if it's going to work for you pretty quickly.
I'm now reading Undoing Depression and getting a lot more out of it. A lot of reviews for that book gave it lower ratings for being out-of-date, but my version is 2010 and I've already gotten so much out of the first 70 pages that I'm very encouraged that it will make a difference for me. The author speaks from the expertise of his PhD, and being a depression sufferer himself who lost his mother to suicide at 15.

This book is incredible. Having had depression since I was six years old, I thought I would never be free of it. When I first read this book, I cried because I'd never before come across anyone who knew how it felt. It was like the author was inside my head.
The advice and practical solutions are fantastic and really work. Now I am able to catch my depression before I get suicidal, which is brilliant.
I keep it by my bed and read it whenever I am feeling I am slipping.
If you have depression you must get this book. It could save your life.

over the last 2 years i've read almost everybook i could lay my hands on do to with depression, in the search to find a cure for me.

by far the best one to date is called

climbing out of depression by sue atkinson.

i carry it everywhere with me, and when i need help i can open it anywhere and read a chapter, its like she knows exactly what i'm going through its been a life line for me. i guess she should cause she has suffered with depression and came out the other side.