Getting Through the Day: Strategies for Adults Hurt as Children [Paperback]

Nancy J. Napier (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 17, 1994

Early abuse can have a profound effect on adult life, especially when survivors struggle with dissociative responses, which range from "trancing out" under stress to the switching of personalities seen in multiples.

This book enables adults who were traumatized as children to learn new strategies to meet the demands of daily living. While focusing on the effects of dissociation and including specific advice for multiples, Nancy Napier presents dozens of exercises helpful to anyone who finds that unresolved childhood feelings are blocking life's path.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“An insightful, compassionate, practical and readable guide for survivors of hurtful childhoods.” (Gloria Steinem)

“This book provides valuable tools for adults abused as children. The title is too modest. The techniques provided not only help 'get through the day' but also empower the reader to gradually mitigate and eventually overcome the effects of painful past experiences.” (Yvonne M. Dolan, author of Resolving Sexual Abuse)

“Nancy Napier has added to the healing literature for adult survivors of childhood trauma. . . . In reading this book, I continuously thought of how useful it would be to any of my current patients.” (Christine A. Courtois, Ph.D., author of Healing the Incest Wound)

About the Author

Nancy J. Napier is a marriage and family therapist in private practice in New York City. She is a former president of the New York Society for the Study of Multiple Personality and Dissociative Disorders, a board member of the New York Association for Marriage and Family Therapy, and a past board member of the New York Milton H. Erickson Society for Psychotherapy and Hypnosis. She is the author of several books, including Sacred Practices for Conscious Living.

Product Details

• Paperback: 304 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (September 17, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393312429
• ISBN-13: 978-0393312423
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #250,207 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 34 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Napier's book has become a security blanket for me! July 13, 1998

By A Customer

Format:Paperback

This book is a must-have for anyone who used dissociative strategies to survive physical, emotional, or sexual abuse as a child; their therapists, and support people. Napier does an outstanding job of explaining what it means to be dissociative, and how to cope with it. She also offers advice for multiple personalities.

A particularly useful chapter covers how to find a therapist and what the therapist-client relationship should be.

I have purchased copies for members of my support family as the book does an excellent job of demystifying dissociation and multiplicity.

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Real Help When Day-to-Day Living is a Struggle January 22, 2003

By E. Myers

Format:Paperback

Sometimes daily life feels like climbing a hill through molasses. Even those who don't have MPD may have inner children (teenagers, pseudo-adults) who seem to be at war with each other, or extreme emotional reactions left over from childhood. This book has a wealth of strategies for soothing those inner selves in the context of the demands of daily living. If that was all, that would be enough for me to recommend this book, because I don't know of another book on the market that deals with practical strategies for daily life in terms of these inner selves (with suggestions for those who do have MPD). But I also appreciate the empathetic tone of the book. Sometimes that kind of tone, however well-meant, can come off as sappy or condescending, but I felt that here it was warm and sincere. I'd also like to recommend two other books: "How to Love Yourself When You Don't Know How" and "Internal Family Systems Therapy." Both are wonderful books about these inner selves and how they function in us. And while they don't deal with the day-to-day struggles and strategies that this book does, they are also resources for exploring the subpersonality issues that affect so many of us.

32 of 35 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Relief may be found within these pages! February 25, 2001

By Brenda

Format:Paperback

Time and time again, I have come back to this book for grounding. For validation. For understanding. For direction...and it never lets me down. It is true that the author of a book can only... really.... take you as far as he/she has gone themselves! This books leads the way to what all other self-help books should aspire too! Absence of ego and a genuine sense and practical advice on how to move from point A to point B! I can not reccomend this book highly enough! Out of all the other books that I have on the subject...... this one... hands down... is the one that sits upon my night-stand! It is invaluable!!!!!