Heal & Forgive: Forgiveness in the Face of Abuse [Paperback]

Nancy Richards (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2005

Heal and Forgive presents a first-hand description of child abuse and navigates the reader through the distinctive stumbling blocks encountered by adult survivors of abuse who are attempting to forgive. This thought-provoking illustration offers new hope to those who have given up at the prospect of forgiving. Many survivors of abuse long to forgive their abusers; however, many common approaches to forgiveness are not appropriate for situations involving abuse. This work demonstrates to the survivor the additional steps necessary to achieve forgiveness in the face of abuse. Surprisingly, it is often the very process of not forgiving, of acknowledging the pain, and taking the steps to heal that frees the abused to forgive. This book clearly points to the need to validate their story with a sympathetic listener, express their anger in appropriate ways, mourn for their losses, and protect themselves and others from re-injury. Further, this work explains to the individual that forgiveness does not mean excusing. No one needs to forgive the acts perpetrated against them in order to let go of resentment and forgive the being who harmed them. Forgiveness is not an event of immediacy. It's not a bolt of lightning that brightens the soul and burns the pain to ashes. Forgiveness is a process that is transformational. When all is said and done, the final process is an act of love.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Nancy Richards is an adult survivor of childhood abuse. She is the single parent of two thriving, adult daughters. Richards is a successful business woman as vice president and general manager of a large wholesale food processing company in Seattle. She is a member of The International Women’s Writing Guild. She makes her home in one of the city’s suburbs.

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Blue Dolphin Publishing (May 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1577331583
• ISBN-13: 978-1577331582
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 4.8 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,304,723 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Nancy Richards is an adult survivor of childhood abuse. She is the author of "Heal and Forgive: Forgiveness in the Face of Abuse," "Heal and Forgive II: The Journey from Abuse and Estrangement to Reconciliation" and co-author of "101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful, Fast-Paced, and Empowering, June 13, 2005

By 

David Kleist - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Heal & Forgive: Forgiveness in the Face of Abuse (Paperback)

Nancy Richards has written a poignant memoir that should be
read by a wide audience. It opens with her early life as a
well-adjusted child in a happy, healthy family; but soon it
veers to the death of her father, the remarriage of her
mother, and the onset of physical and emotional abuse from
her stepfather and, through enabling and collaboration, her
own mother.

Ms. Richards' journey through adolescence, young adulthood,
to mature adulthood is vividly recounted. Any reader whose
journey has been analogous to Richards' will readily
identify with her attempts to give voice to--and then cope
with the consequences of--her childhood abuse.

I found myself underlining or bracketing large portions of
the second half of the book. Richards not only was betrayed
by her mother and stepfather but also was scapegoated by
her own brothers and other relatives as being the "sick"
one, the "troublemaker," the girl who never liked to be
hugged and who always gave her mother a hard time. Even
community members outside of her immediate family who saw
the bruises and the blood refused to help or to even
acknowledge that something was wrong.

For a victim of childhood abuse (and I am one myself), few
things are more damning or confusing than the utter refusal
of family or friends to speak up on one's behalf. It's a
double-whammy: one quickly learns to "cover" for the
abusers and to blame oneself for the evils. How could
parents, the ultimate protectors and nurturers, possibly
hurt their own flesh and blood?

America as a whole is in utter denial over the not uncommon
abuse of children and adolescents by parents and relatives.
Europe much more readily accepts the "divorcing" of one's
own parents; but here, with a blind allegiance to the Old
Testament's "Honor one's mother and father" and a nearly
complete neglect of the true meaning behind "Loving one's
neighbor (or child) as oneself," we perpetuate the
treating of children as property and the goings-on within
any "nuclear family" as inviolable, untouchable--none of
our own business.

Because of this, Richards' account is a much-needed one.
Her own steps toward health and wholeness are realistic and
clear-sighted. Although she advocates forgiveness, she
states that true forgiveness can come only with
acknowledgement, reparation, and change on the part of the
abuser(s). Self-preservation takes precedence over blind
and blanket allegiance/forgiveness. One cannot love others
as oneself if one loves oneself so little that that Self is
permitted to be the object of continued (and
unacknolwedged) abuse.

I am grateful that Nancy Richards has had the courage to
publish this intelligent, sensitive exploration of her own
experiences that so mirror the experiences of many others.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Validating, May 27, 2005

By 

Niki Collins-queen, Author "author" (Forsyth, Georgia USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Heal & Forgive: Forgiveness in the Face of Abuse (Paperback)

My story was written on every page of Nancy Richards' book "Heal and Forgive." This page-turner is inspiring, validating and wise. Her heartbreaking life story shows that forgiveness is not a single act but a life work that has many layers and many seasons.
In sharing her recovery Richards offers a healing blueprint for physical and emotional abuse, a mother's lifelong rejection, and being viewed as an enemy by siblings. She shows how to move from her personal betrayal to the larger collective betrayal we all face.
She illustrates how forced forgiveness and forgiveness in order to heal is shallow and does not last. We need to heal first in order to forgive. Forgiveness without healing is from a position of weakness. She says forgiveness is not a choice but a process that results from healing. Only when we work towards healing does forgiveness become a realistic goal.
Richards chose to stop seeing her mother and take care of herself when her mother continued to heap contempt on her and be oblivious to her feelings. She said the act of not forgiving her mother liberated her from her abuse and set her free to forgive. She stated, "I never would have been able to forgive my mother if I still had a relationship with her."
Her story shows how healing comes with self-preservation and self-compassion when we feel safe to acknowledge and talk about our injuries and begin to deal with the trauma. Richards said, "Each time I thought I had finished mourning, another wave of heart breaking losses emerged. However as I peeled away each layer of pain, I grew stronger."

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must-Read For All Victims Who Feel Pressured To Forgive Prematurely, March 12, 2006

By 

Sister Renee Pittelli "Author of Breaking the... (Gloryland, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Heal & Forgive: Forgiveness in the Face of Abuse (Paperback)

Heal and Forgive is the best book I've read in a very long time. As the director of Luke 17:3 Ministries for adult children of abusive, controlling or abandoning birth-families, I would be hard-pressed to come up with a more helpful book to recommend. It is unique in its perspective in that it teaches the reader that sometimes it is okay, and even necessary, NOT to forgive. It is a page turner right from the beginning, gripping you with Nancy Richards' riveting and disturbing story of her sadistic stepfather's violence and relentless abuse of herself and her brothers, and her mother's complicity in the abuse and complete refusal to protect her children in the slightest way.

Even more distressing is the author's account of her attempts to protect herself and her brothers, and to stand up and speak the truth about the abuse, which resulted in her treacherous mother convincing anyone who would listen that she was a liar and troublemaker with mental problems. There is a twisted episode in which her stepfather was finally going to move out, but her mother told the then 12-year old author to ask him to stay. He did stay, and years later the mother blamed her daughter for controlling her marriage (at age 12!) and making her husband stay when she could have been rid of him sooner.

Long after the evil stepfather was gone and the author was grown, her mother continued to expose the author's younger brothers to repeated abuse from a string of other losers she became involved with. Nancy Richards tells, in heart-wrenching detail, of her attempts to protect her younger siblings, to get anyone to listen to her or believe her, and to somehow maintain a relationship with the mother she still loved and the rest of her family.

But, in a scenario disturbingly familiar to many abuse survivors, her mother managed to convince most of the family that Richards was the problem, and to turn almost her entire family against her, including the brothers she had tried so hard and sacrificed so much to protect. The denial, betrayals, and blatant lies as the family protected the abusers and scape-goated the author will ring true with so many of us.

And then the author was left to embark on the path to forgiveness, with absolutely no remorse or repentance from those she was pressured to forgive, and not even any validation of her traumatic experiences. At each stage of the process, she faced renewed pain with every new revelation, such as the realizations that her mother was the one who betrayed her the most, and that her mother really never loved her.

Throughout her long and difficult journey to forgiveness and recovery, the author has many valuable insights which she lovingly shares with us. The most important insight, which is the main premise of the book, is that healing needs to come FIRST, BEFORE forgiveness. We usually feel pressured to forgive prematurely, by family and friends, therapists, and society in general. But forced forgiveness is not always possible, and is certainly not healthy.

The author teaches us that forgiveness is a process that begins with healing, and needs to include other elements as well, such as validation, anger, grief, and protection. In the process of her recovery, Nancy Richards read other author's works, which helped her to understand these truths about forgiveness, and she quotes from them in her book. When reading Heal & Forgive, one gets the sense that the author is not just writing about her own experiences, but is doing all she can to present a well-rounded and informed picture that will help other abuse victims as much as possible. She opens her heart to us, and shares her innermost thoughts and every feeling she has that might validate our own feelings and help us on our road to recovery.

The book is an easy read, and I was able to finish it in a few sittings. It was a hard book to put down, and I hated to walk away from it in the middle of the story without finding out what was going to happen next. It was a lot of food for thought. Nancy Richards does all abuse victims a favor when she teaches us that sometimes no matter what we are willing to do and how hard we are willing to try, it is just not possible to have a relationship with some people. We understand how important it is to stand up and tell the truth- to others and to ourselves.

When we realize that someone we love doesn't love us, the truth can be so hard to bear, but it is still the truth, and denying it doesn't change anything. We learn that sometimes we need to make the choice to walk away from a toxic relationship. We feel validated in learning that it is alright NOT TO FORGIVE evil people, and that releasing ourselves from the pressure to forgive gives us the freedom to heal. Only after we have healed will we be able to come to a place of genuine forgiveness.

After reading Heal & Forgive, I admire Nancy Richards for her courage and determination to heal and lead a life of peace and happiness despite her birth-family's rejection, and I am appreciative of her sincere efforts to encourage the rest of us and validate our experiences by sharing her story. Her triumph over the devastation and heartache inflicted by those she loved is an inspiration to anyone who thinks they can never get over the pain and be happy again. I urge all those who have felt the knife of a loved one's betrayal in their back, or who feel pressured to forgive before they are ready, to read this book. It is a must-read for any survivor of birth-family abuse.