Recovery from Abusive Groups [Paperback]

Wendy Ford (Author), Wendy Wolfberg (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0931337046 | ISBN-13: 978-0931337048 | Publication Date: May 1993 | Edition: Revised

Recovery from Abusive Groups was written by former cult member Wendy Ford (now Wolfberg) with a preface by social workers Bill and Lorna Goldberg, pioneers in helping ex-cultists. Recovery From Abusive Groups provides practical advice for former cult members and their families and focuses specifically on what ex-members can do to negotiate their way through the challenging post cult recovery process. Utilizing study questions, exercises, worksheets, and an abundance of common sense, Ms. Ford provides concrete suggestions on such issues as:

Building a recovery plan Financial and work issues Reconnecting Making new friends Dating "Floating" Coping with depression What families can do Stress & career planning

Editorial Reviews

From the Inside Flap

``Wendy Ford has written an honest, revealing, highly comprehensive and practical guide for former cultists and their families. Through this sensible, instructive book, a wider circle of people will now have the opportunity to benefit from her wise and practical step-by-step approach. This book is the first of its kind, and it will be difficult to surpass." -Lorna Goldberg, MSW, ACSW and William Goldberg, MSW, ACSW

``This book is of, by and for the recovering ex-cultist, a must-read for those who counsel ex-cultists, and a revealing and invaluable resource for those who love and live with the ex-cultist." - former 16 year member of a Boston-based cult

``This book is chock-full of practical advice. I highly recommend it to everyone who has had a cult mind control expereience and to anyone who wishes to be very supportive of the entire healing process." -Steve Hassan, M.Ed., ex-cultist, and author of Combatting Cult Mind Control

``Ms. Ford has taken the trauma and despair of exiting from a destructive cult and offered gentleness and encouragement in a way only someone who's been there can. This guide through the difficulty of recovery can provide basic steps for someone going through that process alone, or facilitate and enhance someone's work in counseling or rehabilitation. Ms. Ford provides direction at a time when the smallest of decisions is impossible and yet fiercely defended as one's own. I highly recommend this handbook as a tool for those recovering from an experience of mind control." -Nancy Miquelon, MSW, ex-cultist, and National Director of FOCUS, an ex-cultist support network

``An extremely helpful book for those individuals trying to cope with, understand, and recover from a cultic experience." -Carol Giambalvo, ex-cultist, former National Director of FOCUS, and author of Exit Counseling: A Family Intervention

From the Back Cover

"Wendy Ford has written an honest, revealing, highly comprehensive and practical guide for former cultists and their families. Through this sensible, instructive book, a wider circle of people will now have the opportunity to benefit from her wise and practical step-by-step approach. This book is the first of its kind, and it will be difficult to surpass." -Lorna Goldberg, MSW, ACSW and William Goldberg, MSW, ACSW

"This book is of, by and for the recovering ex-cultist, a must-read for those who counsel ex-cultists, and a revealing and invaluable resource for those who love and live with the ex-cultist." - former 16 year member of a Boston-based cult

"This book is chock-full of practical advice. I highly recommend it to everyone who has had a cult mind control expereience and to anyone who wishes to be very supportive of the entire healing process." -Steve Hassan, M.Ed., ex-cultist, and author of Combatting Cult Mind Control

"Ms. Ford has taken the trauma and despair of exiting from a destructive cult and offered gentleness and encouragement in a way only someone who's been there can. This guide through the difficulty of recovery can provide basic steps for someone going through that process alone, or facilitate and enhance someone's work in counseling or rehabilitation. Ms. Ford provides direction at a time when the smallest of decisions is impossible and yet fiercely defended as one's own. I highly recommend this handbook as a tool for those recovering from an experience of mind control." -Nancy Miquelon, MSW, ex-cultist, and National Director of FOCUS, an ex-cultist support network

"An extremely helpful book for those individuals trying to cope with, understand, and recover from a cultic experience." -Carol Giambalvo, ex-cultist, former National Director of FOCUS, and author of Exit Counseling: A Family Intervention

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 106 pages
• Publisher: American Family Foundation; Revised edition (May 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0931337046
• ISBN-13: 978-0931337048
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,881,888 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Life After Brainwashing 101, February 14, 2001

By 

Karl Kahler (Los Gatos, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Recovery from Abusive Groups (Paperback)

This book is an excellent guide to recovery from cult life from one who's been there. It's amazing how much ground there is to cover on this subject, and the author covers it well. If you've been in an abusive group (or want to help someone who has), this is an instructive and enlightening guide to getting over it and moving on.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Practical Self Help, February 19, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Recovery from Abusive Groups (Paperback)

Wendy Wolfberg's book is exceptionally practical, unique among books addressing the subject matter of recovery from abusive groups. Some of Ms. Wolfberg's insights apply to other crisis-driven situations, as well as the more specific recovery from cults and other abusive groups. Not only the ex-cultist but also his or her family can be greatly aided in the recovery process by reading this book; it is in a format which is easily "digested" and comprehensible to the individual in crisis (whether the individual is the ex-cultist or a family member).

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I think it's a great book!, February 13, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Recovery from Abusive Groups (Paperback)

Wendy Ford's book, Recovery from Abusive Groups, is practical experience from a sensitive and intelligent person who at a vulnerable place in life was recruited into an abusive group. The book isin a "workbook" format which has been successfully used for other books in the field of recovery from traumatic abuse or neglect. The book helped me when I was in a similar place in life. I had just broken free from an abusive group myself and needed all the support I could get. For anyone who has survived a traumatic experience, it is important to connect with and seek the support of other people who have "been there." Wendy's book is positive, survivor-friendly, and full of immediately practical suggestions on how to become free from the controlling influence of a group like a cult. It is intended for the survivor who is already out of the cult. It is in a different category from Steve Hassan's well-known book, Combating Cult Mind Control. Steve's book, while based upon firsthand traumatic experience in a cult, is geared more for the counselor than for the survivor, although it certainly has a lot to recommend it if one is a cult survivor. Wendy's book is different because it is a deeply personal reflection on the profound impact of destructive groups upon everyday people who were vulnerable and were seduced by the apparent security and ready answers provided by a cult. Cult abuse, or abuse in any "high demand" group, cuts deeply into the mind and emotions of the victim. There are millions of people in cults in the USA alone. It is hard to describe the hopeless, trapped feeling of being in a group where each day is a new low of suffering under unreasonable and often directly harmful treatment by persons in charge one was led to trust wholeheartedly. It is hard to climb out of a cult alone. Some people never make it out. For those who do, returning to non-cult living can be traumatic in itself. Wendy's book is affirmative and supportive. I can imagine this book would be especially helpful for those many people who do not have access to therapeutic counseling. The book is both heart-rending and heart-mending. I hope people will read it, if only to appreciate the deeply disturbing experience of undergoing the frightening experience of an abusive group.