Customer Reviews

Women Who Hurt Themselves: A Book Of Hope And Understanding

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This was a good book for people interested in the phenomenon of self-mutilation and people who have advanced quite far on the road to recovery, but beware otherwise. It's very intense and has a great deal of upsetting and graphic stories of abuse- many of which are sexual in nature. It's hard to get through at times. If you are in the midst of dealing with a cutting problem, this might be too hard to read. If you are just starting to recover, this might trigger a relapse. It's a good book, but just proceed with great caution.

A new perspective on why women with eating disorders, compulsions, obsessions, and self abuse disorders act out in self-harmful ways. In order to understand these women, it is necessary, says the author, to understand TRS, or Trauma Reenactment Syndrome. All of the women in this book were subconsciously reenacting experienced trauma in childhood. Once made to comprehend that, the women were given a "program" of sorts to help them find their way out of the ever progressive syndrome of self abuse. This book made me look at this syndrome with new eyes and a clearer understanding of the courage the women she writes about have. This book will provide assistance for the many women out there who live with the shame of their obsessions, and will provide hope for a brighter tomorrow. Dusty Miller writes to the average reader, as well as to therapists and other professionals. The book is easy to understand and hard to put down.

My therapist let me borrow his copy of this book when he first started treating me. If anything, this book was more upsetting to me than helpful. I went ahead and gave it three stars because I think if you were a professional trying to get a grasp of what was going on in the head of someone who self injures then this book would be helpful. But for me the graphic descriptions of the abuse the women in the book suffered was a bit much, especially while trying to process my own issues. Plus it did not offer me any true insight into my own problems with self injury, or any guidance as to how to stop. I think the main thing I got out of it was that at least if my therapist had read this he was attempting to understand self injurious behaviour, which was more than most therapists I'd encountered had attempted to do.

I think this book is a must read for anyone who is treating or in a relationship with a women her engages in risky behaviors or self-mutilation. It puts the I don't understand into, ok I get it a bit. I don't think it is an end all book since the trauma and abuse often goes deeper than this book does. I do however reccomend it as a starting point to other more triggering books. I think this book along with being a must read is also a must keep for referral for yourself and family and to give to people who want to understand better the journey of these tortured women.

Dusty Miller is an author and therapist whose gentle spirit and powerul voice are providing a generation of women survivors with a safe and protective presence in their therapy and recovery. This book serves as a role model for clinicians trying to help clients on their sojourn from pain and hurt to truth and healing. Miller provides us the courage we need as therapists to engage in "cutting conversations"--ones which our clients will greatly benefit from and be extreamly grateful for.

--Jonathan Diamond Ph.D. author Narrative Means to Sober Ends: Treating Addiction And Its Aftermath; private practice, Northampton and Greenfield MA.

The first part of the book provides an explanation of why some women can't seem to get to a good - safe place and stay there. She describes how women may try a variety of therapies and self-help organizations for addictions yet, they don't resolve the issue. For example, they go to Dialectical Behavioral Therapy and that doesn't quite fit, although the information can be helpful. Some women go to cognitive therapy for years and worked on child abuse issues, while it might have resolved a lot, it still may be found lacking. She claims that the term complex PTSD more closely approaches the panoply of problems displayed by trauma survivors yet more needs to be included.
She labels the problem as Trauma Reenactment Syndrome or TRS whose central characteristics include:
1. A sense of being at war with one's body
2. Extreme secrecy as a central organizing principle of life
3. Inability to self-protect, often evident in a specific kind of fragmentation of the self
4. Relationships in which the struggle for control overshadows all else

Miller uses a triadic relationship model between the abuser-victim-non-protecting-presence to explain the dynamics that occur when people continue to hurt themselves even when they know it is wrong.
At one point the abuser and non-protecting presence were external. Later, the roles become internalized in order to maintain relationships. At various times, the self-injurer flips through all three roles. There is no room for a protective presence and therefore one grows up to have difficulty in keeping herself safe.

There are case studies throughout the book that provide clear examples ranging from child torture to an over-tending grandparent. Some of these are rather graphic, but to understand the problem, it is necessary to see its depth and the reasons for the resilience to therapy.

The second part of the text discusses therapeutic solutions. It is not written as convincingly as the first part. It gives the impression that the author may be still trying to determine the best therapeutic method.
What Miller comes up with is a method based on an outer ring, middle ring and center ring. Each ring represents the level of knowledge gathering and revelation that takes place between the therapist and the client, with the center being the most intense.
What is understood is that the therapist is doomed to failure if they push for information too quickly. There must be a deepening trust along with an understanding off rules and procedures between the therapist and the client before dealing with the core issues. If a client were to enter therapy to primarily deal with sexual abuse issues, the therapist should slow the process until a necessary rapport and trust relationship has been developed.

I would recommend this book highly to women who have been in recovery for some time and are still wondering why it isn't working. I think all therapists should read this book to get a more in depth understanding of Trauma Reenactment Syndrome.

At last...there is hope of recovery. After reading many other books on the subject of self-harm, a lot of them containing helpful information, I still despaired of getting well. When I came across Dusty Miller's book, I was amazed at the depth of insight into self-injurious behavior it contained. I feel like shouting to the world that SOMEONE UNDERSTANDS. The book addresses a problem shrouded in mystery even to the woman herself, but I believe that the author has found the key. It is not my custom to write reviews even though I devour books of all subjects; however, I had to encourage other women to get this book. It is a roadmap of hope and understanding leading to recovery.

This books speaks so clearly to me, I wish I had read it sooner. I have been through inpatient and outpatient treatment for bulimia and drinking and have not been able to stop hurting myself. The relief, pleasure, pain, release, comfort, numbness, and odd excitement I feel from hurting myself has never been explained so impressively as in Ms. Miller's book. If you think that you might be a woman who in whatever way keeps reverting to abusing herself for release, relief, comfort, or just to keep your sanity, I highly recommend this book. It will not cure you, but it gives great insight and has helped me feel less out of control in many ways. I can now see why I act in certain ways (i.e. try so hard to be close to someone them continuosly push them away, and more). There is more out there than the 12 steps, part of which is really understanding yourself, not just blindly adhereing to societies rules.

THIS BOOK HAS HELPED ME UNDERSTAND MY BEST FRIEND A WHOLE LOT BETTER, I WOULD RECOMEND THIS BOOK TO ALL DOCTORS AND CHURCH MINISTERS AND CHURCH PASTORS AS AN EXCELENT HELP IN UNDERSTANDING WOMEN WHO SUFFER IN THESE AREAS ONCE I STARTED TO READ THIS BOOK I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN.EASY TO READ EASY TO UNDERSTAND, SIMPLY THE BEST I HAVE READ IN THIS FIELD.

Well, I could read about lost souls of stangers before it finaly came to me. I wouldn't belive it at first hint, but couldn't resist it in the next chapter, Self-Protection. My "Triadic Self" was revealed in every single line before I realised the shickness of many friends. It's a shocking fact for many of us living our lives as we like to think we all know something about everything. When we do not understand everything, either the facts or events behind them. This book is a surprise for people who think they know why "Howard" was so bad to them. And for those who are not sure. It's with short true stories intertwined with hope and understanding. It's like a bare cold fact waiting to enter the souls of people in mental warfare. Who are lost and found in twisted hearts, sometimes. As a way of salvation somehow, but shocking in the same time. It's big as it's small and beyond.