Review
"Some events can take years to recover from. The Trauma Tool Kit: Healing PTSD from the Inside Out is a mental health guide from Susan Pease Banitt as she uses her expertise as a psychotherapist to help readers cope with their life's pain, presenting them many ideas on their road to healing and how to better embrace it all. The Trauma Tool Kit is a strong addition to psychology and self-help collections, highly recommended.
" --James A. Cox, Midwest Book Review
― Reviews
"Scores of books have been written about post-traumatic stress disorder--what it is and how to deal with it. The latest is The Trauma Tool Kit: Healing PTSD From the Inside Out by Susan Pease Banitt, a psychotherapist who has been seeing patients for more than three decades and who also is a certified teacher of hatha yoga.
Banitt points out in her book that when she was in her forties she "was shaken to the core with an eruption of PTSD from the bowels of my being." The author does not dwell on the details of her own case of PTSD in the book. But she now recommends spiritual and holistic modialities such as acupuncture and naturopathic treatment for her patients with PTSD.
Those and many other treatments are part of the "trauma tool kit" that Banitt explores in her book. The author does not directly address PTSD in veterans of the Vietnam War or any other conflict. However, veterans with PTSD should be able to use the ideas, information, and practices Banitt includes in her 'tool kit.'" --The VVA Veteran, Books in Brief blog ― Reviews
"Susan Pease Bannitt, a psychotherapist, yoga teacher, and alternative healer, says PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) is a whole-body tragedy. Recovery, she says, begins with grounding, followed by a multifaceted East/West approach for healing body, mind, and spirit. It's not simple, and The Trauma Tool Kit reflects the complexity of the subject matter. In fact, she suggests reading only small parts of the book at a time because of the intensity of the information. This book is a treasure containing insight, practical exercises, and a wealth of resources. Consider displaying it prominently among your self-help/recovery merchandise.
" --Retailing Insight ― Reviews
"Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a human event of such enormous repercussions that it envelops both mind and body. According to Susan Pease Banitt, in her book The Trauma Tool Kit: Healing PTSD From the Inside Out, "PTSD is a whole-body tragedy."
Western medicine has traditionally treated psychological trauma as an issue of the mind and psyche. However, today it is becoming more understood that stress and trauma affect the entire human organism, including physical health.
Banitt encourages people who have been traumatized, whether they are returning soldiers, child-abuse survivors, or others in recovery from trauma, to realize the complexity of their experiences and work on their own rehabilitation." --Penny Hastings, excerpted from ForeWord Reviews, Spring 2012 ― Reviews
"In The Trauma Tool Kit Susan Pease Banitt concentrates on the physical, spiritual and esoteric dimensions of trauma usually ignored by our mainstream culture and healing practices. She presents universal dimensions of traumatic injury and recovery as they have been modeled in spiritual and holistic traditions for millennia as well as integrative methods practiced by holistic healers today. The Trauma Tool Kit is a readable, accessible, comprehensive, 'user-friendly' smorgasbord of healing ideas, information and practices that can help guide trauma survivors to wholeness. Susan Pease Banitt is consistently positive, encouraging and helpful as she guides readers in restoring healing and hope."
--Edward Tick, Ph.D., author of War and the Soul and The Practice of Dream Healing, and Director of Soldier's Heart ― Reviews
About the Author
Susan Pease Banitt, LCSW is a Harvard-trained psychotherapist with over thirty years experience in mental health work. She has worked in a variety of settings with hundreds of diverse clients over the years, including: residential childcare, child abuse prevention, inpatient psychiatric hospitals, outpatient clinics, medical hospitals and private practice. Her clients have included individuals, couples and groups, including children as young as 3 years and adults into their 80s. Since a very young age, Susan has been aware of her spiritual nature. After a Catholic upbringing, she spent her late twenties studying yoga and meditation and obtained her certification as a teacher of hatha yoga in her thirties. Over the years, Susan has come to see that traumatic stress and experiences are behind the vast majority of suffering in the mind and body. Her gifts of empathy and intuition became fully engaged when she began formal work with a shaman in 2000. At the same time, she delved deeper into yogic philosophy through intensive study of Vedanta, ancient Indian spiritual wisdom. As a healed survivor who has taken a deep journey into early traumatic abuse, Susan acts as a compassionate guide for those struggling to free themselves from the effects of traumatic stress. Because Susan has worked with so many gifted psychiatric and alternative practitioners, she has collected a large toolbox of interventions to offer clients and colleagues. Susan currently co-chairs the Mental Health Council for the National Association of Social Workers, Oregon chapter and sits on the board of Street Yoga, an organization that brings yoga techniques to disadvantaged youth in a variety of settings.
