Profoundly helpful
(11 of 11 Found this Helpful)
August 2, 2008
This is difficult work. The reviewers who bash this book can be understood -- it's absolutely petrifying to go into such painful memory. This is because it's not just your mind that stuffs away all the "child rearing" but it's stored in your body.
I'm doing this work with a therapist. It's scary, difficult, but absolutely life-altering. I am starting to see where I act like a child and where I'm back in my adult self again. It's unbelievable how many stimuli out there actually cause one to retreat into a child mentality -- a place where you have NO access to your adult consciousness. This isn't mysterious -- it just takes a lot of work and a deep commitment to being aware. Look at your interactions throughout the day... if a boss yelled at you and you felt depleted the rest of your day... if you are upset with someone but can't express it... the list is long, but it's unique to YOU and how you experienced your parents. Yes, the truth is not that they were BAD PEOPLE, but in how you EXPERIENCED them. Most people will say, "why bother to look at the past, it's gone!" This book will show you that so many childhood feelings STILL RULE YOUR PRESENT LIFE... and how to access and transform them. Be patient... this is not easy. Oh, and by the way, I had the misconception that I had to have actual, overt trauma in order to say I had a "troubled" childhood. The truth is, that even impatience and yelling -- let alone spanking or sexual abuse (which can be everything from actual physical rape to something as "innocuous" as a comment about one's anatomy) -- are traumatic to a child. I'm a lot clearer about all of this as a result of this book. If you've read Alice Miller and want to know how to heal, get this book.
Not helpful
(7 of 16 Found this Helpful)
March 29, 2008
I'd love to know what book these other reviewers read - I got nothing out of this book. It is very dry writing, doesn't site very many examples, and misses my needs completely. I was emotionally abused and got absolutely nothing from this book - no tips, no insight, nothing. This is more for people who weren't directly abused but had other childhood flaws - like having alcoholic parents, or parents who weren't there for you because they worked and also took care of the home. This book sites a couple piddly examples of alcoholic parents and latchkey kids, but it didn't really get even to the depths of those troubles. What, specifically, make these kids hurt? It doesn't really explain it. So the reader has no idea how THEY got to be how they are, and leaves them clueless as to how they themselves got this way. Where are these alleged examples that are supposed to be step by step and help you? There are NONE. No examples, unless you count a brief and piddly list on some views that kids have and turn them into adult views. Such as: No one loves me. vs the adult - there has to be someone out there in the 2 billion earthlings who would love you. How can this tripe even be a book? If this is the best she's got... she must have gotten her degree at Clown College. This list goes on to site more examples how there's got to be SOMEONE on the planet that doesn't think you are lame, a waste of time, have bad taste, etc. Well if you are going to use logic like that, then I say this: There's GOT to be a better book out there. For certain. Waste of time book!
Reclaiming Your Life
(3 of 3 Found this Helpful)
September 17, 2007
It's not too late to reclaim your life--read this book and work alone or with a competent therapist to understand first, why you need to reclaim your life and second, how to do it. You will be amazed. This book is a must read for anyone struggling with identity issues which have arisen from growing up with faulty parenthood. This book is an excellent resource, whether you are beginning your healing work or are stuck somewhere along the way (i.e., attempting to re-work your childhood issues through your current relationship).
absolutely terrific
(12 of 12 Found this Helpful)
November 9, 2006
I think we could usefully back away from the word "abuse" in a lot of instances....let us just say that parents do a LOT of things that injure their children on emotional and even deeper levels, injuries that continue to cause pain and dysfunction all their lives unless the children can figure out how to repair the damage.
Setting aside the overuse of the A-word, this book does four things very well: first, it defines and gives examples of the major categories of things that parents do which are seriously injurious. Second, it calmly shows how those childhood injuries continue to do damage in adult life. Third, it makes the point that by the time the injured child is an adult, there is NOTHING THE PARENT CAN DO to undo the injury. But fourth, wonderfully, it gives step by step instructions as to what the injured child, now an adult, can do to reduce or even end the damaging effects of those childhood injuries.
If you couple this book with the books of Harville Hendrix, you have POWERFUL tools for enabling yourself to live much MORE happily ever after!
Excellent but be careful
(30 of 30 Found this Helpful)
August 10, 2005
Jenson's book is excellent in helping you define past abuse and stop minimizing, denying, etc. Her tone is helpful and she shares that she, too, needed healing from childhood neglect. That said, regression therapy can be very dangerous to do alone. Get a sympathetic therapist, one familiar not only with childhood abuse and neglect but Jensen's work, too. I wouldn't recommend doing it all on your own or with non-professionals--the deeper the trauma, the more abuse there was, the more serious the abuse, the more likely you will tap into very strong and deeply buried feelings that can wreck your day, week or month until you work through them. I used the book on my own and had to find a therapist to help me sort through everything.
I stiill refer back to her book, esp. identifying "old" feelings v. the present situation. Be careful, though and have plenty of professional and family/friend support, esp. if the abuse you suffered left any signs of PTSD or anything like that.
