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Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving: A GUIDE AND MAP FOR RECOVERING FROM CHILDHOOD TRAUMA

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Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving: A GUIDE AND MAP FOR RECOVERING FROM CHILDHOOD TRAUMA Kindle Edition

by Pete Walker (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.8 10,511 ratings

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I have Complex PTSD [Cptsd] and wrote this book from the perspective of someone who has experienced a great reduction of symptoms over the years. I also wrote it from the viewpoint of someone who has discovered many silver linings in the long, windy, bumpy road of recovering from Cptsd. I felt encouraged to write this book because of thousands of e-mail responses to the articles on my website that repeatedly expressed gratitude for the helpfulness of my work. An often echoed comment sounded like this: At last someone gets it. I can see now that I am not bad, defective or crazy…or alone! The causes of Cptsd range from severe neglect to monstrous abuse. Many survivors grow up in houses that are not homes – in families that are as loveless as orphanages and sometimes as dangerous. If you felt unwanted, unliked, rejected, hated and/or despised for a lengthy portion of your childhood, trauma may be deeply engrained in your mind, soul and body. This book is a practical, user-friendly self-help guide to recovering from the lingering effects of childhood trauma, and to achieving a rich and fulfilling life. It is copiously illustrated with examples of my own and my clients’ journeys of recovering. This book is also for those who do not have Cptsd but want to understand and help a loved one who does. This book also contains an overview of the tasks of recovering and a great many practical tools and techniques for recovering from childhood trauma. It extensively elaborates on all the recovery concepts explained on my website, and many more. However, unlike the articles on my website, it is oriented toward the layperson. As such, much of the psychological jargon and dense concentration of concepts in the website articles has been replaced with expanded and easier to follow explanations. Moreover, many principles that were only sketched out in the articles are explained in much greater detail. A great deal of new material is also explored. Key concepts of the book include managing emotional flashbacks, understanding the four different types of trauma survivors, differentiating the outer critic from the inner critic, healing the abandonment depression that come from emotional abandonment and self-abandonment, self-reparenting and reparenting by committee, and deconstructing the hierarchy of self-injuring responses that childhood trauma forces survivors to adopt. The book also functions as a map to help you understand the somewhat linear progression of recovery, to help you identify what you have already accomplished, and to help you figure out what is best to work on and prioritize now. This in turn also serves to help you identify the signs of your recovery and to develop reasonable expectations about the rate of your recovery. I hope this map will guide you to heal in a way that helps you to become an unflinching source of kindness and self-compassion for yourself, and that out of that journey you will find at least one other human being who will reciprocally love you well enough in that way.

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About the Author

Paul Brion has a passion for storytelling. He believes that audiobooks--our most current form of the oral tradition--are the purest of the interactive and co-creative arts. An autodidact with eclectic interests, he enjoys learning about a wide variety of subjects, as he has an avaricious hunger for knowledge.

Pete Walker is a licensed marriage and family psychotherapist with degrees in social work and counseling psychology. He has been working as a counselor, lecturer, writer, and group leader for thirty-five years; and as a trainer, supervisor and consultant of other therapists for twenty years. Pete lives and luxuriates in family life with his wife and nine year old son in the San Francisco Bay Area. He enjoys his art work, gardening, hiking, and reading to his son. Pete also holds certificates in supervision from The California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists and from The Psychotherapy Institute in Berkeley. Pete is a "general practitioner" who specializes in helping adults recovering from growing up in traumatizing families, especially those whose repeated exposure to childhood abuse and/or neglect left them with symptoms of Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD). He has a great deal of recovery from his own CPTSD, and his professional approach is highly enriched by his own forty-year journey of recovering. Pete's articles on a multi-modal approach to treating CPTSD have been published in a number of therapy magazines and websites. His therapeutic approach is eclectic and Relational (Intersubjective). He guides the therapeutic process with values that include empathy, vulnerability, authenticity, and mutuality. Pete's first book, The Tao of Fully Feeling: Harvesting Forgiveness Out Of Blame, has been acclaimed by many therapists, recovery websites, and clients as a powerful, compassionate, and pragmatic tool for guiding recovery.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00HJBMDXK
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Azure Coyote Publishing (December 18, 2013)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ December 18, 2013
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 3039 KB
Simultaneous device usage ‏ : ‎ Unlimited
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 376 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #13,411 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #35 in Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
- #72 in Self-Help (Kindle Store)

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4.8 10,511 ratings

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Pete Walker

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Pete Walker, M.A., LMFT has a private practice in Berkeley, California. He has been working as a counselor, lecturer, group leader, trainer, supervisor and consultant of other therapists for 40 years.Pete specializes in helping adults who were traumatized in childhood, especially those whose repeated exposure to abuse and/or neglect left them with the symptoms of Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder [CPTSD].

Pete's BEST SELLING BOOK, "Complex PTSD: From Surviving To Thriving" is a comprehensive, user-friendly, self-help guide to recovering from all the the lingering effects of childhood trauma. This newest edition contains a new index of key words, and a 38 page excerpt from his memoir: Homesteading In The Calm Eye Of The Storm".

"Complex PTSD" is an overview of the tasks of recovering, and an illumination of the silver linings that can come out of effective recovery work. It is also a map of the recovery process, and contains a great many practical tools and techniques for recovering from CPTSD. It is also richly illustrated with examples of his own and others' journeys of recovering.

Pete's NEWEST BOOK, "Homesteading in the Calm Eye of the Storm: A Therapist Navigates His OWN CPTSD", is a sequel to his best-selling book "Complex PTSD", which is described above. "Homesteading" illustrates the processes of recovering with examples from the author's own recovery process. It is a memoir written in narrative, easy-to-read narrative, that is rich, poignant, funny and full of self-disclosive anecdotes that are sure to help other survivors in their recovery. Many have also said that it greatly reduced their sense of shame and gave them hope and motivation for the journey of recovering. It is written in the spirit of singer/songwriter Brandi Carlile's verse: "You can dance in a hurricane, but only if you're dancing in the eye".

Pete's FIRST BOOK, "The Tao of Fully Feeling: Harvesting Forgiveness Out of Blame", has been acclaimed by many therapists and clients as a powerful, compassionate and pragmatic tool for guiding recovery. It contains practical, in depth guidelines for safely working with the anger and tears of grieving. It also provides a great deal of effective self-reparenting advice. Alice Miller, author of "The Drama of the Gifted Child", wrote: "Pete Walker wrote a book about his own recovery from emotional numbness. The author passionately explores as thoroughly as possible the role of emotions in human life. The result is not only a moving, honest recount but also an informative guide for people who want to become more aware of their buried feelings. Walker's well explained concept of 'reparenting' will help them go through this fascinating process in a safe, protected way."

"Complex PTSD: From Surviving To Thriving" is also now available in SPANISH from Amazon as: "TEP COMPLEJO: De Sobrevivir a Prosperar".

"Complex PTSD..." is also available in GERMAN from Amazon, as Posttraumatische Belastungsstörungand.

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A. J. Porter

Excellent Book

Reviewed in the United States on April 4, 2024

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This powerful and well written book offers an in-depth analysis of CPTSD. It not only covers this topic broadly in a self-help manner, but it offers suggestions for therapists/counselors, and it provides a detailed outline of steps to take to heal CPTSD for the reader. I was not expecting such deep, authentic healing to take place. It also happened to come at a time when I was in a deeply dysregulated state. What incredible timing.
Pete Walker carefully guides the reader through what could be viewed as extremely difficult memories and situations buried deep within. He offers a road map - suggestions - in the event that a reader is triggered, how to address, acknowledge, and ultimately begin authentic healing. This book has had more of an impact on me than any other healing experience. I did not expect the powerful outcome, and I am grateful to have read this. I only regret that I did not have access to this decades ago. Please, if you have CPTSD or know someone who does (a larger number than we can imagine), recommend or read this book.

14 people found this helpful

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L Murphy

I recommend this book - very helpful!

Reviewed in the United States on November 10, 2019

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What I liked:
1) This is the best book I've read in a very long time. Despite some inaccuracies, it unmasks and reveals the horrifying truth of severe and widespread childhood abuse in so-called modern Western culture. Too bad evolution doesn't require humans prove that they will be good enough parents before they're able to have children.

2) Pete Walker shows that finally, someone understands. Somebody gets it, and can write about it in a way which makes it possible for other people to get it. It is a tremendous relief to read this book. It provides validation for the suffering of the silent children inside those of us who were abandoned, abused, and neglected our entire childhoods by all the adults around us. No, we are not "too this, too that, and too much the other thing." We are exactly the right quantities of various traits that we needed to be, in order to survive.

I've lived a very long time with the trauma inflicted on my undeveloped, defenseless nervous system. I'm still wired as though I'm trapped in the horrifying war zone of my childhood. How do I rewire my nervous system? How do I go from surviving to thriving? This book promises to provide a map and guide to help me recover. I hope by the time I finish reading it, I will understand what the map says and know how to use it as a guide to where I'm trying to go.

3) Pete Walker not only understands cptsd, but he also has deep compassion for those who suffer with cptsd.

4) Walker has a lot of good recommendations and suggestions. My complaint with some of them is the missing details of *how* to follow through with them. Part of this may be that I've had few or no models to demonstrate exactly how to go through healthy grieving and healthy anger. Part of this may be because I haven't read the whole book yet. I've used many cognitive tools over many years to perform the thought deconstruction and replacement healing process. I need concrete, step-by-step instructions for the emotional part of the healing process.

What I didn't like:
1) The book has too many links to itself within the book. (See chapter XXX for YYY) This became distracting after a while.

2) Repetitive and wordy

3) Author sometimes gets things wrong, but the wrong parts are buried in a lot of really right parts. This makes it harder to recognize when the author has gone overboard, gotten too enthusiastic with his own theories and conclusions. Not everything rings true, and when strong language is used to describe something which doesn't ring true, I find myself re-reading the section and adding notes. Each person who has cptsd has a different flavor of it, so some of his descriptions and assertions are not accurate.

4) I can't buy the audio version of the book without subscribing to a "free trial" of audible.
___
For people who weren't abandoned, abused, and neglected, this book will probably seem like a gross exaggeration, a lot of whining, and undeserving vilifying of parents. For those who read this book and came away with that impression, I have two pieces of advice:
1. Count your blessings that you were raised by parents who nurtured you, cared about your well-being, and consistently showed you they cared without ripping the rug out from under your feet to punish you on random occasions at their whim. Your parents let you know you mattered, and they actually played an active role in your growing up to become a healthy, mature adult.
2. Try to have understanding and compassion for people who had "not good enough" parenting. We really do exist. Believe that it happened, happens, and will continue to happen. Just because you can't see it doesn't mean it isn't real. Be aware that it may have happened to the person sitting next to you.

47 people found this helpful

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and123

CPTSD Healing START HERE!

Reviewed in the United States on January 6, 2022

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Stop scrolling and listen up. Do not even purchase another CPTSD book until you have read this one. Trust me, I have spent THOUSANDS, yes, thousands, of dollars on trauma healing resources related to CPTSD and its hellish symptoms but this one is *BY FAR* the best. It's the kind of book where you highlight almost every single sentence on every single page. Here's why:

1.) Emergency Preparedness. Unfortunately, the way in which I learned about my CPTSD diagnosis was through a massive emotional flashback. In 2021 I decided to leave a marriage full of the same religious, psychological, emotional, and physical abuse that I was raised in. During this process, old trauma was triggered in a way I had never experienced before. For months I had been living in constant hyperarousal. I felt like a panicky and frantic child. The slightest sounds and movements would throw me into full blown panic attacks. I was insecure, anxious, impulsive, and afraid. I couldn't sleep or eat. I am only 5' and normally weigh 115 lbs and lost 20 lbs in 2 months. I was irritable, couldn't concentrate on my job, and felt constantly on guard. None of this was good considering I own my own six figure business and am a mom to three little kids. I kept digging and researching and everything I found was kind of similar but didn't really describe whatever it was I was experiencing. I had even bought another famous book on CPTSD looking for answers and it held none.

But, 6 months later, I found this book. Pete Walker begins the book by saying something along the lines of, "if you are experiencing such-and-such symptoms, skip to page _____," so I did. My mind was blown, tears were falling down my face because I finally had a name to what it was I had been experiencing for 6 entire months now! It was an emotional flashback. Emotional flashback's are interesting because they do not have the visual element that is present in PTSD flashbacks and they can last for a long time. Mine ended up lasting 6 months and the only reason it stopped was because of this book.

Sadly, until I read Pete's book, I had no idea what was happening. I just kept telling my friends who were helping me, "this isn't me. This isn't me. Something is wrong." I knew I wasn't myself, I just didn't know why. Now I'm here 8 months later trying to play catch up on all the areas of my life that suffered while I was in my emotional flashback. I wish I had found this book sooner. There is so much power in being able to name what you are experiencing and this book helped me do that.

2.) Path to healing. When you first find out you have CPTSD its overwhelming to know where to begin your healing journey. The first book about CPTSD that I bought was a workbook, it was okay, but it was NOTHING compared to this book. Had I found this book sooner, I wouldn't have even bought the other one. Other famous CPTSD authors lay out the the different options for CPTSD healing (CBT, DBT, EMDR, Somatic, Internal Family Systems, Inner Child work, etc.), but Pete takes it a step further and tells you exactly where to start. Which is a massive relief because the last thing you want to do when your CPTSD has been activated is spend hours attempting to research opinions from people who don't even know what it is you're going through. The best part is, if you're distrustful or curious like me, Pete even explains why he puts certain steps before others. .

3.) Lists. No one has time to read an entire chapter when their (or someone they love's) nervous system has been thrown into hypo- or hyper-arousal and they need to figure out what triggered them and why. Which is why Pete's easy to remember and easy to find checklists are literal lifesavers.

4.) Pete Walker knows his stuff because he is a survivor himself. As a child I was told that I was a punishment from God on my mother. This statement was only the beginning of a deep seeded core belief I had that I was innately, permanently broken. Pete's book and the memories and experiences he describes didn't feel triggering to me but healing. It felt like for the first time in my life I could acknowledge that I was normal. I wasn't broken. Nothing was wrong with me. This book is validating and enlightening. A true salve for the traumatized soul.

There are a million other reasons as to why this book is the best of the best, but, I digress. Just trust me and the other 6,000 people leaving reviews here and BUY THIS BOOK NOW!

316 people found this helpful

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Simon Boimran

An Insightful and Transformative Guide to Understanding and Overcoming CPTSD

Reviewed in Canada on February 1, 2024

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Having read numerous self-help books over the years, I must say that this book stands out as an exceptional resource for individuals grappling with Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD). The author's insights resonated with me deeply, providing a newfound understanding of my own behaviors and reactions that I haven't found elsewhere.

What sets this book apart is the author's dual perspective - as a therapist and a person who has personally experienced C-PTSD. This unique viewpoint makes the advice and strategies offered feel all the more relevant and practical. I found myself referencing the book almost daily, and its exercises have been instrumental in my healing journey.

That being said, I would recommend this book to those who have already embarked on their healing journey, as some content could potentially trigger individuals still deeply immersed in their trauma. I would also note that while the book might seem heavily focused on the negative aspects of C-PTSD, it is equally important to acknowledge our strengths and resilience as survivors.

While the organization of the book could be improved, the content is undeniably valuable. The author's empathetic approach and practical advice have been transformative for me. If you, like me, have experienced childhood neglect or abandonment, this book could be the tool you need to navigate your path to healing. It's certainly been that for me.

6 people found this helpful

Amazon Customer

Very helpful

Reviewed in Mexico on August 8, 2023

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This book described me in a lot of way I didn't even know about myself. My therapist agreed to use it as a tool during our sessions.

Thank you.

KURT MENDONÇA, AUTOR DO "GUIA DE SOBREVIVÊNCIA PARA VÍTIMAS DE NARCISISTAS MALIGNOS"

Referência no Trantorno do estresse pós-traumático complexo

Reviewed in Brazil on June 17, 2023

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O autor é um sobrevivente com uma mente desbravadora e desafiadora na descoberta e divulgação dos caminhos de brilhar após a convivência tóxica com os perturbados perturbadores entre nós.

2 people found this helpful

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Helena Wyzgol

Verändert mein leben

Reviewed in Germany on April 24, 2024

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Ich bin noch nicht durch, aber bisher hat alles, was ich gelesen habe, geholfen zu verstehen und Mitgefühl für mich selbst zu haben. Ich denke im Alltag aktiv an Sätze in diesem Buch. Ich habe das Gefühl es unterstützt und leitet mich beim aktiven heilen.

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Sunshine

Have I turned into a narcissist?

Reviewed in France on February 27, 2024

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I cannot thank Pete Walker enough for the insight this book has brought me, about my upbringing and its crippling consequences.

I cried through this book (Kindle format) from the beginning to the end, had many long and meditative pauses, and highlighted almost the entire book.

After many years of self-help and self-improvement books, this is the first one which hit the nail on the head from A to Z. Well over 50 now, I finally have the courage to talk about what happened, and to ask for professional help as I cannot do this alone anymore.

If you still wonder which book to buy next to "fix" you, buy this one! Scales will fall from your eyes.

And just in case you have a problem with communicating with people (I think that many people with CPTSD have difficulties with this) in a way that makes both you and the other person feel heard and understood, I highly recommend to read "Nonviolent communication" by Marshall B. Rosenberg.

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