Evolve With Trauma: Become your own safe, compassionate and wise friend
Higgins, J. (2010). Evolve With Trauma: Become your own safe, compassionate and wise friend. Thawun Press: Eden NSW, Australia.
Traumatic events can completely shatter our meaning structures or our expectations of everything and everyone so that we can feel disoriented, lost and overwhelmed. Every area of our functioning can be severely disrupted. This book is a lifeline and provides a way of making meaning of what is happening in this chaos!
It talks with trauma survivors and their families as people first, rather than as patients or clients who are defined and categorised and treated by practitioners. It is written by a committed and very experienced professional who demystifies the best of what is known about effectively responding to the negative impact of potentially traumatic events and invites readers to use these tragic experiences as a vehicle for the choice of profound and positive transformation of the self, the family, communities and societies.
This book breaks new ground and is innovative in its genre because it responds directly to very hurt people through the questions they are actually asking, rather than the questions researchers or clinicians often want or know how to answer. Responses are not just on the basis of western notions of best evidence based practice (although the most up to date information in this area is certainly included). The responses draw from the raw lived experiences of traumatised people, from neuroscience and from both eastern and western wisdom traditions.
“Evolve with trauma” is written by Dr Jeannie Higgins who is a Canberra psychologist with extensive experience and interest in all aspects of trauma. Her book is simply written making it accessible yet it provides an integration of the available knowledge, experience and research on the traumatic stress reaction. Despite it being aimed directly at the survivors of trauma, all those involved including supporters and health professionals will find this an excellent resource in providing insight and understanding.
The format of question and answer enables the book to be picked up at will. Case studies personalise the concepts and make the subject relevant, covering a broad range of different people including veterans and service personnel. Many of these people have suffered severe almost unthinkable trauma but Dr Higgins provides hope and optimism when following their journeys of empowerment and recovery. Her refreshing treatment approach is founded on evidence-based therapies but advice is given with compassion, safety and wisdom. The treatment encompasses simple practical steps as well as information on medical and other interventions.
This book is a valuable read for GPs treating traumatised patients and for those survivors of trauma.”
Dr Brenda Tait, ACTDGP Mental Health GP Advisor and Rosemary Agnew, ACTDGP Program Officer.
To purchase this book please contact the author: jeannie@empoweredwisdom.com.au
Cost
- Aust - A$30+P&H = A$40.60
- Intl NZ - A$30+P&H = A$46.00
- Intl - Asia-Pacific A$30 + P&H = A$49.40
- Intl- USA / Can / Mid East - A$30+P&H = A$52.85
- Intl - Rest of world - A$30+P&H = A$58.25
I am more than my trauma, pain and loss (eBook)
Higgins J. (2017): I am more than my trauma, pain and loss. e-Book: Thawun Press: Eden NSW Australia
Trauma can and does destroy connection to life. Our sense of identity, worth, control, reality and our foundational roles in life can be completely shattered. We can feel lost and become consumed by the suffering we have experienced.
This book published by Thawun Press is an invitation for you to allow the time to deeply connect through your senses with the animals, the plants, the landscapes and the words. You can then know, even for just a moment, that you are more than your experience of trauma, pain and loss.
The contributors (author and photographers) have donated their time and expertise to create this book and it is being freely distributed as a PDF and can be printed from the print-on-demand website BLURB.
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD A FREE PDF (53 MB). The PDF is not suitable for printing.
Open with Acrobat Reader and display as a two-page view for optimal viewing. (Menu --> View --> Page Display --> Two-page display).
To obtained a printed version go to:
http://au.blurb.com/b/7898288-i-am-more-than-my-trauma-pain-and-loss
The contributors do not receive any profit from the printing of this book, at all, but hope that if you download the PDF or arrange for a printed version, you will consider making a donation that you can afford to Bush Heritage Australia as a way of saying thank you. You may also wish to mention the book in “Your Details” in the “ Comments” section as you are making a donation online.
https://www.bushheritage.org.au/donate
“This book is a focused collection of beautiful images that are enriched by a reflective set of poetic words. These miscellany of philosophical moments shows the orientating nature of what language can offer to those who are traumatised. While these statements demand the effort of consideration, they can provide a path to transcendence which is a critical challenge of people who have been captured by the horror and fear that life can meter out. It something that provokes and should be not be put down and forgotten”
Professor A. C. (Sandy) McFarlane (Professor of Psychiatry University of Adelaide, Director of the Centre for Traumatic Stress Studies, Psychiatric Advisor - Phoenix Australia)
Selected Articles & Presentations
- Higgins, J. (1995a,). Traumatic Stress reactions in police. Doctoral Dissertation Abstract. University of Wollongong. Australia.
- Higgins, J. (1995b,). A conceptual model of traumatic stress reactions. Beyond Survival 13,11-17
- Higgins, J. (1997a, October). The reconstruction of trauma: A brief overview. Australasian Stresspoints. 7-10
- Higgins, J. (2000, March). Therapeutic process issues and the reconstruction of trauma. Invited Advanced Level Workshop. Abstract Third World Congress, International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (ISTSS), Melbourne, Australia.
- Higgins, J. (2001a, November). Traumatic stress reactions: Assessment and treatment. Invited Seminar for ACT Division of General Practitioners, Canberra, Australia.
- Higgins, J. (2001b, March). Relevance and validity of evidence in psychological treatment of trauma. Invited paper presented at the National Conference for the Australasian Society for Traumatic Stress Studies and National Centre for Post Traumatic Mental Health. Canberra, Australia.
- Higgins, J. (2002, February). Surviving the medico-legal process. Invited paper presented on International RSI Awareness Day to the RSI and Overuse Injury Association of the ACT. Canberra, Australia.
- Higgins, J. (2002, October). Work-related injury, stress, trauma and chronic pain. Invited presentation to AFP/ACT policing executive
- Higgins, J. (2005, September). Dramatic evolution in functioning as a possible response to a traumatic event. Paper presented at ASTSS Conference. Perth, Western Australia.
- Higgins, J. (December, 2010) Evolve with Trauma: Become your own safe, compassionate and wise friend. Thawun Press: Eden, Australia.
- Higgins, J. (2011, May). Evolve with Trauma- organisations. Invited presentation Emergency Services Australia - ACT. Canberra, Australia.
- Higgins, J. (2011 October) Invited paper presented to the Police Post Trauma Support group. Sydney, Australia.
- Higgins, J, (2014, March). Threat, neuroscience and emotional Intelligence. Invited paper/workshop for audit training program for the Murray–Darling Basin Authority. Canberra, Australia.
- Higgins, J (2017). I am more than my trauma, loss and pain. Eden, Australia: Thawun Press.
- Higgins, J. (2018, March). Surviving a compensation claim. Invited paper presented on to the RSI and Overuse Injury Association of the ACT. Canberra, Australia.
- Higgins J. (2018, August). Trauma Workshop: Evaluation & Impact, Identification & Support, Vicarious Traumatization and Trauma & Autism Spectrum Disorder. Invited presentation to Playability Inc Bega & Surrounds. Eden, Australia
Other Useful Resources
A collection 10 empowering books by sexual assault survivors
References
- Benjamin, R., Haliburn, J., & d King, S. (Eds). 2019). Humanising Mental Health Care in Australia: A guide to Trauma-informed approaches. New York: Routledge.
- Boyle, M., & Johnstone, L.(2020). A Straight Talking Introduction to the Power Threat Meaning Framework: An Alternative to Psychiatric Diagnosis. Great Britain: PCCS Books.
- Carey, G. (2020). No matter our Wreckage: A memoir about Grooming, Betrayal, Trauma and Love. Crows Nest, Sydney, Australia: Allen Unwin.
- Guha, A. (2023) Reclaim: Understanding complex trauma and those who abuse.
- Hari, J. (2018). Lost Connections: Why You’re Depressed and How to Find Hope. London: Bloomsbury.
- Herman, J. (2023) Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence- From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror. New York: Basic Books.
Trauma and Recovery was first published in 1992 and again in 2015 and 2023, “is the foundational text on understanding trauma survivors. By placing individual experience in a political frame, psychiatrist Judith L. Herman argues that psychological trauma is inseparable form its social and political context…. surprising parallels between private horrors like child abuse and public horrors like war”
“Meticulously documented and frequently using the victims' own words as well as those from classic literary works and prison diaries, Trauma and Recovery is a powerful work that will continue to profoundly impact our thinking”
This edition (2023) "includes a new epilogue by the author assessing what has-and hasn't-changed in understanding and treating trauma over the last three decades”.
- Johnstone, L., & Boyle, M. (2018). The Power Threat Meaning Framework: Towards the identification of patterns in emotional distress, unusual experiences, and troubled or troubling behaviour, as an alternative to functional psychiatric diagnosis. The British Psychological Society: Division of Clinical Psychology (see paper)
- Joseph, S. (2011). What doesn’t kill us: The New psychology of Posttraumatic Growth. New York: Basic Books.
- Kelter, D. (2023). Awe: The Transformative Power of Everyday Wonder and How it Can Transform Your Life. New York: Penguin Press.
- Kornfield, J. (2017). No Time Like the Present: Finding Freedom, Love and Joy Right Where You Are. New York: Atria.
- Mate, G. & Mate, D. (2022). the Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness and Healing in a Toxic Culture. Vermillion: London.
- Molloy, S. (2023) You made Me This Way: A powerful personal Investigation into trauma, hope and healing. Harper Collins: Australia.
- Nekvapil K. (2022). Power: A Woman’s Guide to Living and Leading Without Apology. Australia: Penguin, Random House.
- Tame, G. (2022). The Ninth Life of a Diamond Miner: A memoir. Sydney, Australia: Pan Macmillan Australia.
- Tygielski, S. (2021). Sit down to Rise Up: How Radical Self Care Can Change the World. California: New World Library.