Books our Trauma Therapists will Read in 2021
At Woven Therapy, our staff took all of the newly found 2020 downtime seriously, and started reading together. We’ve been meeting biweekly to discuss books, articles and movies that help us broaden our cultural competency. 2021 will be no different, and we are setting our sights high by putting together a list of books that we want to dive in to as a staff. This book list is full of helpful trauma reads, as well as writing that challenges our colonized, white-centric ways of thinking about the psychology of our patients.
Our staff wants to make the world a safer, more knowledgeable place for all people to exist. We also want to challenge ourselves to rethink the ways that we understand human suffering and overcome obstacles. We always invite the reimagining of healing. If you would like to read along with us in 2021, grab a copy and cozy up in your most comfortable chair; we would love to have you. If you are a therapist or clinician reading along, reach out and let us know what it has been like for you to learn alongside us. We host biweekly book clubs and would love for you to join us. You can email us anytime at hello@gideonpsych.com.
List of books our trauma therapists will read in 2021:
Trans+: Love, Sex, Romance and Being You by Kathryn Gonzales and Karen Rayne
Woven Together Trauma Therapy is a safe-house for all trans+ folks, so we are making it our goal to educate ourselves and better understand the experiences of the people walking through our doors. This is a sexual education book, as well as a helpful resource for helping people feel safe in their journey to self-discovery.
Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century by Alice Wong
Did you know that one in five people in the United States live with disability? I had no idea. Wong puts together compelling stories to help you rethink disability, your privileged space in the world, and challenges you to think more inclusively. She highlights different cultural narratives we have about disability and shows us new ways to be helpful allies.
Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
This book has been on my shelf for a while - I cannot wait to read it! Something else always seems to get in the way of me cracking open this bad boy, but I’m prioritizing it this year. Wilkerson is a Pulitzer Prize winning author that walks us through how our culture maintains social order, the emergence of “distorted rules of engagement” and gives us a rich history of the modern day caste system in America.
Being a Brain-Wise Therapist by Bonnie Badenoch
This was one of the first books I ever picked up by Badenoch. I was right in the throes of all the stress of grad school and never got past the first few chapters. Yet, every single time I think about Interpersonal Neurobiology, I think of how helpful the first few chapters of this book were. So now I’m setting my sites on picking it back up and reading it to completion. I can’t wait to dive into the many helpful examples she gives on better understanding the brain, body, and our relationships.
The Heart of Trauma: Healing the Embodied Brain in the Content of Relationships by Bonnie Badenoch
Right after I finish Being a Brain-Wise Therapist, I’m moving on to more specific reading about trauma and how it affects us in our bodies. Badenoch has an eloquent way of helping us understand the nuances of our brains in the context of trauma and relationships. This book uses the theoretical framework of Interpersonal Neurobiology to walk us through what our bodies are doing when trauma happens and how we can heal in the context of our relationships.
Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily Nagoski and Amelia Nagoski
Burnout might be the theme of 2020, am I right? We are all just about at our wits’ end waiting on safety/quarantine measures to lift while also trying our best to stay healthy, keep up with work-from-home obligations and taking on the lion’s share of policing school duties in our homes. Our book club can’t wait to learn how to unlock the stress cycle and start to close the endless loops of worries in our heads. Who is with us?
My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies by Resmaa Menakem
This one has also been on my list for a while and I’m excited to jump into a better understanding of how body-centered psychology can help us understand the depths and impacts of racial trauma. This book is written by a therapist with decades of experience in helping people understand their trauma responses. It is at the top of the list for me!
The Body Remembers: The Psychophysiology of Trauma and Trauma Treatment by Babette Rothschild
You know we are trauma therapists, right? So most of our extra reading is centered around the theme of trauma, its impact and how we can help our people move forward in their lives with a more integrated understanding of their bodies and experiences. This book was written for both clinicians and clients, so I’m hoping it’ll be one that our clients also add to their reading list. Rothschild focuses on the physiological impact of trauma and how we can understand our bodies in the context of our experiences.
The Polyvagal Theory in Therapy by Deb Dana
If you’ve been in the trauma world for a while, you know that Polyvagal theory has gotten a lot of attention in recent years. If you’re unfamiliar, it's the connection between our neurology, evolutionary makeup and psychology via our central nervous system. This theory helps provide some framework for how to understand our emotions, our histories, and the ways that mind and body are so intertwined that they cannot be disconnected. Our staff at Woven has had training and read other books on the subject, but we want to think more about how to integrate Polyvagal into therapy. We’ve picked this book to help us do just that!
In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness by Peter A Levine and Gabor Mate
This book is written by a clinician and combines all of his expertise from years of work in the world of trauma. Levine challenges our previous understanding that trauma is a disorder and talks about events in the context of injury. We are big believers in empowering trauma survivors and sometimes changing our language around the trauma is just the ticket to do just that.
The New Science of Narcissism: Understanding One of the Greatest Psychological Challenges of Our Time and What You Can Do About It by W. Keith Campbell, Carolyn Crist, et al.
I’ve just started this book, but I’ll probably have to finish it in 2021, since I’m currently in the middle of six (I am not kidding) books at the moment. It’s a refreshing primer on personality and social psychology research and makes direct connections with the different theories we use to understand narcissism. It’s been one of the better books that I’ve begun in 2020 (out of the 60+ I’ve read!), so I’m thrilled to continue.
Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment by Patricia Hill Collins
And for the powerhouse book to end this list…. Black Feminist Thought. We are currently reading this as a staff at Woven and I’m already reconsidering my understanding of the intersectionality of identities even in the first chapter. Collins talks us through the intersection of race and gender in this powerful, academic book. She walks us through different feminist theorists and thinkers that help us better understand our history and how allyship and empowerment are important for the freedom of all women.
Happy reading!
