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Fall to me is a time of fresh starts and a time of the mind – losing myself in new books and new subjects, and feeling the pleasant fatigue in my brain after learning hard things.
When the weather changes and Labor Day is in the rearview mirror, some people want pumpkin spice lattes and to break out their Ugg boots. I want a package of Audible credits and a brand-new Moleskine for my journaling. So in honor of Fall and this season of learning and expanding our intellectual horizons, I want to share a set of books that I dearly love and that have helped me enormously over the last 20 years with my own relational trauma recovery journey—and that I regularly share with my therapy clients.
I’ve arranged the list by topic area, much like aisles in a bookstore, so you can browse and see what interests you based on your own personal history. If you can find even one pen-and-paper friend from this list, one work that makes you feel less alone and imbues you with a little more hope, knowledge, and some helpful tools, that will make me so very happy.
Top books to explain the biological impact of childhood trauma
- The Body Keeps Score: Brain, Mind, And Body In The Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk, MD. This book is a classic for clinicians interested in helping clients heal from traumatic experiences. Like some other books on this list, this entry may be denser reading, but it’s excellent if you want a comprehensive view of what trauma can look like and how it can be healed.
- It Didn’t Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle by Mark Wolynn. Building upon the work of van der Kolk and other trauma clinicians, this popular book explores the intergenerational impact of trauma – specifically its neuropsychological expression in our lives – and provides interactive tools to explore your own possible manifestations of inherited trauma.
- Childhood Disrupted: How Your Biography Becomes Your Biology And How You Can Heal by Donna Jackson Nakazawa. In relatable and clear ways, this book explores how adverse childhood experiences leave “fingerprints” on our biology and what tools and options are available to us to help us overcome our histories.
Top books to outline the healing pathway out of trauma’s grip
- Transforming The Living Legacy of Trauma: A Workbook for Survivors and Therapists by Janina Fisher, Ph.D. I respect Fisher’s work enormously and this recent publication is one of the top psychoeducational resources that I recommend to clients as a complement to our work to help illustrate the impact of trauma and bring clarity to confusion around the trauma symptoms they experience.
- Journey Through Trauma: A Trail Guide to the 5-Phase Cycle of Healing Repeated Trauma by Gretchen Schmelzer, Ph.D. Beautifully written by a clinician who is herself a trauma survivor, this book helps childhood trauma survivors make sense of their experiences and begin to think through their healing journey differently.
- The Complex PTSD Workbook: A Mind-Body Approach to Regaining Emotional Control and Becoming Whole by Arielle Schwartz, Ph.D. An excellent and practical workbook by a body-centered psychotherapist who I know and respect deeply, this book walks survivors through manageable and tolerable exercises to support their healing journey.
Biographies and stories of estrangement, disownment, and abuse
- Educated by Tara Westover, Ph.D. One of the few books I can honestly say I’ve read four times (and will likely read once a year – I love it that much), this blockbuster memoir is extreme and perhaps not relatable in the exact details of the family’s landscape, but does relatably illustrate what it’s like to come from a fractured family, split by members’ mental illness, and to experience the gaslighting, disownment, and estrangement that sometimes comes as a cost when you begin to heal. I truly can’t recommend this book enough.
- Shadow Daughter: A Memoir of Estrangement by Harriet Brown. Another fantastic, well-written book that speaks to the “unspeakable” – estrangement from one’s own parents. The author weaves her story with others in a compelling, honest, and, to be quite honest, refreshing way.
- Estranged: Leaving Family and Finding Home by Jessica Berger Gross. This book might be particularly impactful for anyone who grew up in a family that looked “great” on the outside but on the inside experienced emotional and mental abuse. The author chronicles her journey and, so importantly, speaks about how her healing came in tandem with her decision to estrange herself from her family of origin.
Books for those who grew up with personality and mood-disordered parents
- Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson. A powerful read for those who can’t point to anything “dramatic” or “extreme” about their parenting experience, and yet who still feel strong emotional wounds from childhood.
- Surviving a Borderline Parent: How to Heal Your Childhood Wounds and Build Trust, Boundaries, and Self-Esteem by Kimberlee Roth. A volume of hope and help for those who were parented by someone with diagnosed or suspected Borderline Personality Disorder.
- Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers by Karyl McBride, Ph.D. An excellent read for daughters (and sons) of those who had mothers who were largely selfish, self-involved, and whose love felt conditional.
- Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When Someone You Care About Has Borderline Personality Disorder by Paul T. T. Mason, MS and Randi Kreger. Another classic and staple for those with diagnosed or suspected borderline parents, but also helpful for anyone who had to endure feelings and conditions of emotional, verbal, and physical instability and lack of safety growing up.
