These are just a few of resources that I’ve found useful. I’m linking to Amazon because it’s simple. You can find most of these from many different sources.
A word of caution: not every one of these resources fits every person at every point in time.
They simply may not apply to you or your situation. If you’re looking for something in particular, send me an email, and I’ll be glad to offer whatever I can. This is only a small fraction of things I sometimes recommend. My goal is to make this list more comprehensive and better organized, but for now, this will have to do.
Or they may be too much and too overwhelming. Particularly if you are just starting to work with some difficult issues, listen to your gut, go slowly and don’t hesitate to reach out for help – professional or otherwise.
This is a brief list that I can see is already skewed, but I have a lot more to add. My frustration with formatting text and images on my webpage has slowed me down, so for now, here’s just a few links:
Articles
- “Our calm is contagious”: How to use mindfulness in a pandemic, by Sigal Samuel
- Coronavirus and mental health: Psychologists offer advice on leaving our homes, by Eleanor Cummins
- Dissociative Disorders are Nearly as Common as Depression. So Why Haven’t We Heard About Them? NeuroscienceNews.com
- I Now Suspect the Vagus Nerve is the Key to Wellbeing, by Edith Zimmerman, thecut.com
- We Can’t Keep Treating Anxiety from Complex Trauma the Same Way We Treat Generalized Anxiety, by Vicki Peterson
- Study provides new insights into the relationship between PTSD, genetics and inflammation, by Eric Dolan, pyspost.org
- What is EMDR? from the EMDR Institute.
- EMDR Therapy: What You Need to Know, healthline.com
- What is EMDR? from the EMDR Humanitarian Assistance Programs Trauma Recovery website (same title, different article as above)
- Three Important Life Skills Nobody Taught You, by Mark Manson. Spoiler, the three skills are 1) How to stop taking things so personally, 2) How to be persuaded and change your mind, and 3) How to act without knowing the result. It’s a fun article with great advice.
Videos
- TED Talk from 2010 – Brene Brown: The Power of Vulnerability – With 35 million views and counting, this is definitely worth watching.
- TED Talk from 2012 – Brene Brown: Listening to Shame – Brene’s second Ted Talk.
- The Polyvagal Theory: The New Science of Safety and Trauma, by Seth Porges. About thirty minutes long, it explains a lot about why we do the things we do when we’ve been traumatized in a lighthearted, watchable presentation. He’s a comedian who is presenting his father’s research in a very approachable manner.
- EMDR for PTSD, from the Department of Veterans Affairs, the National Center for PTSD has a good article/video combination. It’s basically an outline with several short video links. A great resource.
- Butterfly Hug Technique – a good way to calm anxiety or ground yourself. The more you practice it, the better it works. Seems relatively simple, but you can’t do anything too complicated when you’re feeling either anxious or checked out.
- Dissociation, what is it? How do we deal with it? by Katie Morton. An eight-minute overview
Books
- The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Body, and Mind in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk
- Daring Greatly: How the Courage to be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead by Brene Brown
- In an Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness by Peter A. Levine
- Parenting from the Inside Out: How a Deeper Self-Understanding Can Help You Raise Children Who Thrive by Daniel Siegel and Mary Hartzell
- Brainstorm: The Power and Purpose of the Teenage Brain by Daniel Siegel, M.D.
- The Highly Sensitive Person by Elaine Aron
- Self-Therapy by Jay Earley – an introduction and step-by-step guide to Internal Family Systems therapy
- The Illustrated Happiness Trap: How to Stop Struggling and Start Living by Russ Harris and Bev Aisbett
- Getting Past Your Past: Take Control of Your Life with Self-Help Techniques from EMDR Therapy by Francine Shapiro
- Beyond Consequences, Logic, and Control by Heather Forbes – this is the first of three books in the series
Websites
- ISSTD – The International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation’s Website. If you’re in a professional in the field, it’s worth becoming a member. But there are also some great informative FAQ’s about trauma, dissociation, and helps even clarify the difference between normal dissociation and problematic dissociation.
- Trauma Center Research and Articles Page – a number of academic articles done by the Trauma Center on developmental trauma disorder, EMDR, dissociation, yoga for PTSD, and several other topics
Screening Tools
I’m on the fence about whether to include these at all, but they really can be useful. I believe that a diagnosis is only necessary for billing, and it’s only useful if it informs treatment. Splitting hairs for precise diagnoses can be problematic if it becomes the focus of therapy, but sometimes there can be a lot of relief in knowing there’s a name for what you’re going through and that yes, it really is that bad. That can be really validating. Sometimes these are also useful for starting a conversation with your therapist or doctor. So if these are useful, great. If they aren’t, leave them alone. There are a few that are much more reliable and valid than most, which are the ones I list here. The number total is not nearly as important as the conversation it may start or the motivation you might have to do something about the way you feel.
- PTSD Screening Tool – PCL-5 from the National Center for PTSD page abbout the PCL-s.
- Patient Stress Questionnaire – in two pages it includes screenings for depression (PHQ-9), generalized anxiety (GAD-7), a very brief PTSD screen, and a screening tool for alcohol problems. The cutoff scores are the tiny numbers in parentheses.
- Dissociative Experiences Scale II – The DES-II is has 28 questions that you rank from experiencing 0% to 100% of the time. My experience with this scale is that the questions are great starting points for conversations about dissociative symptoms, which are often tricky to put into words. However the number scale for this seems to be way off. The problem seems to come from the difficulty estimating “the percentage of the time you have the experience.” It’s more important to note whether you experience these things and whether they are causing you difficulties in your life.
- Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale – The EPDS is awkward to score from the pdf if you’re looking at it on a smartphone, sorry. But if you’ve had a baby recently (or if you haven’t been quite the same since you’ve had a baby) it’s a good screening tool and a good way to talk to your OB or family doctor about postpartum depression. See also this page for a three-question screening tool for postpartum depression.