Ellen Bass - The Courage to Heal: A Guide for Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse (20th Anniversary Edition)

PRAISE FOR THE COURAGE TO HEAL

This book advances the empowerment of survivors another major stepfrom breaking the silence to sharing recovery.

Judith Herman, M.D., author of Trauma and Recovery

The Courage to Heal is a wise and gentle book that should be read by all people trying to recover from having been sexually misused as a child, and by all friends, family members, and professionals with a genuine desire to understand both the experience of being a victim of sexual abuse and the arduous path to recovery. The Courage to Heal has helped countless survivors of sexual abuse in their efforts to confront the realities of their lives and to take charge of them in the present.

Bessel A. van der Kolk, M.D., associate professor of psychiatry, Harvard Medical School

The Courage to Heal continues to be an invaluable resource for adults sexually abused as children. Ellen Bass and Laura Davis provide survivors with concrete and practical information about the healing process and its many challenges.

Christine Courtois, clinical director of the Post-Traumatic Disorders Program of the Psychiatric Institute of Washington, D.C., and author of Recollections of Sexual Abuse: Treatment Principles and Guidelines

With scrupulous care, balance, and a clear political vision, Ellen Bass and Laura Davis have written a groundbreaking book that will stand as a classic for many years to come. Clearly a labor of both love and commitment to the healing of tens of thousands of women still suffering the deep wounds of their experience, The Courage to Heal will find a wide, appreciative, and altered readership.

Sandra Butler, author of The Conspiracy of Silence

ACCLAIM FROM SURVIVORS FOR THE COURAGE TO HEAL

The Courage to Heal touched the deepest part of me, the part that has been walled off and silent for twenty-five years. You have spoken the words for me that I was unable to utter.

When your book entered my life, it gave me the reassurance that one day I would be whole.

Dealing with feelings that have been hidden, suppressed, and unacknowledged for fifty years is an awesome task, and your book is helping to make the process bearable and possible.

If there was any one thing that helped me to believe in myself, and helped to reconstruct my life, it has been this book. The Courage to Heal has not spent a day on the bookshelfI utilize it so often that it is a waste to put it away.

Thank you hardly seems like enough to say. You have changed the direction of my life in a positive way with as much impact as the incest changed my life in a negative way so many years ago.

Thank you for helping me save my life and my sanity.

ALSO FROM ELLEN BASS AND LAURA DAVIS

Ellen Bass

Like a Beggar (poetry)

The Human Line (poetry)

Mules of Love (poetry)

No More Masks! An Anthology of Poems by Women

(coeditor, with Florence Howe)

I Never Told Anyone:

Writing by Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse

(coeditor, with Louise Thornton)

Free Your Mind:

The Book for Gay, Lesbian, and Bisexual Youthand Their Allies (with Kate Kaufman)

I Like You to Make Jokes with Me, But I Dont Want You to Touch Me (for children)

Laura Davis

The Courage to Heal Workbook:

For Women and Men Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse

Allies in Healing:

When the Person You Love Was Sexually Abused as a Child

Becoming the Parent You Want to Be: a Sourcebook of Strategies for the First Five Years

(with Janis Keyser)

I Thought Wed Never Speak Again:

The Road from Estrangement to Reconciliation

The Last Frontier:

Is Reconcilation Possible After Sexual Abuse?

(out of print)

Ellen Bass and Laura Davis

Beginning to Heal:

A First Book for Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse

For additional information about these books, foreign translations, and audio editions, please visit www.ellenbass.com and www.lauradavis.net

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This book is for informational purposes only and is not intended to be a substitute for appropriate medical care. The publisher and the authors disclaim all liability that may arise as a result of using the information in this book.

The authors regret that they are unable to answer individual letters, e-mails, and phone calls. If you need resources, information, or support, please contact the many helpful organizations listed in the Resource Guide.

Print editions and an enhanced audio download edition of THE COURAGE TO HEAL are available from HarperCollins Publishers

Copyright acknowledgments precede the List of Poems.

The first edition of this book was published in 1988 by Harper & Row, Publishers.

THE COURAGE TO HEAL, FOURTH EDITION. Copyright 2008 by Ellen Bass and Laura Davis. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the authors except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and review.

ISBN 978-0-9961718-0-9

Contents

Dont run away from it. Dont bury it. Dont try to produce a different reality getting all strung out on something, or eating your way through your feelings. Dont slash your wrists. Just deal with it, because its going to keep coming back if you continue living anyway. Its painful, but you just have to keep going. Its just part of life, really.

SOLEDAD

Give as much commitment to healing as you did to surviving for the last ten or fifteen years.

DORIANNE

Theres more than anger, more than sadness, more than terror. Theres hope.

EDITH HORNING

Preface to the Twentieth-Anniversary Edition

W hen we began work on The Courage to Heal in 1984, the climate for survivors of child sexual abuse was dramatically different than it is today. There was little understanding about the process of healing from child sexual abuse. There were few therapists knowledgeable about treating abuse and almost no support groups. Incest was considered to be extremely rare. When survivors did disclose their abuse, they were most frequently met with denial, minimization, or blame.