I just finished this book -- I couldn't put it down!
It's a work of fiction that's smart, funny, endearing, and a little tearful. Just like life.
What's most striking about it are its themes of trauma, isolation, and empathy.
That maybe someone who's a little socially awkward is coping the best they can in this world, and that we all need to have a little more compassion for those who annoy us and for ourselves.
This book is incredibly relatable and a startlingly accurate portrayal of someone starting and moving through the journey of processing their trauma.
It's for anyone who feels alone, emotionally burdened, stuck, or awkward. Which, I think, is most of us!
I love this book so much I recorded a short review of it!
I'll definitely be recommending it to my patients who are struggling with trauma, anxiety, depression, isolation, and more.
It's a wonderful look at the human condition and that we're all just trying to get by as best we can with the tools we've been given. And that we have a choice to expand that toolset whenever we want, it just takes some serious elbow grease!
Check out what I thought about Gail Honeyman's Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine.
A special note: Everyone's trauma is unique to their person and the way events unfolded in their life. But that doesn't mean that no one else understands. We all have carry trauma and we all have the capacity to recognize it and offer support and compassion.
We don't "pass on our trauma" to others if we communicate it consciously through conversation, art, or any other form of expression. We only run the risk of harming others if we don't work through our trauma and we unconsciously repeat the same cycle that injured us.
So talk about it, open up, get a counselor, confide in a friend. And maybe use the wonderful protagonist in this book as a guide :).
