Therapist's Guide to Growing Free

Help victims and survivors break the cycle of abuse!

Trying to get victims and survivors of domestic abuse to recognize their own victimization can be a frustrating experience. They often become so frightened, isolated, and self-doubting that they make excuses for the abuser. Combining psychological insight with practical safety information, this book helps therapists guide their clients into understanding--and ending--the vicious cycle of wooing, tension, violence, and remorse.

A Therapist''s Guide to Growing Free provides a comprehensive outline of the issues, tasks, and goals involved in the treatment of victims and survivors. Its chapter-by-chapter breakdown of how violent relationships function and how to end them safely can help you guide a traumatized woman through her therapeutic journey.

The guide''s companion volume, Growing Free: A Manual for Survivors of Domestic Violence is the perfect handout for clients in individual therapy, group therapy, and battered women''s shelters. Reading stories like their own may provide the shock of recognition they need to be able to understand--and eventually to end--the cycle of violence that characterizes all levels of domestic abuse. It outlines a series of steps they can take to ensure their emotional and physical safety. Its stories of women in abusive relationships and discussions of the cycle of abuse are direct and easy to read without ever being condescending.

A Therapist''s Guide to Growing Free provides the insight and therapeutic models needed for effective intervention and treatment, including:

• psychological effects and belief systems of victims and survivors
• discussions and illustrations of the cycle of violence
• the effects of domestic violence on children and adolescents
• the therapeutic challenges of couple/conjoint therapy
• handling crisis intervention
• suggestions for conducting group and therapeutic therapy for victim and batterer

A Therapist''s Guide to Growing Free and its companion volume provide both therapists and clients with a practical, action-oriented approach to the problem of domestic violence. It is ideal training and reference material for counselors at women''s shelters, emergency room personnel, law-enforcement officers, and other professionals involved in the rescue, support, defense, and treatment of victims and survivors.