Resilient Adults: Overcoming a Cruel Past

By Gina O'Connell Higgins

Book Overview

Offering an approach that focuses on the origins of mental health rather than the beginnings of mental illness, this book outlines how men and women can recognize the resilient traits they possess and foster the strength to overcome tragedy. An inspiring and invigorating book! I recommAnd it to the courageous women and men who struggle each day to overcome their own cruel pasts, to the therapists who work with them, and to anyone interested in the relationship between adult development and mental health.''--Robert Kegan, Harvard University and the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1555426735
• ISBN13: 9781555426736
• Release Date: January 1994
• Publisher: Jossey-Bass
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.59 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.3" x 1.0" x 6.5"

Customer Reviews

A Fascinating Look at What Comprises Resilience

This book by psychologist Gina O'Connell Higgins is one of the best book on resilience available. As a clinical social worker and marriage and family therapist, this is the book I most often provide to my clients who have struggled with a history of childhood abuse. I try to help people view themselves as survivors rather than as victims and this book is a wonderful resource for that mindset. Higgins has studies what resilient adults have in common. "They are above average to superior in IQ; possess exceptional talents, including creativity and other inner resources (and have developed many of these); have obtained higher economic levels than their family of origin; demonstrate high levels of ego development; have sustained empathically close relational ties in childhood, adolescence and adulthood (including those they formed with parental 'surrogates'); frequently have highly psychologically compromised siblings; and maintain strong political and social activism.. More dynamically, they remain fiercely committed to reflection, new perspectives, and ongoing therapy." (p. 20) I find this book fascinating and highly readable for the lay-person and the professional. It is of profound and tragic interest that the author came from an abusive past. She went on to become a psychologist while her brother committed suicide. This book will give the reader unusual insight into the courage and unique adaptivity of the resilient adult.

One of the best...

This is one of the best books I have ever read. It moved me and inspired me. The author uses real examples of people she knows/has worked with. It is a fairly easy read and I have already suggested that it be a recommend/required reading for my Master's program courses.

Excellent not only for the young, but for those still hoping

As a forty-eight year old womens' health professional who struggled with an abusive childhood and recently left an abusive marriage of 27 years, I found great validation and hope in this book. Ms. O'Connell Higgins protrays the resilient who successfully avoided repeating the terror of their upbringing. Yet her focus on faith and her description of "the Sea Beyond the Sirens" are invaluable supports to anyone- young or old- who has decided to rid themself of the deamons of abuse.Finally, the descrptions the resilient and their role as "helpers" explains the activites of many who struggle to survive. They give back the fruits of their labors to others who are in need of example and assistance. Most importantly, her work incorporates the notion that no person abused should be viewed only as a victim. The survivor status may not come to all, but is always available to those who have the desire to change. The hope this book inspires makes it an excellent text for anyone who is involved in treating the traumatized or who is personnaly at any stage of abuse recovery.

Refreshing focus on health vs. pathology of abuse survivors.

Recommended reading for young adult survivors and their therapists. Forty persons who have overcome severe childhood abuse whom today live succesfully in long term, committed relationships and hold respected positions in their career fields are the subjects of the author's research.

It speaks the truth about overcoming an abusive childhood.

Accurate, Helpful, Reassuring