Suggested Reading

Addressing Domestic Violence in the Workplace

By Johnny Lee

Written by a domestic violence specialist, the book’s 10 chapters provide valuable insight into the complexities of dealing with domestic violence in business. It is recommended reading for human resource professionals, managers, and business owners who want to prevent an incident through policy and program development or be ready to intervene in case of a crisis. It is also a critical resource for domestic violence advocates, employment law attorneys, security personnel, and occupational health professionals.

Getting Free: You Can End Abuse And Take Back Your Life

By Ginny Nicarthy M.S.W.

Although Getting Free was written in 1982, it is still called the bible of all domestic violence texts. It's not just the content of the book--twenty-four chapters covering a gamut of issues--but the tone. The problems of and solutions to domestic violence are clearly defined through the voices of women as they share their experiences and carve out their steps toward freedom.

Each chapter discusses a different phase in the experience of "getting free" and the problems surrounding each phase. Readers can reach for this book to look up specific domestic abuse issues or they can read it straight through. There is much to learn here--the history of battering as a phenomenon; the political and social aspects of abuse; the historical changes to the institutions of marriage and family, and more.

Not To People Like Us: Hidden Abuse In Upscale Marriages

By Susan Weitzman

Chicago's affluent North Shore provides 20-year veteran psychotherapist Weitzman with abundant evidence of the secret lives of "upscale domestic abusers" and their victim-wives. Shattering the cultural myth that emotional and physical violence in the home is confined to couples of a lower socioeconomic class, the author presents vivid case histories that are often excluded from clinical studies and statistics. Lacking a frame of reference for domestic violence in this echelon, health-care professionals ignore the signs, while law enforcement agents and judges go easy on it, she contends. Few believe or sympathize with a well-dressed, bejeweled woman if she finds the courage and self-respect to speak out against her successful, respected, powerful and often charming husband, while battered women's shelters turn her away, assuming that she has many other resources. But according to Weitzman, she doesn't. While often well educated and successful, the "upscale abused woman" is typically ignorant of her legal rights, convinced by her abuser that she is responsible for his behavior and isolated by her denial and shame from validating voices and potential assistance. Weitzman's upscale abuser exhibits Narcissistic Personality Disorder, feels eminently entitled and is incapable of seeing his wife as a person in her own right. Weitzman provides excellent practical advice for these women to make choices that extricate them from abuse, and proposes a new language and better education regarding "upscale violence" for the professionals who are likely to see it in their work.

Invisible Heroes: Survivors of Trauma and How They Heal

By Belleruth Naparstek

In the wake of 9/11, there was much media coverage of post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD—the long-term stress response whose symptoms include chronic pain, nightmares and panic attacks—and how to treat it. Naparstek, a therapist for more than 30 years, is an advocate of guided imagery, as opposed to talk therapy, and in this book she uses case histories to illustrate how it works; she also looks at recent research on the brain that shows why this method is effective and offers step-by-step instructions on using guided imagery, which she defines as "deliberate, directed daydreaming," for healing trauma. According to Naparstek, trauma damages the left brain, which is language, oriented, and talking about the trauma can actually worsen symptoms. Imagery, on the other hand affects the right brain, the seat of the emotions. Guided imagery is "fast, powerful, costs little or nothing," says the author; it can be done alone or in groups, with the help of tapes that walk the stress victim through the process of finding images that help heal the trauma. Clinicians will find the entire book useful; people seeking help may not need explanations of the biochemical processes underlying PTSD, but will respond to Napartek's passionate advocacy of a simple, gentle healing method.

The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect us from Violence

By Gavin De Becker

Each hour, 75 women are raped in the United States, and every few seconds, a woman is beaten. Each day, 400 Americans suffer shooting injuries, and another 1,100 face criminals armed with guns. Author Gavin de Becker says victims of violent behavior usually feel a sense of fear before any threat or violence takes place. They may distrust the fear, or it may impel them to some action that saves their lives. A leading expert on predicting violent behavior, de Becker believes we can all learn to recognize these signals of the "universal code of violence," and use them as tools to help us survive. The book teaches how to identify the warning signals of a potential attacker and recommends strategies for dealing with the problem before it becomes life threatening. The case studies are gripping and suspenseful, and include tactics for dealing with similar situations.