What Happened to You?
by Bruce D. Perry and Oprah Winfrey
A conversation between a child psychiatrist and Winfrey on trauma, the brain and healing: replacing 'what is wrong with you' with 'what happened to you', the sequence of brain development, regulation before reasoning, and the power of relationships to repair. Accessible, humane and well grounded.
Read it if…
you want to understand trauma's effect on behaviour without a textbook.
Skip it if…
you want clinical depth; see The Body Keeps the Score.
Three things you will actually use
- Ask what happened, not what is wrong.
- Regulate, relate, then reason.
- Relationships heal what relationships hurt.
Do this first
Read the chapter on regulation and notice what regulates you.
Our verdict
Trauma, accessibly.
Compare with other Resilience books
Transitions
William Bridges · Resilience
Wise, calm and underrated; the book to read when nothing else makes sense yet.
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