Healing From Hidden Abuse: A Journey Through the Stages of Recovery from...

[SamwizeGamgee]

Healing from Hidden Abuse, by Shannon Thomas

I'm reading this now, and I'd like to discuss.  Feel free to remove, or reformat this post to fit the norms on this section.
This book is directed towards survivors who are in the process of recovering from true sociopathic abuse, not so much the BPD kind.  However, the author describes a very accurate and insightful mapping of what survivors of emotional abuse might go through. I am exposed to a different kind of abuse, but,  Thomas's book really helps me see myself healing.  
There's more to say, but, I wanted to ask if others have read it.

[empath]

I have read the book. Some of what she had to say was helpful to me, especially the stages of healing from abuse.

[SamwizeGamgee]

I finished the main book rather quickly.  I think I'll go over sections later. I am working on the journaling parts next.
The stages of healing were the most applicable portions.  I am pretty certain that I would have identified and ended a relationship with someone who is a sociopath as she described (sneering at my pain, for example).  But, even when I have a more hidden experience suffering through abuse.  I almost think it's harder to decide to escape, and harder to heal, when the abuse is really, really hidden - as in the passive aggressive, mind games, blame, programming the kids, and so forth.
Nevertheless, the stages of healing I thought were uncannily similar.  It helped me recognize that I have come far in my journey.  I can't have the total satisfaction of going no contact, or even a proper limited contact (since we have kids, and still live in the same house).  I can have the satisfaction of know I can recognize control, abuse, and my feelings better.  i simply chose to not allow toxic people into my inner-circle, as much as I can control it anyway.
I'm working on improvement everyday. Okay, well, weekly at least ;)

[empath]

The stages were encouraging to me; I could see where I was on the healing process. I can't go completely no contact either - h was still at home when I read the book and like you, we have a child at home still. I could do detached contact where I didn't feed the drama and limited my dependence on h.

H was getting a lot of advice about what to do in our marriage from his pastor who most likely had some narcissistic tendencies. H wanted to be accepted by this person, so... . That all created another level of the abuse that I have encountered in my own healing journey.

Recently, I had a "toxic" person (member of my extended family) who wanted me to stay at her house; the people who were making decisions didn't ask me what I wanted or what would work for me. Eventually, I said that it wasn't okay for them to be making plans about where I would stay without asking me. That upset the very tenuous balance of how things were going. It wasn't pretty, but I held to what I needed. The toxic person still doesn't like me. I was glad that I had been on the healing journey and came to a place where I was able to say no to the control and be okay with the toxic person being unhappy with me. It's hard when they are family members.