Not the Price of Admission: Healthy relationships after childhood trauma

by Laura S. Brown

Have you struggled to have the happy, emotionally nourishing relationships that you deserve? If you are a survivor of childhood trauma, neglect, or abuse, you've spent your life feeling as if happiness in love and friendship is for other people, not you. To have connections with others you've paid a price of admission to relationships, sacrificing your values, your safety, your sense of personal worth, and sometimes your financial security. You've felt unworthy of love. You believed, because of how you were treated when you were a child, that you had to pay these prices simply to have people be around you. You've been used and exploited by people who said they loved and cared about you. You've read every relationship self-help book on the market, but none of them seem to understand the ways in which your childhood trauma has affected your ability to be close to others.

If this is your life, this book is for you. Drawing upon the author's four decades of working with survivors of childhood trauma, abuse, and neglect, this book teaches you to understand the emotional and neurobiological causes of your difficult relationship patterns. It describes effective strategies for learning how to trust yourself, how to assess other people more accurately, and how to take care of yourself emotionally so that you can have the healthy relationships that you deserve.

Genres: Self Help, Psychology, Nonfiction, Relationships, Mental Health

182 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2015

About the author

Dr. Laura S. Brown is a clinical and forensic psychologist in Seattle, Washington. Dr. Brown has taught at Argosy University, University of Washington, and Southern Illinois University.

Dr. Brown practices from a feminist perspective. She has received many honors. Dr. Brown has published a number of articles, books, and programs throughout her successful career.

Dr. Brown has served a number of psychological organizations including the Washington State Psychological Association as the President, State Legislative Advocacy Coordinator, Webmaster, Convention Program Chair, and many other high ranking positions within the WSPA.

Dr. Brown is the current director of the Fremont Community Therapy Project and she maintains a private practice in the greater city of Seattle.

Reviews

[Subhashree Patra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book took me a really long time to finish because every chapter uncovered an unsettling truth I wasn’t prepared to learn.
I have slept nights ruminating over the flash of reality it threw on me. I had never grieved, looked at myself with compassion for the journey that I took.
This book, the author touched my soul in ways no one could ever.
I learnt the importance of grieving, and gaining the courage to move on!

All I feel today is a new found respect for self. I feel a sense of freedom and empowered to see life in a new light.

I am grateful to have found this book and to have stumbled upon a great human as Laura S Brown.
Thanks!

[Louise · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd HIGHLY recommend this book to any adult who experienced childhood trauma, anything from full-blown abuse or abandonment, to milder emotional abuse or neglect. I'd also very much recommend particularly the first half to anyone in a relationship with someone in that situation. At first I thought her writing style was a little too touchy-feely ("you're good enough, you're wonderful!") but she knows what's what and spelled it all out.

[Julie Cabell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Helpful examination

Excellent source of information. Compassionate, respectful, gentle approach to an uncomfortable topic. Gives plain language recommendations to general readers and good for thought for professionals. Takes the literature a much needed step forward.

[gaudeo · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was skeptical about this book at first, because it is self-published. However, it is a great find. Not your typical self-help book, Not the Price of Admission looks at childhood trauma (which includes far more than physical abuse) through the lens of current research into how trauma affects neurobiology. Even better, it addresses how people with that background can develop healthy relationships as an adult. The book includes a very helpful list of resources in the back. I'm not typically a self-help reader, but this book is more than worthwhile.

[Rowan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hands down one of the most helpful books regarding trauma I have read, I have recommended this book to close to a dozen people already. The author's tone is conversational, kind, warm, and validating- making for what can be sensitive topics approachable. Concepts are illustrated with examples and explanation of rationale behind the suggestions with strong encouragement to ignore what is not helpful and offerings of additional sources to pursue. It is amazing to open a book and feel like the author so thoroughly gets it. I simply cannot recommend it enough.

[Blue Neustifter · Rating 5 out of 5]

It took me four and a half months to read this, because at times I could only read a handful of paragraphs before needing to take a break because I have never been this level of intensely seen before. An utterly heartbreaking and healing book. It has caused me so many tears. I will probably read it again in a couple months. This is my new religious text.

[Nicholas Piercy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book. After a traumatizing marriage, this book was helpful to correlate the events of my childhood to my choice to marry the female version of my father.

The parallels between examples given in the book and my actual experiences are uncanny.

The best start to recovery is discovery.

[Terri · Rating 4 out of 5]

.

[Janille · Rating 5 out of 5]

A++

[Wassim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Insightful despite its concise length and a must-read for anyone interested in trauma and/or on their own self-healing journey

[Stephanie McClure]

"Immersing myself in the challenges and struggles of people who had less-than-adequate experiences of attachment, love, care, and connection in childhood, and sharing the hope, strength, and compassion that I have been taught by my work with those folks, made the writing process transformative for me. I’m excited about this book because I think that it fills a gap and will empower people to have a sense of how to create the quality of connection with others that has been difficult for them to achieve." -- Laura S. Brown

[Jessie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely necessary reading for anyone recovering from childhood trauma.