Waking Up: Climbing Through the Darkness

My dear Terry, I had the privilege of meeting you during your CMI presentation in Phoenix AZ this past April 4, 2005. I bought a copy of your book that day, and how I wish I would have read it before I met you -- because then I could have told you in person what I thought of it. "Waking Up" is without a doubt one of the most powerful personal accounts of therapy I've ever read. I am astounded at the honesty in your writing, and at the courage it must have taken for you to decide to get it published. What is more astounding is that I don't think you realize what a gift you've given to the world. I wish every student learning to be a therapist would read your book, and every person who's ever been depressed or contemplated suicide, and everyone who's ever been thrust into the role of care giver, and every hospice worker and bereavement counselor who is companioning the bereaved -- and everyone who just wants to read a terrific book. I want you to know that I've told all my hospice colleagues about you, I've added your book to my list of recommended readings on the Articles and Books page of my Grief Healing Web site, and I will do everything in my power to help you spread your important, uplifting, life-saving message. I am honored to have met you, and I wish for you what you are giving to all the rest of us: nothing but the best. With love and admiration, Marty Tousley, APRN, BC, CT Bereavement Counselor Grief Healing Web site: www.griefhealing.com Grief Healing Discussion Groups: www.hovforum.ipbhost.com

Well-told story of a woman's journey back to sanity from the terribly place of depression. We can forget that we only think one thought at a time, and we can choose which thought we wish to think. When we remember it, just small changes of thought and consequent behavior can turn our lives entirely around. Bravo Ms. Wise. A. B. Curtiss author of Depression is a Choice.

This touching journey kept me hooked from the first page. It was gripping. The writing really took you inside of this woman's mind and heart. I can see how this book will give hope to those who are at the end of the line. I highly recommend Waking Up. Make sure you clear out some time before you start, because you are never going to be able to put it down!

For those of us who have never experienced psychiatric therapy, Waking Up is a rare insight into the pain and numbing effects of childhood sexual abuse and losing a spouse to a rapidly debilitating disease in leading to depression and drug dependency . . . and how therapy can be a valuable road to recovery. Although I have read a number of moving books written by the formerly depressed, Waking Up is the most vivid, moving and insightful. Ms. Wise is exceptionally good at capturing her thoughts and emotions at various stages in her therapy, and how she responded to the probing of her therapist, Dr. Cali Joseph. The two often corresponded by e-mail between office visits, and those communications added a lot to my understanding of how therapy works. Although I have not experienced depression, I found the book also insightful for understanding aversions I have . . . and seeing ways to change my behavior for the better. If you ask yourself the questions that Dr. Joseph asked Ms. Wise, you will learn a lot.I am sure that this book deserves to be on the required reading list of those who are studying to become therapists or who already practice. I do not believe that there are very many books where a patient has been willing to reveal so much of herself in print . . . and with such grace. I came away from the book with new insights about how I can describe therapy to those who have never experienced it. I hope I can use this new insight into assisting those who need therapy to get it in the right way.The book opens with a chilling description of the author's barely failed attempt to kill herself on Christmas 2000. I learned from this to be sure to check in with my loved ones and friends on important holidays, anniversaries and other meaningful occasions to be sure that they really are all right.I think we all owe Ms. Wise a debt of gratitude for sharing her experiences, thoughts and emotions with us. May God bless you, Ms. Wise!

Waking Up is a powerful description of the intense psychotherapeutic experience of a client struggling to recover from serious losses. This account from the patient's perspective illustrates how a determined and caring therapist helps a struggling, but also determined client to work through childhood abuse, death of a spouse, substance abuse, and suicide crises. In the process, it provides a primer on effective collabortive therapy.