The Body Keeps The Score by Vessel Van der Kolk

I received a Kindle as one of my Christmas presents this year. Never thought I would be a Kindle person. I’m pretty old fashioned, intentionally keeping things as analog as possible. I’m one of those intolerable “I love the way the pages feel in my fingers and that new book smell” type of people. But I suppose I love the way old books smell too.

Perhaps that’s the reason why there has been a stack of books on my nightstand for the past year as - blasphemously - a self described bibliophile I barely read 3 not-work or study related books in the last year. My husband noticed this new decorative piece if you will, and felt rather than hoarding my books it would make sense to have one tiny, compact, and portable library.

I took a moment to get used to this notion and while I further procrastinated using my new Kindle, listened to a podcast. One of my favorite podcast channels, On Being with Krista Tippett featured Bessel van der Kolk. Professor van der Kolk is a Dutch psychiatrist, author and educator based in Boston, USA. Since the 1970s his research has been in the area of post-traumatic stress.

I myself have been slowly working on a passion piece on the maltreatment of children and the effects on their neuroanatomy. But this professor has spent his life studying it, writing about it and coming up with solutions for it. His talk is supremely insightful and eye opening. Underscoring things we see always but I had not connected. Take for instance, the loss of speech you experience during trauma connected with the effect on Broca’s area. He speaks of yoga and the sensate experience needed to deal with trauma rather than the conventional verbal therapy. Here, his book, The Body Keeps The Score is referenced.

Now eager to read his work, with no time to waste on ordering or desire to run out to the bookshop at 8pm at night, my nifty little kindle, (now lovingly referred to as the earnest, Ringo Starr) presented me with the opportunity to dive into this New York Times Bestseller in a matter of seconds.

Already pages deep, I already have started devouring the book and maybe, just maybe this year I can actually live up to my bibliophile name.

Link to the On Being podcast episode here.

Link to The Body Keeps The Score on Amazon.