++++
Tuesday, September 16, 2014. I am trying yet again to read The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: And Other Stories from a Child Psychiatrist’s Notebook–What Traumatized Children Can Teach Us About Loss, Love, and Healing (2007)by Bruce Perry and Maia Szalavitz. I again fell into the depths of my sadness while reading page 25 just as I did when I stopped reading Perry’s book in 2007. My slide again began while reading forward from page 22. Why am I trying again?
Dr. Perry will be speaking here in Fargo, North Dakota in a little over two weeks. My daughter will be there to hear him. I have continued to think that the one person I would want to read our book, Story Without Words, and to write a “blurb” for it would be Perry.
++
I am grieving for my life. Obviously not for the one I have as a survivor of 18 years of severe (psychotic) abuse from the moment I was born. I grieve for my OTHER life. The one I was robbed of. I also grieve for my mother. For her suffering. For the life she lived and for the life she lost.
I cannot read Perry’s work without being swallowed by this grief.
How productive is THAT?
++
Or, how tolerable?
++
I don’t think there is an early neglect and abuse survivor reading this post who will not resonate with what Perry writes beginning on page 22. (If that link becomes inactive Google search for “perry boy who was raised as a dog they would unravel and forget” and begin reading on that page by clicking on the first link the search provides.)
++
I asked my published brother who is also a highly successful used bookstore owner about how to approach Perry for a book “blurb.” He immediately responded with his humorous suggestions which included the following example:
Dear Mr. _______
I have followed with great interest your research on delectable shrimp recipes for wild-caught Alaska prawns. Your book 101 Ways to Boil Shrimp has been an inspiration to me in my own work on the subject of making healthy, tasty meals for my family. I was privileged to hear you speak last year at the National Crustacean Symposium, and your responses to audience questions at the Q&A that followed your presentation highlighted your unique and innovative approach to the field of seafood preparation.
I am a former vegetarian and recovering vegan, whose journey to preparing shrimp has carried me through many years of cooking classes, cookbook study, and first-hand research upon the oceans of the Pacific Northwest. I have written a book (complete in manuscript form) that I feel addresses a need among home chefs who are struggling with their own feelings of prawn apprehension. Life Lived Backwards: My Journey Across the Ocean Floor tells the story of my own travels through the culinary world of scallops, crabs, oysters, shrimp, and other delectable members of the crustacean nation that your own work has made so accessible. It would be an honor for me if you would consent to previewing a copy of my book and, if you like it, contribute a few short words that I could use on the cover of the book, and on my web site and other promotional venues marketing this important work.
May I sent you a copy of Life Lived Backwards?
Please contact me via email at ____ or by phone at ____ with your postal address, and I will send a copy out promptly to your attention. Thank you in advance for your kindness, and thanks again for your outstanding work in this field!
Yours Sincerely,
Wanda B. Anauthor
Me again. I haven’t tried it, but I bet with some creative Googling you can find lots of tips about this from online writing/author/publishing web sites that will further describe approaches you might consider.
++
I thanked my brother and decided that in order for me to write anything like a genuine request letter to Perry I better read the two books of his I have here. My plan has gone as far astray as my OWN REAL life has gone due to the severe trauma and its changes to my physiology that I experience. I am “land locked” in my frozen Silence.
This grief has no words.
Obviously.
++
I am trying. I have now read to page 37. Will I be able to finish Perry’s book? Time will tell….
++++
I am thinking about being this blunt with a subtitle for this book – Did Child Abuse Break My Mother?
++++
Here is our first book out in ebook format. Click here to view or purchase –
It lists for $2.99 and can be read by Amazon Prime customers without charge. Reviews for the book on the Amazon.com site are welcome.
++++
++++
Stop the Storm 