Book Review: Healing Days - A Guide for Kids Who Have Experienced Trauma

Author: Susan Farber Straus
Illustrator: Maria Bogade
Interest Level: Ages 6 and Up

From the Book Jacket: Healing Days is a sensitive and reassuring story intended for children who have experienced trauma and covers the feelings, thoughts, and behaviors that many kids have after a bad and scary thing happens.

A useful book to read with a parent or therapist, Healing Days emphasizes that children are not to blame for what happened, and that they can get help and look forward to a happy future. Kids will begin to understand their response to the trauma and learn some strategies for feeling safer, more relaxed, and more confident.


An extensive Note to Parents and Caregivers, including a list of helpful resources, is available for download at the publishers website at www.apa.org/pubs/magination

Why It's On My Bookshelf: This is probably my favorite find of the summer. First of all, the name of the book is beautiful and after I read it what came to my mind was "this is so healing for kids!" Second - just look at the below and you will see exactly why you need this on your counseling shelf:


 
teaches kids about "fight, flight, or freeze"
(my jaw about hit the floor - yes to this!)

 
My Safety Plan (I write these with kids ALL the time.
So I love how this is reinforced).

 
My Feel-Good Plan - Another great tool to use with kids.
 
Healing Days does not reference a concrete traumatic experience. It leaves it open to the reader to relate their own experience to the feelings going on. Breathing and practicing yoga are also discussed as tools to help kids. I appreciate how the author took the time to really explain to kids what these coping mechanisms are and how to use them. It's WELL written. I just absolutely love it and will be recommending it to ALL my counselor friends.
 
It's definitely geared towards kids who are going to be working directly with a therapist. But even if a child is not seeing a therapist - it can STILL be used to help you guide kids towards healing. You can be creative with the words.

What an OUTSTANDING resource.

A Link to This Book and Others You Might Find Helpful:



 

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