Getting Unstuck: Unraveling the Knot of Depression, Attention and Trauma - Softcover

Kerson, Don

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0976986728 ISBN 13: 9780976986720

Publisher: Greenpoint Psychiatric Press, 2008

Synopsis

Getting Unstuck is a groundbreaking first-look at “stuckness”—the profound inability to move one’s life forward. Being stuck is a mental health problem that affects thousands of adults; and yet, it has gone unrecognized and misunderstood by mental health professionals, until now. The author, psychiatrist Don Kerson, argues that adults who are stuck are bedeviled by a complex interaction between depression, attention deficit disorder and dissociation, a consequence of childhood trauma.

 

People who are stuck can’t get things done, no matter how smart, skilled, articulate or creative they may be. Their personal and professional lives are often on shaky ground, and depression is a constant problem. Therapy helps, sometimes. Anti-depressants help, sometimes. But they never really feel good. They remain stuck, Kerson argues, because the problem—if recognized at all—is being treated only partially. The key to getting people unstuck is to tease apart the depression, ADD, and dissociation (or whichever of these conditions is present at any one time), and then to address each of them separately.

 

Kerson wrote Getting Unstuck to help people with this problem to lead more productive and satisfying lives and to share what he’s discovered with mental health professionals so they can begin to recognize the problem and offer effective treatment for it. Kerson details the successful and efficient method he developed to help his patients get their lives moving again. It includes the innovative use of neo-Ericksonian hypnotherapeutic integration exercises to address the procrastination and disorganization that plague individuals with ADD.

About this title

About the Author:

Don Kerson, M.D. has practiced outpatient psychopharmacology and psychotherapy for over 20 years in Manhattan and at Greenpoint Psychiatric Services, the clinic he founded in Brooklyn, New York. Until 2000, he was Medical Director of the Long Island Consultation Center, the fourth largest freestanding mental health and substance abuse clinic in New York State. Dr. Kerson is currently developing a group therapy program that uses an integrated approach to help participants get back to fully enjoying life, seminar for young adults on using their right brain and a seminar for adults in which he will teach the trance skills he discusses in Getting Unstuck.

Review:

“A superb book by a superb clinician. This book has what so many books on this subject lack: the honesty and truth that can only be gained by working in the trenches of real life. What you'll get from Getting Unstuck are nuggets you can really use in your everyday life. Dr. Kerson has worked a lifetime to write this book, and his life’s work now becomes a precious gift to us all.”

— EDWARD HALLOWELL, M.D., author of national best sellers Driven to Distraction, Worry, and Connect

A very insightful book on mental health problems seemingly approached from a new angle.  Having recently experienced the most traumatic event I have ever gone through I am hoping to utilize some of the information contained in the book.  Also, it addresses other problems with mental health which began in childhood and I really believe there is 'hope for the future' if the guidelines are followed.  I fully intend to explore the information the author has revealed.

I think this is a book which should be read by mental health professionals as well as those who require help in their everyday lives and believe it is a true way forward for a profession which seems to have had limited success.  

Jackie Hepton 
NetGalley

I found this a valuable resource on the different types of depression and their effects steaming from multiple disorders. Understanding is most important when faced with one of these issues and the author gives a clear and very descriptive outline of the causes, effects and even some of the why's. Sometimes just medicating is not the answer. 

Debbie Forde
NetGalley

About this edition

• Publisher: Greenpoint Psychiatric Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0976986728
• ISBN 13: 9780976986720
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 292