Practical advice on divorce, trauma recovery

Book review by Graham Ries

FLYING IN RECOVERY by Helen Phillips

Helen writes with the authority of one who has suffered a great deal in life. This comes through in her excellent penmanship. She dispenses her advice and concern for her readers with a clinical, unemotional approach that certainly made me think and reflect over many issues in my life. In fact, some of Helen’s advice pushed me the final few inches into my own total recovery from nearly 50 years of pain, and I am grateful to her for this.

However, I feel that in trying to cover all aspects of an individual’s pain, Helen tries to take on too much in a single book. The subject is too vast and multifaceted!

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I appreciated her candour when she admitted to having sold sandwiches during a difficult time, for I too have walked that road — the road of being so desperate for an income and unable to find employment that I have gathered a few cents together, bought bread, filling and plastic bags and stood on a street corner selling my sandwiches so that I could take home a few rands to my wife. Helen, I salute you!

The workbook at the back is a definite help to people who want to work their way through issues, although I might be inclined to say that something like this should not be attempted alone but rather with the assistance of a trained professional – preferably a Christian counsellor or similar.

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A steady read, Helen Phillips’ FLYING IN RECOVERY is well written, definitely helpful and obviously very genuine. They say it takes one to recognise one, and as a twice-divorcee myself, with a lifetime of pain and trauma behind me, I heartily recommend this book to anyone who has had to face the sadness of divorce and/or other trauma.

This book will urge you to get on the road to recovery and to find the Jesus we all talk about and love – and more than that, it will help you to lift your head and get out from behind the shame that always accompanies divorce and other trauma, even if you were not to blame.

Well done Helen!

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[The book can be ordered from the author]