Book excerpt: A powerful guide to transcending childhood trauma—from the people who’ve done it It’s like a dark thread woven through a piece of cloth: You can’t pull it out without unraveling the whole thing. And it shows up here and there among all the other threads. Surviving and Transcending a Traumatic Childhood: The Dark Thread weaves together 90 stories of survival to create a silver lining of hope for those struggling to heal from childhood trauma. This unique book documents the endless challenges facing children and adults who have been subjected to physical, emotional, and psychological abuse, and examines the proactive coping strategies that have made their recoveries a success. Each poignant story reveals an amazing capacity for growth and an ability to adapt emotionally that offers a positive spirit to others suffering abuse. Surviving and Transcending a Traumatic Childhood: The Dark Thread examines how 90 people who have experienced childhood trauma and abuse have been able to rise above the suffering to not only endure, but prevail. In their own words, trauma survivors discuss what happened to them as children and the process they went through to become healthy, happy adults. Their stories are heartfelt, heartbreaking, and sometimes surprising in the variety of traumatic experiences, the intensity of the stress, and the number of people who were forced to deal with multiple issues in childhood, including sexual and physical abuse, alcoholism, neglect, and violence. The stories told in Surviving and Transcending a Traumatic Childhood: The Dark Thread explore: when the trauma began common feelings associated with trauma therapy and support groups getting married escaping abuse the role of religion and spirituality significant people who provided help types of homes where abuse occurred the positive effects of surviving trauma school life patterns of survival and much more Surviving and Transcending a Traumatic Childhood: The Dark Thread also includes a list of resources that might be helpful to those in the process of transcending trauma and a self-study guide for developing a deeper understanding of the healing process.