Quotes from Bruce D. Perry

The most destabilizing thing for anyone is to have their core beliefs challenged. As psychologist Virginia Satir puts it, we feel better with the certainty of misery than the misery of uncertainty. Good or bad, we are attracted to things that are familiar.

relationships in modern society. In our work, we find that the best predictor of your current mental health is your current "relational health," or connectedness. This connectedness is fueled by two things: the basic capabilities you've developed to form and maintain relationships, and the relational "opportunities" you have in your family, neighborhood, school, and so forth.

You cannot love if you have not been loved.

took out a paper and pencil and drew the upside-down triangle model of the brain, and we talked for a minute or two about memory, associations, and triggers.

The long-term impact of being whupped—then forced to hush and even smile about it—turned me into a world-class people pleaser for most of my life. It would not have taken me half a lifetime to learn to set boundaries and say "no" with confidence had I been nurtured differently.

Reflective thinking and creativity require that we stop in the middle of a moment, reflect, and spend time "in our head." We reflect on the past and imagine the future, making dissociative disengagement a key part of daily life. And it's essential for relational interaction, as well.

Oprah: What if you don't have the resources to get a therapist? Dr. Perry: Great question. Most people who experience adversity and trauma do not have access to therapy, let alone a clinical team like I just described. But what we're learning is that having access to a number of invested, caring people is actually a better predictor of good outcomes following trauma than having access to a therapist.

relational connection.

This isn't to suggest that therapy isn't helpful, but therapy without "connectedness" is not very effective.

a la hora de comprender cualquier problema clínico relacionado con el cerebro es obtener una historia precisa de las experiencias del paciente.

Dr. Perry: I think that's true. Even though we live in an amazing country filled with good people, I believe that collectively we're less resilient. Our ability as a people to tolerate stressors is diminishing because our connectedness is diminishing.

feel like they are jumping out of their skin

So when a single mom is living on a limited income, trying to manage four children, trying to be mother and father, and she feels overwhelmed or feels like it's impossible to do it all—it's because it is impossible.

My grandmother Hattie Mae's home was a place where children were seen and not heard.

So much so that on the night Henry was electrocuted, his last words were that all of his life, he'd gotten it wrong. His parents had taught him wrong, that Black people were the enemy. And he'd had to come to death row to learn what love was.

Esta interconexión, asociar el placer con la interacción humana, es el «pegamento» neurobiológico esencial que vincula y crea relaciones saludables.

My father, Vernon, used to tell me I would never have been born if he hadn't been curious about what was underneath my mother's pink poodle skirt.

When someone has symptoms in each of those four categories, the DSM label is PTSD. It is really important to remember, however, that PTSD is not the only way that trauma impacts our mental and physical health. The adverse effects of trauma that we discussed at the beginning of the chapter can have just as significant an impact on someone's life. In fact, the majority of the long-term effects of trauma don't manifest as PTSD.

The brain develops, processes incoming sensory input, and heals in sequence.

The most pervasive feeling I remember from my own childhood is loneliness.

la inteligencia es el procesamiento más rápido de la información: una persona requiere un número menor de repeticiones de una misma experiencia para establecer una asociación.

It is in the small moments, when we feel the other person fully present, fully engaged, connected, and accepting, that we make the most powerful, enduring bonds.

Nine months after that singular encounter, I arrived. From the moment I could make sense of it, I knew I was unwanted.

The wise learn how to carry their burden with grace, often to protect others from the emotional intensity of their pain.