This article explores second-wave feminist Susan Gordon Lydon’s 1993 memoir, Take the Long Way Home: Memoirs of a Survivor as a historical document whose resonances remain relevant for people working in the multidisciplinary field of trauma studies. Lydon’s memoir illustrates what are arguably the most significant legacies of second-wave feminism’s consciousness-raising and its propagation of the notion that the personal is political: the feminist reconceptualization of trauma to include women’s everyday experiences of interpersonal violence and the emergence of survivor discourse. The article demonstrates that Lydon’s conceptualization of her addiction as a response to trauma reflects three key feminist contributions to trauma theory: the expansion of the conventional concept of trauma to include women’s everyday and ongoing experiences; out of this expansion, the development of the concept of “insidious trauma”; and the depathologization of adaptive, “normal responses” to trauma.
Alcoff, L., & Gray-Rosendale, L. (1996). Survivor discourse: Transgression or recuperation? In S. Smith & J. Watson (Eds.), Getting a life: Everyday uses of autobiography (pp. 198-225). Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.
2.
American Psychiatric Association. (1980). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3rd ed.). Washington, DC: Author .
3.
American Psychiatric Association. (1987). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (Rev. 3rd ed.). Washington, DC: Author.
4.
American Psychiatric Association. (1994). Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed.). Washington, DC: Author .
5.
Aull, F. ( 2009). Mission statement. Medical Humanities . Retrieved May 28, 2009, from http://medhum.med.nyu.edu/
6.
Barrett, M., & Trepper, T. ( 1991). Treating women drug abusers who were victims of childhood sexual abuse. In C. Bepko (Ed.), Feminism and addiction (pp. 127-146). New York: Hawthorn.
7.
Brown, L.S. ( 1995). Not outside the range: One feminist perspective on psychic trauma. In C. Caruth (Ed.), Trauma: Explorations in memory (pp 100-112). Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press.
Burgess, A., & Holmstrom, L. ( 1974). Rape trauma syndrome. American Journal of Psychiatry, 131, 981-986.
10.
Carnes, P. ( 1998). Addiction and post-traumatic stress: The convergence of victims’ realities. Treating Abuse Today, 3, 5-11.
11.
Cottler, L.Compton, W.M., III, Mager, D., Spitznagel, E.L., & Janca, A. ( 1992). Posttraumatic stress disorder among substance users from the general population. American Journal of Psychiatry, 149, 664-670.
12.
Cvetkovich, A. ( 2003). An archive of feelings: Trauma, sexuality, and lesbian public cultures. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
13.
Dayton, T. ( 2000). Trauma and addiction: Ending the cycle of pain through emotional literacy. Deerfield Beach, FL: Health Communications.
14.
Driscoll, E. ( 1993). The politics of recovery. In C. Brown & K. Jasper (Eds.), Consuming passions: Feminist approaches to weight preoccupation and eating disorders (pp. 251-273). Toronto, Ontario, Canada: Second Story Press.
15.
Freedman, K. ( 2006). The epistemological significance of psychic trauma. Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, 21, 104-125. Retrieved October 11, 2008, from http://muse.jhu.edu/login?uri=/journals/hypatia/v021/21.2freedman.html
16.
Friedling, M. ( 1996). Feminisms and the Jewish mother syndrome: Identity, autobiography, and the rhetoric of addiction. Discourse, 19, 105-130.
17.
Frieldling, M. ( 2000). Recovering women: Feminisms and the representation of addiction. Boulder, CO: Westview .
18.
Haaken, J. ( 1996). The recovery of memory, fantasy, and desire: Feminist approaches to sexual abuse and psychic trauma. Signs, 21, 1069-1094.
19.
Herman, J. ( 1992). Trauma and recovery. New York: Basic Books.
20.
Kandall, S. ( 1996). Substance and shadow: Women and addiction in the United States. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
21.
Kilpatrick, D., Resnick, H.S., Saunders, B.E., & Best, C.L. ( 1998). Victimization, posttraumatic stress disorder, and substance use and abuse among women. In C. Wetherington & A. Roman (Eds.), Drug addiction research and the health of women (pp. 285-307). Bethesda, MD: National Institute on Drug Abuse. Retrieved September 4, 2009, from http://www.nida.nih.gov/WHGD/DARHW-Download2.html#TOC
22.
Lamb, S. ( 1999). Constructing the victim: Popular images and lasting labels . In S. Lamb (Ed.), New versions of victims: Feminists struggle with the concept (pp. 108-138). New York: New York University Press.
23.
Leys, R. ( 2000). Trauma: A genealogy. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
24.
Luxenberg, T., Spinazzola, J., & van der Kolk, B. (2001). Complex trauma and disorders of extreme stress (DESNOS) diagnosis, part one: Assessment. Directions in Psychiatry, 21, 373-392.
25.
Marecek, J. ( 1999). Trauma talk in feminist clinical practice. In S. Lamb (Ed.), New versions of victims: Feminists struggle with the concept (pp. 158-182). New York: New York University Press.
26.
Nicki, A. ( 2001). The abused mind: Feminist theory, psychiatric disability, and trauma. Hypatia, 16, 80-104.
27.
National Institute on Drug Abuse. (2005a). NIDA infofacts: Understanding drug abuse and addiction. Retrieved December 13, 2006, from http://www.nida.nih.gov/Infofacts/understand.html
28.
National Institute on Drug Abuse. (2005b). Addiction is a chronic disease. Retrieved December 13, 2006 , from http://www.nida.nih.gov/about/welcome/aboutdrugabuse/chronicdisease/
29.
Palmer, C., & Horowitz, M. ( 2000). Sisters of the extreme: Women’s writings on the drug experience. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.
30.
Rapping, E. ( 1996). The culture of recovery: Making sense of the self-help movement in women’s lives. Boston: Beacon.
31.
Read, J., Brown, P., & Kahler, C. ( 2004). Substance use and posttraumatic stress disorders: Symptom interplay and effects on outcome. Addictive Behaviors, 29, 1665-1672.
32.
Root, M. ( 1989). Treatment failures: The role of sexual victimization in women’s addictive behavior. American Journal of Ortho-psychiatry , 59, 542-549.
33.
Root, M. ( 1992). Reconstructing the impact of trauma on personality. In L. S. Brown & M. Ballou (Eds.), Personality and psychopathology: Feminist reappraisals (pp. 229-265). New York: Guilford .
34.
Sullivan, J.M., & Evans, K. ( 1994). Integrated treatment for the survivor of childhood trauma who is chemically dependent. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs , 26, 369-378.
35.
van der Kolk, B. ( 2001). Assessment and treatment of complex PTSD. In R. Yehuda (Ed.), Treating trauma survivors with PTSD (pp. 1-29). Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Publishing. Retrieved September 4, 2009, from www.traumacenter.org/products/pdf_files/Complex_PTSD.pdf
36.
van der Kolk, B., & van der Hart, O. (1995). The intrusive past: The flexibility of memory and the engraving of trauma. In C. Caruth (Ed.), Trauma: Explorations in memory (pp. 158-182). Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
37.
Walker, L. ( 1978). Battered women and learned helplessness. Victimology, 2, 525-534.
38.
Yehuda, R., & McFarlane, A. ( 1995). Conflict between current knowledge about posttraumatic stress disorder and its original conceptual basis. Trauma Information Pages. Retrieved February 1, 2004, from http://www.trauma-pages.com/a/yehuda95.php
39.
Zweben, J., Clark, H.W., & Smith, D.E. ( 1994). Traumatic experiences and substance abuse: Mapping the territory. Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 26, 327-344.
