HA! I've always wanted to do one of those headlines!
But seriously. Even before As soon as I fell was officially launched, readers were writing with questions, like: "I see myself in this story, but now what?"
Guess I managed to avoid the how-to book trap pretty well...
Good news is, lots of other people have written great how-to's, so let me point you in some general directions which I hope will be helpful.
photo: Michael Bruner
Here are my recommendations for general soul care:
1. My resource page here on the blog links you to Amazon books in various categories. It's worth visiting there just to see the little carousels twirl around, I think. If you couldn't get to Coney Island for Labor Day, this is the next best thing.
2. For the truly debilitated (and don't feel bad, we've all been there), the anxiety and depression carousel is duplicated right here on the blog page. Just shift your eyes over to the left to the little blue-gray Amazon box and click. You're in.
3. If you need help finding a counselor in your area, I recommend searching at the American Association of Christian Counselors. You'll find four different categories of counselors: Professional Christian Counselor, Christian Counselor, Pastoral Counselor, Biblical Counselor. There are explanations of all those various types on the site, and I'll let you wade through that to your heart's content.
4. Groups are also a great way to find support and feed your soul. Search for groups near you at Celebrate Recovery, Grief Share, or Divorce Care. Many churches offer support groups under other names as well. I just googled "Christian support groups" and found The National Association for Christian Recovery, for addicts and their families. Poke around online and see what you can find. There is help!
5. International friends, there's an International Therapist Directory with counselors in many countries who are "familiar with the TCK and international expatriate experiences." I'm on the list for Texas. Which, as you know, is a country.
6. If you're looking for counseling while staying overseas...well, that's not easy. I do offer a limited number of Skype consultations for folks overseas. For more information, submit the form on my Connect page.
7. Talk to someone who cares about you. If you don't have anyone nearby, move yourself until you are in such a place. (I have suggested several places in numbers 3, 4, 5, and 6.) Put yourself on a plane to find this person if you need to. Then open your mouth and speak. (Tell the truth while you're at it.)
8. Be open to change. Doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result is the classic definition of insanity.
If you want to stop trying so dang hard all the time:
9. Tired of Trying to Measure Up by Jeff Van Vonderen. The subtitle is: Getting Free from the Demands, Expectations, and Intimidation of Well-Meaning People. I'm not sure everybody is always so well-meaning, but Jeff is clearly a nice guy. This book helped me a whole lot.
10. Grace for the Good Girl by Emily Freeman. Her website is really pretty, too.
These recommendations are specifically for pornography recovery:
11. Covenant Eyes filtering software is the first line of defense against internet nastiness at the Bruner household.
12. Hope After Porn is a free download at Covenant Eyes for women. It's four women telling the story of healing in their marriages. Covenant Eyes just updated the book after tens of thousands of downloads, and asked me to write a summary chapter for it, so there you go. Bonus material.
13. Speaking of Covenant Eyes, they also have a blog. You can subscribe to for free, and read tons of articles for men, women, parents, anybody who needs help with pornography issues. There are lots of voices on the blog, and you may not agree 100% with everything (I don't), but it's a conversation that I think is really helpful.
14. I have written several posts for the Covenant Eyes blog, and here's the page where you can find all of those.
15. Pure Desire is another resource that a blog reader told me about a while back. They have groups in various places, as well as books and videos. We visited a group near us and felt it was definitely something we could recommend with enthusiasm for men, women, and spouses.
16. Here's another website someone floated my way this week: Guilty Pleasure. This one started in Australia. They're really interested in getting churches to talk about pornography, which would be awesome.
NEWS FLASH!!!
Guess what happened on our very first day at Amazon? YES! We are a hot new release!
Thank you so much for posting to Facebook, Good Reads, tweeting, reading, reviewing, bugging your friends, and buying the book!
If you want to share some more today, knock yourselves out:
http://www.amazon.com/As-Soon-Fell-Memoir-ebook/dp/B00MS8IKSG
In the UK:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/As-Soon-Fell-Memoir-ebook/dp/B00MS8IKSG
In Australia (Kindle version only; print has to be ordered from amazon.com):
http://www.amazon.com.au/As-Soon-Fell-Memoir-ebook/dp/B00MS8IKSG
