Reader Review - Trauma Theory & Testimony

Featured Reader Review — Trauma Theory & Testimony

By Charlietta D. Owens, MSW, LCSW

What Readers Are Saying
A powerful, in-depth reader review is featured below.

Full Review

By Ishmael A. Muhammad

(Professional review left on Amazon & Barnes & Noble)

I AM leaving this one here just for YOU:

Cuz, WOWWWW… reading Trauma, Theory, and Testimony felt like hearing your heart speak directly to mine. I knew some of your story before, but nothing prepared me for the power of hearing it in your own voice—raw, unfiltered and courageous in a way that shook me. 

As I scrolled on my Kindle app (book should be here soon; and I plan to put highlighter to work!!—so I AM going to need that signed copy), it felt like you were sitting across from me, trusting me with truths you carried for so long. You didn’t sugarcoat shyt. You didn’t hide behind theory or storytelling tricks. You just opened yourself, and I felt every bit of your strength in those words and I read them ALL.

There were moments I had to set my phone down and breathe, because the honesty in your testimony hit places inside me I didn’t even know were waiting to be touched.

What amazed me most was how you took the ideas of Maslow, Freud, and others and made them part of your journey—not just as academic names, but as tools you used to understand your own survival. You turned theories into light, and shined them into the darkest corners of your past with a kind of bravery that most people can't even start to touch.

You didn’t just explain trauma—you translated it into something living, something that reaches people right in the center of their humanity. YOU TESTITAUGHT‼️

And your resilience… I felt it in every line. Not the kind of resilience people talk about casually, but the kind forged in silence, in struggle, in the determination to keep moving forward even when nothing around you made sense.

You carried yourself through things that could have broken you, yet somehow you emerged with wisdom, depth, and a voice strong enough to lift others. Including me (especially ME—at this time in my life).

I want you to know this:
Your story inspired me. Truly. Deeply. In a way I will never forget. 🖤

Reading your testimony lit a fire under me. It reminded me why I started telling my own story in Strong Generation, and it has pushed me to keep going—to go deeper, to be more honest, to speak from the soul the way you did.

You made me realize that our stories don’t just belong to us. They belong to the people who might find healing in them, strength in them, connection in them.

You helped me see that trauma isn’t the end—it’s part of the journey. And truth, when spoken to light, with courage, can change everything.

I’m proud of you, Cuz. Proud of the woman you’ve become. Proud of the voice you’ve found. And proud to be your FAMILY, standing beside you in our lineage of Survivors, Builders, Griots (& Griottes), Overcomers and from a STRONG GENERATION.

Thank you for inspiring me to want to keep writing.
Thank you for reminding me what resilience looks like.
Thank you for showing the world—and SHOWING AND REMINDING ME—what it means to RISE. 🖤

#FOE‼️

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