What My Bones Know

By: Stephanie Foo

Narrated by: Stephanie Foo

Length: 10 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's summary

A searing memoir of reckoning and healing by acclaimed journalist Stephanie Foo, investigating the little-understood science behind complex PTSD and how it has shaped her life.

Every cell in my body is filled with the code of generations of trauma, of death, of birth, of migration, of history that I cannot understand.... I want to have words for what my bones know.

By age 30, Stephanie Foo was successful on paper: she had her dream job as an award-winning radio producer at This American Life and a loving boyfriend. But behind her office door, she was having panic attacks and sobbing at her desk every morning. After years of questioning what was wrong with herself, she was diagnosed with complex PTSD—a condition that occurs when trauma happens continuously, over the course of years.

Both of Foo's parents abandoned her when she was a teenager, after years of physical and verbal abuse and neglect. She thought she'd moved on, but her new diagnosis illuminated the way her past continued to threaten her health, relationships and career. She found limited resources to help her, so Foo set out to heal herself, and to map her experiences onto the scarce literature about C-PTSD.

In this deeply personal and thoroughly researched account, Foo interviews scientists and psychologists and tries a variety of innovative therapies. She returns to her hometown in California to investigate the effects of immigrant trauma on the community, and she uncovers family secrets in the country of her birth, Malaysia, to learn how trauma can be inherited through generations. Ultimately, she discovers that you don't move on from trauma—but you can learn to move with it.

Powerful, enlightening and hopeful, What My Bones Know is a brave narrative that reckons with the hold of the past over the present, the mind over the body—and examines one woman's ability to reclaim agency from her trauma.

©2022 Stephanie Foo (P)2022 W F Howes

Critic reviews

“Achingly exquisite…providing real hope for those who long to heal.” (Lori Gottlieb, author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone)

"A sharp, insightful and stirring memoir." (Kirkus Reviews)

"Foo's writing is shrewdly insightful. Highly recommended." (Library Journal, starred review)

Frozen in awe

Brilliant. I am just blown away by the writing style and the amazing ability to place the reader in the picture. Thank you.

Brilliant and unapologetically honest

I thoroughly enjoyed this book which shed light on the generational curse of trauma and which enables me to have the vocab to now articulate... and to better understand myself. I especially loved that we got a view from the perspective of a brown person which adds an incredible dynamic to the extreme nuance related to the disorder.

Brave, enlightening and informative

Whoah! I’m at loss for words. Amazingly written and told real life story of complex trauma and resilience. I admire the bravery in unpacking the cultural issues and the drive to find solutions and get better. ❤️‍🩹 highly recommended.

Excellent overview of C-PTSD

Wow, I’m so glad that someone online recommended this book. What an incredibly personable storytelling tone coupled with journalistic research. I felt pulled in by the author’s stories, whilst reflecting on my own. Beautifully written and told.

complex post-traumatic stress disorder

the author/narrator gives an open and honest review of her life as an abused child of Asian immigrant parents. Although I purse although I cannot personally relate to her experiences, she does such a good job of painting her life and her feelings that I can definitely empathize with her. Her story is both heartwarming and heart-rending.