Most days, I walk individuals to my office door. People tend to look up as if asking permission to come in. They take the couch (or swing), and I take my blue chair. I recognize the sacred nature of what we are about to approach.

Therapists’ offices are sometimes the first places a secret is broken. It can be a castle where shame is unleashed from its cage, growling and thrashing about. Together, we meet the creature and seek to heal.

I recently pored over the book Unapologetic: Unshackle Your Shame, Reclaim Your Power by Annalie Howling. Rather than greeting others’ shame in my office, I reflected on my emotional landscape while I swung on my hammock.

Shame is a rather ubiquitous thing.

Unapologetic defines shame as “a felt sense that lies in wait for us in the shadows. Its power lies in its ability to convince us that our worth depends upon conforming to what others expect of us” (Howling, 2025, pg. 1). It is quite the shapeshifter, isn’t it?

Howling recognizes shame as a common byproduct of trauma, sharing her own experiences of abuse coupled with the poisonous message that it was her fault. In her book, she describes a phenomenon that therapists know too well: shame’s ability to convince us that even our trauma is not “good enough” to qualify. That we are not good enough.

She discusses the mechanisms by which shame has been utilized to control others, particularly women: “To make a wild mustang tame, first you break them. The way to make a woman tame is to shame her” (Howling, 2025, xi). She then moves to discuss the insidious ways that shame and trauma manifest in the lives of women, ranging from unexplained health concerns to compliance.

Most people are aware of the Hollywood rendition of traumatic stress flashbacks and nightmares. Yet, this denotes just a tiny portion of how trauma affects us. Howling zeros in on the more abstract impacts, saying that “trauma takes part of us, often in the most discreet of ways” (Howling, 2025, pg 12).

Indeed, especially in the case of complex trauma, the effects reach far beyond the criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder to components that can be difficult to measure, like an altered sense of self or safety.

Howling also tackles a topic that is rarely spoken about: competition among women. She states, “We claim to wish to fix each other’s crowns, and yet when we see a woman begin to rise, it is one of her kind, led by shame, who is first to tear her down” (Howling, 2025, pg. 195). She further urges women to remember that “the fight is not with each other. It is with the systems that have told us we must compete.”

Unfortunately, I have seen vicious conflicts among women and believe wholeheartedly that these often are sparked through scarcity. When we can lift each other instead of pushing each other down, we can all rise.

Drawing from concepts of eye movement reprocessing and desensitization (EMDR), a type of therapy usually utilized to address trauma, Unapologetic takes a courageous look at how women can recognize their shame and the accompanying binding beliefs it can bring. Howling herself practices EMDR with her clients and describes the process with intimate beauty.

The book also holds some parables and excerpts from others’ stories.

As I signed the ‘Manifesto’ at the end of the book, sharing a final apology to myself for all the times I ought not to have apologized, I felt I genuinely freed myself from something. I plan to keep this book with my notes and journal entries as precious insights to reflect on for continued growth. I look forward to sharing this book with friends and clients looking to work on their own processes.

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