Healing Beyond Trauma's Shadow
Transforming Pain Into Power Through Practical
Healing Books That Foster God's Path Healing
Healing Beyond Trauma's Shadow
Transforming Pain Into Power Through Practical
Healing Books That Foster God's Path Healing
Beyond the Scar: Healing the Wounds of Trauma
There is hope in realizing you can heal.
Will I ever be the same again?
It's a question countless people ask in the wake of trauma. The grief, anger, anxiety, shame, or numbness can feel overwhelming. Our identity fractures. Relationships change. Faith can feel distant. We look at ourselves and wonder, Who have I become?
Beyond the Scar: Healing the Wounds of Trauma is a powerful invitation to healing-written by Dr. Steve West, a former military chaplain, EMT, police officer, and trauma survivor. Drawing from decades of frontline ministry and his own personal journey, Steve offers honest insight, biblical truth, and practical tools for those navigating life after trauma.
This book is for anyone who feels like their pain has isolated them from others-or even from God. Whether the trauma comes from abuse, violence, grief, betrayal, combat, moral injury, or life-shattering loss, Beyond the Scar helps readers understand what trauma does to the mind, body, and soul-and how healing is possible through grace, support, and spiritual renewal.
Steve doesn't offer platitudes. He writes with raw honesty, vulnerable storytelling, and hard-won wisdom. Readers will see themselves in these pages-and begin to find words for what they feel. They'll also find hope that they're not beyond repair. Healing doesn't mean going back to the way things were. It means becoming whole again, even if life will never be the same.
Beyond the Scar also speaks to those who walk with trauma survivors-family members, pastors, chaplains, counselors, and friends-equipping them to respond with compassion, presence, and understanding.
Books for Emotional Resilience
The Bronze Scar
There is comfort in realizing you are not alone.
Am I crazy?
People with post-traumatic disorders often ask themselves this question. The inability to control actions, memories, anxiety, and other aspects of PTSD can make the one who suffers feel like they are crazy, but the answer is no. All of these things are normal PTSD responses. It isn’t easy to reconcile “who I am now” with “what I’ve become” compared to “who I was” and “how I acted” before all of this.
The Bronze Scar will help those with PTSD know they are not alone. Steve West pulls no punches. He never hides his faults while being completely transparent and speaking from his heart. The book is a powerful account of what goes through his head and how he feels at any given moment. Those with PTSD will easily recognize these thoughts and feelings in themselves. Gaining insight can make it easier to explain to others.
The book will also help families, friends, and colleagues who deal with the imbalances daily by detailing Steve’s experiences. If people can better understand what really happens when someone with PTSD finds their anxiety on the rise, it will help them respond in helpful, non-judgmental ways.
One of the great disadvantages of living with a person with PTSD is not having a point of reference. Being unable to relate to a loved one with PTSD causes frustration. The one with PTSD often lashes out and hurts those who invest in them the most.
This book helps explain how PTSD feels, then those who suffer, and their families can, hopefully, understand each other a little better. It leads to the point where we can talk intelligently about this experience, and that is a sufficiently positive starting point.
Perhaps you are unsure if you have PTSD and have therefore not sought help. If you identify with what Steve shares, perhaps it will lead you to seek help. You can’t do it alone. It takes a group of people who are committed to supporting you. Not everyone can be cured, but everyone can find a certain level of healing. This healing stems from an understanding of the inner turbulence and the external manifestations of PTSD. There is comfort in realizing you are not alone.
About Dr. Steven West
Dr. Steve West is the author of two influential works on trauma recovery: The Bronze Scar: Understanding How PTSD Feels and his newest release, Beyond the Scar: Healing the Wounds of Trauma. His writing combines decades of professional caregiving with personal experience, offering hope, clarity, and practical tools for those navigating trauma and for those who support them.
Living With PTSD
Steve has lived with a PTSD diagnosis for over a decade. His entire career has been dedicated to serving others through roles as an emergency medical technician, police officer, military chaplain, pastor, and hospital chaplain. He currently serves as the Director of Chaplaincy for the National Association of Evangelicals, where he equips and supports chaplains across the country.
A Distinguished 40-Year Military Career
A retired United States Air Force chaplain, Steve completed a distinguished 40-year career in 2015. During his military service, he was honored to serve as chaplain to two Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and retired as the final Air Force member on active duty who began service during the Vietnam era in 1974. Steve holds a Master of Divinity in psychology and counseling from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and a Master's in Marriage and Family Therapy from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where he was sent by the Air Force as a subject-matter expert in the field. He later served as the marriage and family therapy consultant for the entire Air Force Chaplain Corps.
In Beyond the Scar, Steve expands his trauma work to explore not only PTSD, but a wide range of emotional, spiritual, and relational wounds. Drawing from Scripture, theology, neuroscience, and real-life stories, the book offers a Christ-centered path toward hope and healing.
Steve is married to Cherri West. They have two children, Adam and Jennifer, a daughter-in-law, Emily, and two grandchildren, Addison and Greysie.
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