User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
This is a memoir in which the author, while in law school and while having very dark thoughts, decides to seek help in the form of a group therapy session. Initially, therapy seems to do a lot of good for Tate. She’s forced to start talking about her issues with eating and sex, and the therapist (Dr. Rosen) helps her give voice to issues long left unspoken.
But as we go along, the therapist’s instructions and his role in the author’s life grows, especially as he
suggests that she join additional groups and he begins to encourage her (read: commands her) to stay in a toxic relationship or to accept a more high-powered job (that pays more...when his sessions are pricey. Just saying).
I am always pleased when people make choices to take care of themselves. I think therapy is an amazing thing you can do for yourself and I absolutely hate that often people can’t afford to get that kind of help. Christie Tate obviously had a number of things haunting her from her childhood and from previous relationships that she needed to work through and it seems like group therapy helped with that. She’s very honest in this memoir about what the experience was like, and for that I applaud her.
But what I’m having trouble accepting is the ownership these people allowed Dr. Rosen to have over their lives. As stated above, Tate would repeatedly make choices that her therapist had given her as “prescriptions,” such as telling a man who was basically a stranger that she was a “cock tease.” I waited until the end of the book, hoping that the reasoning for such a command would be made clear, but nope. If there was a reason, it’s destined to remain a mystery. More likely, it was a power trip on the part of this therapist.
“No secrets” is a rule that Dr. Rosen has. You must tell this therapist everything or else….what? You’re failing? You’re cheating yourself? He doesn’t say. The whole way through this book, I kept thinking, “it seems like the only thing you’d gain from such a rule is a room full of oversharers.” And boy, oh boy, I had no idea how right that gut impulse was.
Because Christie Tate isn’t just an author of this memoir, she was also in the news just shy of two years ago, for being the mommy blogger who refused her child’s request to take down their personal information. At the time her child requested this, Tate said, “Promising not to write about her anymore would mean shutting down a vital part of myself, which isn’t necessarily good for me or her.” Or, to rephrase in my words, “I’ve made a second career off of writing about these humans that I’ve birthed and now that they’re old enough to see that I’ve talked about their intimate details for an audience, I’m going to claim this blog is a vital part of my personhood so that I can deny them the right to privacy.”
The oversharing is a huge part of this book. There are so many sexual details. SO MANY SEXUAL DETAILS. I’m a very nosy Scorpio and even I DON’T NEED TO KNOW ALL OF THIS.
This is a really complicated book for me to talk about because yay therapy, but I think this therapist is ethically questionable and I think the author, according to the abovementioned mommy blogger scandal, doesn’t draw boundaries effectively. This one gave me an icky feeling and it’s not one I would recommend.
Rating: really liked it
“I was afraid of marrying my heart with the scoring that rose naturally between people, the inevitable bumping against other peoples desires, demands, pettiness, preferences, and all the quotidian Negotiations that made up a relationship. Scoring was required for attachment, and my heart leapt the grooves”.
“The deep secret that I carried was that I didn’t belong. Anywhere. I spent half my days obsessing about food and my body and the weird shit I did to control both, and the other half trying to out run my loneliness with academic achievement”.
“For eight years, I’d been a member of a 12 step program that taught me how to eat without sticking my finger down my throat thirty minutes later. My future gleamed before me like grandma’s polished silver. I had every reason to be optimistic. But self-disgust about my stuckness—I was far away from other people, aeons away from a romantic relationship— lodged in every cell of my body. There was some reason I felt so apart and alone, a reason why my heart was so slick. I didn’t know what it was, but I felt it pulsing as I fell asleep and wished not to wake up”.
Christine Tate wrote other books before *Group*
“The No-Homework Women’s Bible Study”, books. I ‘think’ I counted about eight different books she wrote on Amazon.
Was she Christie Tate? So many similarities to Christie Tate
Confused me - a lot!
About the author (I read this on Amazon):
Christine Tate, originally a
midwest native, grew up in the northwest suburbs Chicago.
The only child of a successful floor trader and an Indian farm girl, she was strongly influenced by conservative ‘Bible Belt’. Christian theology. She started college at the age of fifteen and graduated from USC with honors at nineteen earning a degree in Cinema-Television.
After various career experiences and many years of living on the west coast, she met and married the love of her life. From there, she embarked on the travels and adventures that come with being a military spouse.
Christine and her husband have one daughter and are currently station in Virginia Beach, VA. She spends much of her time homeschooling her daughter, writing Bible studies, and being active in church life. She is also a contributing writer to
www.successstory.com and the producer of the annual Virginia Beach Christian Authors festival”
About the author:
*Christie* Tate in the last page of this book I’m holding
“Group” say:
About the Author;
Christy KHS a Chicago-based writer and essayist. She has been published in the New York Times (Modern Love), the Rumpus, The Washington post, the Chicago tribune, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Eastern Iowa Review, and elsewhere. Kiese Laymon selected her essay, “Promised Land” as they winner of the New Ohio nonfiction contest, which was published this fall”.
The two bio’s written about ‘Christine’ and ‘Christie’ are ( and feel), very different to me. Yet there were so many similarities — I was sure they were the same person ....
Another member pointed out that I am wrong about this .
I apologize if I am -
Things still don’t feel right to me - but having debates over it in comments - started to not feel right either —
I wasn’t crazy about this book.
I’m sure there will be an audience for “Group”....it’s Christie’s story.
But the nicest thing I can say about this book...
It left a bad taste in my mouth.
Was this memoir? fiction? nonfiction... or a little of all three?
It felt like ‘all three’....
I lost my interest early on...
This book was nowhere near the enjoyment that
“Maybe You Should Talk to Someone”, by Lori Gottlieb, was for me.
I didn’t find things funny, or terribly miserable. I didn’t get an ounce of pleasure eavesdropping on the others in the group, Christie, or the unconventional doctor, Dr. Rosen.
I didn’t care about who had an orgasm or not.
My favorite sentence:
“All I understood was that my therapist had a Freudian bug up his ass”.
I didn’t have a ton of respect for the following sentences:
A dialogue between Dr. Rosen and Christie:
“If you attach to me- here, in treatment—he pointed toward his dorky shoes— then you will be able to attach to men out there”. He gestured out the window. Assuming we have a healthy attachment, you can use it as a foundation for your romantic relationships”.
“Is it working? I held my palms to my chest”.
“Does a bear shit in the woods?”
2 stars ...
It left a sour taste in my mouth.
Rating: really liked it
I think I’ve mentioned before, self help style books are not my jam. 🤷🏼♀️ So... why do I keep reading them? I’m blaming Reese for this one... 😜 This memoir follows the author through her issues. Primarily around her need to be in a relationship. 😬 I kinda kept hoping she’d come to the conclusion that she can be happy without a partner- but that’s not the message. 🤫 It’s more about being honest with everyone in your life about your issues.
Rating: really liked it
I listened to the Audible version of the book, read by the author.
Memoirs are difficult when the writer comes across as unlikable, more so when that writer narrates her story. I suppose a certain amount of self-importance is necessary to assume one’s life is worth a story, unless you’re someone famous like Michelle Obama or you’ve had an extraordinary life experience or deep insight, none of which applies to Christie Tate. She comes across as privileged and unlikable, but that wasn’t my biggest issue with GROUP.
I don’t recommend GROUP because the therapist is creepy, bordering on unethical. I’ve taken Group Dynamics and Group Therapy courses in grad school and I’ve been in group therapy several times. This therapist and therapy breach so many guidelines and ethics protocols that GROUP is a poor example of group therapy.
I can’t think of a reason to recommend this book.
Rating: really liked it
I can’t really in good faith recommend this book to folks (unless you’re simply looking for non-fic that can be taken with a hefty grain of salt).
This was salacious and entertaining and... honestly kind of iffy.Tate is a crassly funny narrator, and this book presents a no-holds-barred account of her experience with group therapy and coming to terms with traumatic memories and eating disorder recovery. I liked the metaphor of the scored heart that she uses throughout the book. Just like how one scratches hatch marks on pieces of clay that you intend to join together, Tate’s heart is in need of scoring: its slick, unmarred surface is no good for connecting with others’. Hopefully, group therapy—and baring/facing all the gory bits of her life, from childhood pinworms to her present-day sex life—will help with this.
I’d say that my first red flag went up when Tate discussed her first group session, during which she was informed by everyone present that there would be “no secrets”—aka
zero confidentiality. In addition to this, there were other elements that I found a little outrageous and ethically dubious, like how all the clients, Tate included, adhered near-unquestioningly to Dr. Rosen’s bizarre “prescriptions” (e.g., telling a guy she was attracted to that she's a “cocktease,” and getting the words “I hate my breasts” henna-tattooed on her stomach). Again, I’d urge you to take these parts with a HEFTY grain of salt.
And though this book does contain self-help-y components that could—if removed from the context of this book—be of use, I find myself thinking about all the ways I could’ve gotten the message without having to sift through all the parts that made me feel icky.
Lastly, I would like to say that I’m not someone who can divorce a person’s art/writing/work from that person themselves. I didn’t realize that Christie Tate was a mommy blogger who refused to take down posts she’d made about her daughter’s personal life (after her kid saw herself online and asked her mom to stop). BIG NOPE FROM ME. Olive Fellows’ review enlightened me to this fact. (See links below for more info.)
This, coupled with the fact that I don’t always feel 100% good with rating people’s autiobiographical accounts, has led me to decide that I ultimately will not be giving this book a star rating.
Washington Post article by Tate (Jan. 3, 2019), “My daughter asked me to stop writing about motherhood. Here’s why I can’t do that.”
Buzzfeed article (Jan. 4, 2019), “This Mommy Blogger Is Under Fire For Refusing To Stop Writing About Her 9-Year-Old After The Girl Begged Her To”
Little Things article (Jan. 7, 2019), “Mommy Blogger Comes Under Fire For Refusing To Stop Writing About Her 9-Year-Old Daughter”
TW: bulimia, disordered eating, suicidal ideation, witnessing the death of a friend’s parent, not fully consensual sex, mentions of abuse by other group members
Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Canada for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Rating: really liked it
This is a complex review for me!
I got to read this book as an ARC and I was super excited about it since I am first-year therapy graduate student. I think that I was coming at this book from a different angle. The book is from the perspective of a client in therapy, specifically group therapy. Christie is a very successful law student and professional who finds herself in need of help.
My main critique of this book (it is a memoir) was that I really struggled with ethical issues throughout the book. While I think some of the narration is tongue-in-cheek, as a first-year therapy student, I am learning a lot about the importance of ethics and boundaries regarding therapy. Having been in therapy myself for the last 4 years, it is very difficult for me to wrap my head around some of the lines crossed by the therapist and clients.
I am all for authenticity and honest emotions, but many times throughout the book I was confused about how the group therapies (multiple in a given week) were helpful to the clients, especially because they were required to pay so much money for the sessions. I have experienced AA-type meetings, and they are phenomenal for accountability and support - but they are donation based. I cannot fathom asking a client of mine to spend upwards of $900 on group therapy per month.
I landed on 2 stars for this book because I really appreciate the author's honesty and the writing was well done, but as a future therapist, I cannot recommend the book based on the lack of ethics demonstrated in the book by the client's therapist.
Rating: really liked it
Giveaway Win!
I want to start this review off by saying that I don't think traditional forms of therapy are for everyone. I've tried going to therapy and I've tried taking anxiety medication and neither were for me. That does not mean that those things won't work for someone else. Mental health treatment is not a one size fits all type of thing.
For me these are the things that work for ME (these are not recommendations for anyone else)
1) taking time away (a day or two)from everyone (total solitude) to analyze (over think) how I am feeling.
2) Cleaning or organizing my things or the things of friends and family
3) Acupuncture! Its life changing (for me)
That being said I enjoyed the author Christie Tate's journey. Group therapy takes alot of courage and I know that I could not handle it. Christie gives us brutally honest look at her journey from a group therapy non believer to a group therapy lifer. It isn't a linear path, Christie has lots of ups and downs and at various times she wants to quit but she sticks it out.
I entered to win this book not for myself but for my sister. She is a great believer in group therapy and I will be passing this book on to her this weekend.
The Group made me feel uncomfortable and at times my anxiety was triggered but I think it was triggered in a good way.
BUT!
If talk of depression, anxiety, suicide, self harm, disordered eating, sex addiction or cheating may be triggering for you than maybe tread lightly or avoid this book completely. Because of those reasons I won't give a recommendation for this book but I think this book is a really good book that could be helpful for some people.
Rating: really liked it
Group caught my attention after I read a couple of outstanding memoirs titled Maybe You Should Talk to Someone and Good Morning Monster. These two books are both penned by psychotherapists and both landed in my top 5 reads of 2020. I find books like these fascinating—I’ve always wondered about what going to therapy is like. I also find this type of book helpful in understanding some facets of myself. Group, in contradistinction to the other two, is written by the patient; and the patient is not in one-on-one therapy, but group therapy. This gives the reader a whole different view of the psychotherapy world. Furthermore, this particular “Christie-Dr. Rosen world” is probably highly unusual in that the patients are strongly encouraged to tell the group everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) and are under no restrictions in passing what is heard in that room to the whole world. Really? Is that actually legal?
In any event, I enjoyed Christie’s journey, albeit not as much as I enjoyed the two aforementioned titles. Group, while highly engrossing (Christie lets it ALL out), is not as masterfully woven nor as profound. I did not learn as much from this book as from the others. Sometimes it seemed really over the top for a nonfiction narrative. That being said, Group is quite a story of quite a woman and her struggles to have “a normal life.” She desperately wants someone who will love her and start a family with her. I watched her go through boyfriend after boyfriend, disaster after disaster, breakdown after breakdown. Though I can see how other readers might not like Christie, I did. I appreciated her fortitude in following whatever “prescriptions” (things to do, not meds) Dr. Rosen doled out and accepting feedback and empathy from the group. She tried. She really stuck with it and tried. I admired that. I also liked the fact that she realizes that years and years of therapy does not change her hardwiring. She understands that she will always be in danger of slipping back into her ways, but because of Dr. Rosen’s and the other patients’ help over the years she has come to the point where she can both live with yet handle her hardwiring and have “a normal life.” I loved her deep connection with Dr. Rosen and her group mates.
A small criticism is that we really don’t get to know the other people in the book very well, including Dr. Rosen and her most trusty group members. I realize they aren’t the “stars” of the book, but I still would have liked to have known them better.
Overall, I’m glad I picked this one up. The ratings are all over the place so it’s tough to know who will like it and who won’t. I certainly recommend that readers who have any interest in the world of psychotherapy try it though. It’s an easy read and kept my attention throughout.
Thanks to Net Galley, Avid Reader Press (Simon and Schuster), and Ms. Christie Tate for gifting me an advanced copy. Opinions are mine alone and are not biased in any way.
Rating: really liked it
At first I read in horror, the most unconventional approach to therapy I’ve ever heard of. A therapist who doesn’t believe in the novel idea of privacy? Huh? That goes against all my understanding of therapy, I kept thinking what kind of hack is this Dr. Rosen? And then.....! I ended up thinking what kind of genius is this Dr. Rosen! Hallelujah! What a revelation! Maybe this IS the answer we should all sign up for group therapy immediately!! BUT by midway I lost patience with THIS story there was only so much woe is me, tantrums and bad sex stories I can tolerate, the book reads like a laundry list of bad dates and bad energy. I again questioned the ethical boundaries of her therapist, it bothered me, so many moments left me unnerved. Generally I’m all for a forum that allows open honesty and revealing flaws and insecurities in most instances but some details I could have done without. I was sick of everyone pandering to her. Instead of inspiring this book was exasperating and exhausting! I appreciate the idea behind this book and her expelling the benefits of a lifelong commitment to group therapy but this book didn’t convince me enough. I think I need therapy after finishing this book!
Rating: really liked it
Oh wow. Five stars all the way around.
I know that several reviews I’ve read are stuck on the ethics of Dr. Rosen and the way he chooses to practice in his group therapy, but you know what? It didn’t bother me. I see the value in the way he makes everyone uncomfortable and let’s them feel things and get angry and work through it as a team. Having a support system is so important. Having a place to go every week at an exact time to keep the feeling of purpose alive in people who are struggling to feel a purpose is so important. This setting works for some people and doesn’t work for others. Christie made life long friends and has a support system like I’ve never seen before. We could all use that from time to time.
This little therapy memoir made me laugh, made me cry, made me frustrated at times. It also made me wonder if the traditional 1:1 therapy didn’t work for me because I crave a deeper human connection with people rather than just one therapist and me talking about coping skills. Who knows? All I know right now is, this book was such a treat. A glimpse into all of us and our weird emotional struggles and how important it is to be communicative and compassionate towards others.
So, as uncomfortable as some parts were, I think it challenged me to think outside my comfort zone and see a different perspective towards therapy and sharing intimate details of our lives with others we trust in a safe environment. And about the unorthodox prescriptions that helped these people have emotional breakthroughs, I loved them.
10/10 would recommend if you need a good humble laugh about your own mental bullshit and want to feel the messy connection with some hilariously diverse strangers in group therapy.
Also, if you need a reminder that our mental health struggles and successes ebb and flow and that it's always going to be a cycle of figuring out how to steady ourselves and then having the rug pulled out beneath us the next day - this is that reminder. You're not alone, and it's wonderful works of writing like this that we just need sometimes. This was a treasure.Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my advanced reading copy.
Rating: really liked it
Welp so, full transparency here, I have an eating disorder. I used to go to this awesome group a few years ago and now struggling to drag myself to this new group therapy. I tried reading this to find me some motivation to go, but it ended up being an upsetting read for me personally.
Dr. Rosen's therapies are strange and unorthodox and not alike anything you'd find normally. If you have questions about normal group therapy, ask google, your therapist, or myself. -- This book is not about anyone's recovery but about Tate presenting/whining about her sexual journey during a very unusual group therapy. If you're curious about it, great, but know this before you read this:
a real therapist guides and supports. A real therapist helps you see if what you are doing will self-sabotage your happiness. A real therapist will not destroy your autonomy and force you to rely on other people. Tate's Group idolizes a man who does the contrary.
I wrote a very long angry review about why this book was a miss for me and how upset I was while reading it, but I'm just posting the previous paragraph because spilling hate is senseless. So yeah, I'm going to skedaddle out of here now. Bye.
Rating: really liked it
This is difficult to rate because I didn't have any problems with the writing or how the author presented herself as a person, but the whole thing made my skin crawl. Everything Dr. Rosen did felt gross and unethical and over the line. There were so many times when Christie was about ready to quit going to group, and I was like "Good for you! Recognize that this isn't ok!" and then she always went back. I am glad that she ultimately got what she wanted and is in a good place. However, I don't think these "unconventional" methods and the TEN THOUSAND DOLLARS a year, as opposed to a more normal and less creepy group therapy, were necessary to get her there. I genuinely cannot believe this man still has a license to practice. The whole thing seemed like a cult, which the group members make a joke about, but I didn't think it was funny. I'm very interested to see what other people think when the book is released next month (I work at a library and received an advanced copy). Right now it seems like I'm in the minority with my ethical concerns.
Rating: really liked it
“Group: How One Therapist and a Circle of Strangers Saved My Life” (2020) is a candid and remarkable debut written by Christie Tate. The basis of her memoir is the exploration of group therapy that is based on the therapeutic alliance modeled after 12 Step Programs. Tate began group therapy when she was enrolled in law school seeking relief for her addiction and relationship issues. Tate is a practicing attorney in Chicago, with a passion for writing, essay, and blogging-- her award winning writing has been featured in several notable publications including the NYT and Washington Post.
Initially, the idea of group therapy didn’t appeal to Tate. After being recommended by a friend to Dr. Rosen, a Harvard educated psychiatrist, she was impressed with the results of his organized therapy groups. Dr. Rosen would insist that while he honored all forms of patient confidentiality, his therapy groups were based on the fact that secrets were “toxic” and ultimately blocked the healing process. Tate also realized she had been in a 12 Step program previously with Dr. Rosen and actually knew the history of his personal problems! This didn’t faze him in the slightest bit, and he made it clear that all aspects and intimate details of her life would be shared with her assigned group. Tate gave group therapy a try, and her slow healing process began.
The book spans over several unspecified years. It was unclear how Tate realistically managed the two critical parts of her life: her academic studies in law school, with her group therapy. The stories of her peers and lovers were really interesting and how group members worked together with affirmations and phone calls outside their group to support one another; there were noticeably strange questionable "prescriptions" assigned group members by Dr. Rosen. Tate naturally healed over time as she matured, and openly related misteps, periods of insecurity, desperation, and poor relationship choices. However, the idea of being part of costly therapy groups indefinitely may not appeal to some readers, though it was encouraging this form of therapy worked quite well for Ms. Tate. ** With thanks to Simon and Schuster via NetGalley for the DDC for the purpose of review.
Rating: really liked it
Just what the doctor ordered to forget about the pandemic and no electricity- what’s better than reading about someone else’s crazy messed up life! Lots of humor and misery kept me engaged until the very last page!
Group is an engaging and entertaining read. The author goes deep as she brings us with her to group therapy sessions and shows how the difficult process of revealing personal secrets allowed her to develop more intimate relationships.
In this memoir, Christie Tate, a lawyer with an eating disorder and overwhelming feelings of sadness, shares with us her journey as she is faced with thoughts of suicide and then takes the chance to heal by opening up to her therapist, Dr. Rosen, and some strangers in group therapy. Dr. Rosen assigns to Christie some odd tasks and after considerable resistance, she begins to trust him and complies with his unusual requests. Developing a strong sense of self and her quest for intimacy and connection are challenging goals that require continual personal effort and support from the group.
For Christie, the level of trust required to reveal her inner secrets to the other members is overwhelming and painful…
“How do I let the group in? You share with them every aspect of your life that deals with relationships, friendship, family, sex, dating, romance, all of it.”
“Wait what’s going to happen to me when I start group? You’re going to feel lonelier than you ever have in your life. If you’re serious about getting into intimate relationships, becoming a real person, as you said, you need to feel every feeling you’ve been stifling since you were a kid. The loneliness, the anxiety, the anger, the terror…”
As Christie experiences some success in her group therapy she expands participation in additional groups recommended by Dr. Rosen. Developing relationships and becomes increasingly more open, we witness Christie’s personal transformation throughout the book. With openness and humor, Tate shares the breaking down and rebuilding of her self amongst strangers who become trusted friends and her lifeline. I enjoyed Group: How One Therapist and a Circle of Strangers Saved My Life by Christie Tate and recommend it.
Rating: really liked it
I never ever DNF. But I couldn’t read the last 45 pages. I couldn’t endure one more minute of this book. It just oozes self-importance. How many more times are we going to read that you were at the top of your class in law school? How many times were you going to name drop the name of your prestigious firm?
As someone whose life was truly changed by group therapy, I felt like this book was a disservice to therapy as a whole. I expected to read about self-discovery, breakthroughs, and eye-opening approaches to growth. There was none of this. There were groups where people trashed each other, gave awful advice, and just sat around like a bunch of chatty Cathy’s yammering on and on about everything but things that were at the core of their issues. I struggled to find anything poignant in this entire story. Anything that would actually help someone on a quest to healing. Anything that I would even consider relatable. I’m still unsure of what the goal of this book actually is. Again- it all felt like an attempt at self-promotion (mayhaps for that mommy blog we’ve all heard so much about?).
