My Grandmother’s Hands Review: A Therapist on Racialized Trauma

BOOK REVIEWS • April 09, 2026

LAST UPDATED: APRIL 2026

Opening Sensory Scene

The clock’s soft tick punctuates the quiet hum of my therapy office, where the late afternoon sun filters through the blinds, casting long, warm stripes across the worn rug. Across from me sits Maya*, a woman in her early 40s with an intensity that bristles just beneath her calm exterior. Today, her hands — restless, fidgeting with the edge of her sleeve — tell a story her words haven’t yet fully uncovered.

“You know I’ve been reading that book you mentioned — My Grandmother’s Hands,” she says, voice low, tentative. “It’s… unsettling. But I think it’s why I feel so stuck, even after all these years of therapy.”

I nod, inviting her to say more, watching for the subtle shifts in her posture. Her shoulders tighten, as if bracing against an invisible weight. “Menakem talks about how trauma isn’t just in our minds but in our bodies — passed down from one generation to the next. I always thought my anxiety was just my own. But now I’m wondering if it’s something deeper… something racial, something my family never talked about.”

Her gaze drops to her hands again — the same hands that have clenched and released the fabric so many times this session. “My grandmother lived through Jim Crow. My parents grew up with that fear, even if they never said it out loud. And now, here I am, carrying it without knowing how to set it down.”

In that moment, I remember why I assign My Grandmother’s Hands so often. Resmaa Menakem’s work isn’t just a book — it’s a visceral, body-centered guide to recognizing and healing the unseen currents of racialized trauma that shape our relationships, our communities, and our very sense of safety in the world.

I lean forward slightly. “What parts of the book have stuck with you the most?”

She inhales deeply, a slow, deliberate breath that seems to momentarily uncoil the tension in her chest. “The idea that the body is both the site of oppression and the site of healing. Menakem calls it ‘somatic abolitionism’ — working to dismantle white body supremacy not just in society but within our own nervous systems.”

Her words hang between us, heavy with implication. This isn’t just about personal healing; it’s a revolutionary act against centuries of embodied trauma.

“I noticed he talks about five anchors — specific body-centered practices that help ground us and shift these inherited patterns,” Maya continues, her voice gaining clarity. “I tried the ‘grounding’ exercise last night. Feeling my feet on the floor, noticing the tension in my calves. It was strange but… powerful.”

I smile softly. “That’s exactly the kind of work that helps us reclaim parts of ourselves that trauma has fragmented or silenced. Your body remembers what your mind can’t always access.”

She nods slowly, eyes glistening. “It’s like I’m starting to understand why I’ve felt disconnected from my own family — like there’s this undercurrent of pain we can’t talk about. And how that pain shows up in my relationships — the anger, the mistrust, the exhaustion.”

I reflect on the many clients I’ve seen wrestle with similar invisible burdens — wounds that don’t fit neatly into standard trauma frameworks because they’re woven into the fabric of identity and history. Menakem’s book provides a language for these experiences and, crucially, offers tools for healing that honor the body’s wisdom.

“Thank you for sharing that, Maya,” I say gently. “It’s a difficult path, but you’re not alone in this. Your willingness to engage with this work is what makes transformation possible.”

As our session draws to a close, the light in the room softens. Maya’s hands rest in her lap, steadier now. She looks up, a hint of resolve in her eyes. “I want to keep doing this somatic work. For me. For my grandmother. For the generations after me.”

I know this is just the beginning, but it’s a powerful beginning — one rooted in courage, body awareness, and the radical hope that healing can ripple through time.

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*Name changed to protect client confidentiality.

Review 37: My Grandmother’s Hands — Resmaa Menakem (2017)

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What This Book Is Actually About

At its core, My Grandmother’s Hands is a radical invitation to understand racialized trauma not as an abstract societal problem but as a deeply embodied, intergenerational, and relational phenomenon. Resmaa Menakem reframes the conversation around race and trauma by shifting our focus from solely cognitive or ideological frameworks to the lived experience of the body—the physical vessel where trauma is both stored and, crucially, where healing begins.

In my clinical work, I often see how trauma is passed down silently, lodged in the nervous systems of clients who may not consciously connect their present-day struggles to ancestral wounds. Menakem’s book offers a clinical lens that makes visible what many traditional therapeutic approaches might miss: the somatic imprint of racialized violence and oppression. This isn’t trauma that lives only in the mind or in cultural narratives; it’s trauma encoded in muscle, bone, and breath. Menakem insists that healing racialized trauma demands we engage the body directly.

The premise is deceptively simple but revolutionary: racialized trauma is held in the body, and healing white supremacy requires white bodies to do the somatic work of abolition. This is a marked departure from most anti-racist work, which often centers education, dialogue, or political action without addressing the visceral, physiological experience of trauma. Menakem’s framework is what he calls somatic abolitionism—a practice that acknowledges and disrupts the violent imprint of white supremacy on the nervous system.

The Body as Site of Both Oppression and Healing

Menakem’s clinical perspective is grounded in the understanding that trauma is not just psychological but profoundly somatic. He writes, “White body supremacy has been taught to us through the body and it is through the body that we heal it.” This means that for people of color, especially Black and Indigenous communities, the trauma of racism is etched into the body’s muscle memory. For white people, the same body-centered patterns maintain and perpetuate racialized violence, often unconsciously.

This duality—that the body is both the site of trauma and the pathway to healing—is the foundation of Menakem’s work. He maps how trauma circulates through the body, how it manifests as tension, posture, breath patterns, and automatic survival responses. His approach insists that to dismantle racialized trauma, we must first recognize and experience the ways it lives in our bodies.

Intergenerational Transmission of Racial Trauma

One of the most clinically compelling elements of My Grandmother’s Hands is its focus on how racial trauma is transmitted across generations. Menakem draws on research from epigenetics, trauma studies, and somatic psychology to illustrate how trauma leaves physiological marks that can be passed down—not just stories or behaviors, but actual changes in nervous system functioning and body tension patterns.

For example, Menakem shares how the historical trauma of slavery, segregation, and systemic violence continues to shape Black bodies today, influencing everything from stress responses to relational dynamics. He also highlights how white bodies unconsciously carry the tension of supremacy, sometimes through patterns of defense, control, or dissociation. This transmission is often invisible but palpable in clinical sessions where clients experience unexplainable anxiety, rage, or disconnection rooted in ancestral wounds.

In my practice, I’ve seen clients who struggle with relational trauma that feels “too big” or “ancient” to be explained by their immediate life experiences. Menakem’s work offers a framework to understand these patterns as inherited somatic legacies, which must be addressed at the level of the body to truly move toward healing.

Five Anchors of Body-Centered Healing

Menakem introduces five “anchors” that form the basis of his somatic abolitionist practice. These anchors guide the healing process by helping individuals recognize, feel, and shift the trauma held in their bodies. They include:

1. Sensing – Becoming fully aware of bodily sensations and the ways trauma manifests physically.
2. Shifting – Learning to change tension patterns and release held trauma through movement and breath.
3. Settling – Cultivating a grounded, calm nervous system as a foundation for resilience.
4. Storing – Understanding how trauma is stored in specific body parts and how to work with these areas.
5. Sharing – Creating relational spaces where somatic healing can be witnessed and supported communally.

These anchors are not just theoretical concepts but practical steps that Menakem weaves through the book with exercises and reflections. He encourages readers to practice “body literacy”—developing an intimate relationship with their own somatic experience to interrupt habitual trauma responses.

Clinical Vignette: Embodying Racialized Trauma in Therapy

To illustrate, I recall working with a Black client who came in with chronic anxiety and a fraught relationship with her white family members. She described feeling “on edge” around them, but couldn’t articulate why. Using a somatic approach inspired by frameworks like Menakem’s, we began to explore how her body responded in these interactions: a clenched jaw, shallow breath, and tight shoulders. These were not isolated reactions but embodied echoes of historical trauma—her nervous system was activated by relational dynamics that unconsciously mirrored racialized power imbalances.

By guiding her to sense and shift these bodily responses—through breathwork, grounding exercises, and mindful movement—she started to access a deeper layer of healing beyond cognitive insight. This process also helped her family members recognize their own embodied tension, opening a pathway for difficult conversations about race and trauma that were otherwise inaccessible.

Systemic Implications: Trauma as a Public Health Crisis

Menakem’s work also pushes clinicians and readers to consider racialized trauma as a systemic issue, not just an individual one. The body-centered trauma of white supremacy is a public health crisis that demands collective attention. Recognizing trauma’s somatic roots challenges institutions—therapeutic, educational, and political—to shift from purely intellectual or behavioral interventions toward embodied, relational approaches.

This has huge implications for how we train therapists, design community programs, and engage in social justice work. In clinical settings, it means prioritizing somatic awareness, trauma-informed care, and racial equity not as add-ons but as central components of healing. Menakem’s insistence that white bodies must do the work of somatic abolition is a call to action for white clinicians and clients alike to engage in deep, uncomfortable, but necessary transformation.

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What This Book Gets Right

My Grandmother’s Hands succeeds brilliantly in several key areas that deepen our clinical understanding of racialized trauma and its treatment. Menakem’s integration of somatic theory with anti-racist practice is unlike anything else in the field, and this book is essential reading for clinicians working with clients whose trauma is compounded by race and systemic oppression.

1. The Body as a Primary Site of Trauma and Healing

Many trauma models focus on psychological symptoms, cognitive distortions, or behavioral patterns. Menakem challenges this by putting the body front and center. He writes:

“The body carries the trauma of the past and the present. Healing happens in the body, not in the mind alone.”

This is a crucial clinical insight. In my experience, clients often report feeling stuck in trauma despite “knowing better.” Menakem’s framework provides a way to bypass cognitive defenses and access the nervous system directly, allowing healing to unfold where trauma is literally held.

This somatic emphasis aligns with Polyvagal Theory (Stephen Porges) and Peter Levine’s work on somatic experiencing, but Menakem uniquely situates it within the specific context of racialized trauma and white supremacy. He helps us understand how trauma manifests differently in Black and white bodies, informed by historical and systemic realities. (PMID: 25699005) (PMID: 7652107)

2. Somatic Abolitionism: Radical Healing as Anti-Racist Practice

The concept of somatic abolitionism is Menakem’s most original contribution. It extends abolitionist thought—traditionally focused on dismantling prisons and systems of racial control—to the realm of the body. Menakem argues:

“We cannot abolish white supremacy without abolishing the trauma it holds in our bodies.”

This framework insists that white people must engage their own bodies in healing work to stop perpetuating racial violence unconsciously. It is a call for white embodiment and accountability that goes beyond intellectual acknowledgment of privilege or guilt.

In clinical practice, this means therapists who identify as white must attend to their own somatic responses to racialized stress, bias, and discomfort. Menakem’s work helps clinicians facilitate this process with clients through embodied exercises, enhancing empathy and relational attunement.

3. Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma

Menakem’s discussion of intergenerational trauma is grounded in cutting-edge science yet made accessible through clinical storytelling. He highlights how trauma is encoded in the nervous system and passed down through families, shaping responses to race and authority.

This resonates with epigenetic research showing how trauma alters gene expression and nervous system regulation across generations. Clinically, this helps therapists understand why some clients’ trauma feels “too big” or “ancestral.” Menakem’s framework validates these experiences and offers concrete somatic tools to begin shifting inherited patterns.

4. The Five Anchors: Practical Somatic Tools

The five anchors—Sensing, Shifting, Settling, Storing, and Sharing—offer a clear, actionable roadmap for clinicians and clients. This framework helps translate complex somatic theory into accessible practices:

– Sensing trains clients to notice bodily sensations without judgment, increasing body literacy. This is the foundation of trauma regulation.
– Shifting encourages intentional movement and breath changes to release tension.
– Settling cultivates a nervous system state of safety and regulation.
– Storing invites exploration of where trauma lives in the body, often in muscles or connective tissue.
– Sharing emphasizes relational healing—somatic experiences are best integrated in community or therapeutic relationships.

For example, I assign this book when clients are struggling with race-based relational trauma because the anchors provide simple, effective somatic practices that can be integrated into therapy immediately.

5. Centering Relational and Communal Healing

Menakem emphasizes that somatic healing of racialized trauma isn’t a solo endeavor. Healing requires relational safety and communal witnessing. He writes:

“Trauma stored in the body longs to be witnessed and held in relationship.”

This insight is critical for trauma therapists who work with clients from marginalized communities. It’s not enough to process trauma individually; the relational context must be healing and affirming. Menakem’s approach encourages therapists to cultivate spaces where clients can safely share embodied experiences of race and trauma, fostering connection and validation.

6. Demystifying White Body Supremacy

Menakem’s clear, compassionate unpacking of white body supremacy as a lived, embodied reality is a clinical breakthrough. He reframes white supremacy not just as ideology or policy but as physiological patterns embedded in white bodies. This makes the problem—and the solution—intimately tangible.

This approach avoids shaming or intellectualizing white clients or clinicians, instead inviting embodied curiosity and responsibility. For therapists, this reduces defensiveness and fosters genuine engagement with anti-racist healing.

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In summary, My Grandmother’s Hands gets right what so many clinical texts miss: that racial trauma is held in the body, that healing demands somatic work, and that white supremacy is a lived, embodied force requiring abolition through body-centered practices. Menakem’s somatic abolitionism is a revolutionary clinical framework that transforms how we understand and treat racialized trauma. For anyone committed to deep healing and racial justice, this book is indispensable.

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Next up: I’ll be sharing how to integrate Menakem’s somatic abolitionism into your clinical toolkit and daily life—stay tuned!

What This Book Misses — Or Gets Wrong — For Driven Women

While My Grandmother’s Hands by Resmaa Menakem is groundbreaking in its somatic approach to racialized trauma, it’s important to acknowledge where it might leave driven women like those I work with wanting more, or even feeling a bit stuck. As a therapist who frequently integrates somatic modalities with cognitive and relational frameworks, I approach this book with deep respect — but also a critical eye. Menakem’s work is essential, yet it’s not a perfect fit for everyone, especially for those of us navigating the complexities of ambition, leadership, and relational power in predominantly white spaces.

1. The Narrow Focus on Racialized Trauma to the Exclusion of Other Intersectional Layers

Menakem’s laser focus on racialized trauma in the body is exactly what makes his book revolutionary. However, for driven women who also carry layers of trauma related to gender, class, sexuality, or disability, the singular focus on race can feel a bit reductive. As much as racial trauma is a foundational wound in our society, it’s not the only one shaping a woman’s experience in the body.

For example, many of my clients who are women of color also wrestle with the trauma of sexual harassment, microaggressions in the workplace related to gender, and the exhaustion of navigating multiple marginalized identities simultaneously. Menakem’s book doesn’t delve into how these traumas might interact somatically or relationally with racial trauma. This can leave readers feeling like they need to “choose” which trauma to focus on — which isn’t how healing works in real life.

2. A Lack of Guidance on Navigating White Spaces as a Driven Woman

The book’s focus on “white body supremacy” is essential and urgent. Still, Menakem’s approach is primarily aimed at awakening white readers to their own embodied trauma and complicity. For women of color who are ambitious professionals, the book doesn’t offer enough concrete guidance on how to embody healing while actively engaging in white-dominated professional environments.

I often hear from my clients the tension of needing to adapt their bodies and behaviors to white cultural norms in order to succeed — a somatic survival strategy that’s deeply ingrained and complicated. Menakem’s framework illuminates this, but stops short of offering strategies for managing these dynamics in real-time. For example, how does a Black executive practice somatic abolitionism while also navigating microaggressions in a board meeting? How does she hold her body’s impulses for safety without shutting down or overperforming? These questions remain largely unanswered.

3. The Absence of a Developmental or Lifespan Perspective

Menakem emphasizes the intergenerational transmission of trauma, which is invaluable. However, I wish there was more attention to how racialized trauma manifests and shifts across different life stages. Driven women often face unique challenges at various points: early career, motherhood, midlife shifts, and later stages of leadership.

For example, the somatic responses and relational patterns a woman experiences in her 20s might be quite different from those in her 40s or 50s. Trauma is not static, and neither is healing. Menakem’s model, while rich in the “five anchors” of body-centered healing, doesn’t fully account for these evolving needs or the ways developmental tasks intersect with racialized trauma.

4. The Book’s Tone and Accessibility Might Feel Alienating or Overwhelming

Menakem’s writing blends clinical insight with poetic prose, which is a strength but can also be a barrier for some readers. The book assumes a level of readiness to confront deeply uncomfortable truths about race, trauma, and the body. For women who are already juggling demanding careers and personal challenges, this can feel like an emotional and cognitive overload.

In my practice, I’ve seen that some clients pick up My Grandmother’s Hands and immediately feel both illuminated and overwhelmed. The somatic practices require time, safety, and support — resources not always available to driven women who are time-strapped or lack community. The intensity can trigger secondary trauma or feelings of paralysis without enough scaffolding.

5. The Limited Discussion of Power Dynamics Within Communities of Color

Another critical omission is the book’s relatively limited exploration of power and trauma within communities of color themselves. While Menakem’s focus is on white body supremacy, the reality is that trauma and oppression also play out within marginalized groups, sometimes in ways that replicate or complicate dominant structures.

Driven women of color know all too well how intra-group dynamics can carry their own forms of somatic stress — whether it’s colorism, intergenerational conflict, or internalized oppression. These nuances aren’t deeply explored, which means some readers might feel their full experience isn’t reflected or addressed.

6. A Somatic-Centric Approach That Can Overlook Cognitive and Relational Healing

Menakem’s somatic abolitionism is innovative, grounding healing in the body’s wisdom. However, driven women, especially those who thrive on intellectual engagement and relational connection, may find the lack of integration with cognitive-behavioral or relational frameworks limiting.

In my clinical work, I see that healing from racialized trauma often requires a blend of modalities: somatic work to release held tension and trauma, cognitive work to challenge internalized narratives, and relational work to rebuild trust and connection. While Menakem gestures toward relational healing, his emphasis remains primarily on individual and body-centered work.

This can leave readers wanting more practical tools for communication, boundary-setting, and community-building that are essential for thriving in the real world.

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Clinical Vignette: Navigating These Gaps in Practice

I recall a client, “Jasmine,” a Black woman in her early 30s working in a predominantly white tech company. She found My Grandmother’s Hands deeply validating in naming the somatic patterns she experienced during meetings — the tightening in her chest, the frozen feeling in her legs. But she struggled to translate the book’s practices into her daily life.

Jasmine expressed a need for guidance on how to “show up” in her body authentically while dealing with constant microaggressions and the pressure to perform. She wanted tools to help her regulate her nervous system in the moment of racialized stress, especially when she didn’t have the luxury of retreating to a safe space.

Together, we integrated Menakem’s somatic anchors with practical communication strategies and mindfulness tools tailored to Jasmine’s workplace challenges. This blend addressed some of the book’s gaps, highlighting for me the necessity of multi-layered approaches when working with driven women.

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Systemic Implications: Why These Omissions Matter

Menakem’s work is a call to action — to dismantle white body supremacy at its roots. But for it to be fully effective in supporting driven women, especially women of color, it must be expanded to include the realities of intersectionality, power dynamics, and everyday survival strategies in white-dominated systems.

Ignoring these complexities risks leaving individual bodies to heal in isolation, without systemic change or community support — a known recipe for retraumatization. The book’s brilliance lies in revealing the body as both victim and agent of change, but healing also requires cultural, organizational, and political shifts that Menakem’s framework touches on but does not fully map out.

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Summary: Holding the Book’s Gifts and Limits

My Grandmother’s Hands is a vital text for anyone interested in racialized trauma and somatic healing. Yet for driven women, especially those balancing ambition with the embodied toll of navigating systemic oppression, it may feel like only part of the puzzle.

The book’s deep somatic wisdom, intergenerational perspective, and call for somatic abolitionism are gifts I return to often. But I also urge readers and clinicians to supplement it with intersectional, relational, and developmentally attuned frameworks — and to cultivate communities where the body’s wisdom can be held safely and sustainably.

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The Chapters My Clients Highlight Most

When I recommend My Grandmother’s Hands to my clients, I’m selective about which chapters to encourage them to focus on — and which I suggest they skip or return to later. The book isn’t an easy read, and its somatic practices require a certain level of readiness and safety. Here’s how I guide clients through it, based on clinical experience and feedback.

Chapters I Assign

Chapter 2: The Body Keeps the Score of Race
This chapter is foundational. Menakem clearly explains how racial trauma is stored in the body — a concept many clients find both validating and clarifying. I assign this early because it helps women connect their emotional and relational struggles to an embodied reality. The chapter’s blend of science, history, and somatic insight sets the stage for deeper healing work.

Chapter 4: The Five Anchors of Body-Centered Healing
This chapter lays out Menakem’s practical framework for somatic abolitionism. I assign it because it offers tangible practices clients can begin experimenting with: grounding, centering, and tracking sensations in the body. For driven women who tend to live in their heads, this chapter is a powerful invitation to slow down and listen to their bodies.

Chapter 6: The White Body
I often assign this chapter to clients who identify as white or work closely with white colleagues. It’s a challenging but necessary read that explores how white body supremacy operates on a somatic level. For women navigating predominantly white environments, this chapter opens up space to understand complicity and responsibility without shame.

Chapter 8: The Trauma of the Black Body
For clients of color, this chapter resonates deeply. Menakem’s sensitive and detailed description of the Black body’s trauma and resilience offers a somatic vocabulary that many women have lacked. I assign this chapter when clients are ready to engage with the depth of intergenerational trauma and honor their inherited pain.

Chapter 10: Somatic Abolitionism in Practice
This chapter bridges theory and practice, offering concrete steps for integrating somatic abolitionism into daily life. I assign it toward the end of the reading process — once clients have a basic understanding of the body’s role in trauma and healing. The exercises here, though simple, can be transformative when done with intention.

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Chapters I Suggest Skipping — At Least Initially

Chapter 1: The Personal Story
While Menakem’s personal narrative is heartfelt, I often recommend clients skip this chapter at first because it can feel dense and emotionally heavy. For women already carrying significant trauma, diving immediately into a detailed family history of racial violence can be triggering without sufficient support.

Clients can always circle back to this chapter once they’ve developed some somatic grounding and feel ready to bear the weight of personal and ancestral pain.

Chapter 3: The History of Trauma in the United States
This chapter provides important historical context but can be overwhelming due to its breadth and detail. For some clients, especially those new to concepts of racial trauma, this chapter can feel like a “history lesson” that triggers feelings of helplessness or despair.

Instead, I often provide supplemental historical resources outside of the book that are more digestible or tailored to clients’ specific needs.

Chapter 7: The Blue Body
This chapter, which discusses trauma in police and law enforcement bodies, is critical to the book’s overall argument but can feel distant or less relevant to some clients’ immediate healing work. I usually suggest clients skip this one unless they are directly working with law enforcement trauma or have a specific interest in systemic violence.

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Why This Selective Approach Matters

The somatic work Menakem outlines requires safety and pacing. Driven women often push themselves hard, and reading the entire book front-to-back without integration can lead to overwhelm or dissociation.

By guiding clients toward chapters that illuminate their experience and offer practical tools, I help them build confidence and resilience. Then, as they grow stronger, they can revisit the more challenging material — or explore it in therapy with support.

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Client Feedback on Chapter Highlights

A client named “Elena,” a Latina entrepreneur, told me that Chapter 4’s “Five Anchors” gave her the first tools she’d found to calm her body during moments of racialized stress in business meetings. She said, “It was like learning a new language for my body — something I could actually do instead of just think about.”

Another client, “Maya,” a Black academic, found Chapter 8 validating in ways she hadn’t anticipated. She said, “Menakem put words to the tension and pain I carry — and gave me permission to honor that without guilt.”

These responses reinforce why I prioritize certain chapters: they meet driven women where they are and open pathways to embodied healing.

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Final Thoughts

My Grandmother’s Hands isn’t a book to be consumed all at once. It’s a workbook, a somatic guide, and a call to action that requires thoughtful engagement. By curating which chapters my clients focus on, I help them build a somatic foundation that feels manageable and empowering.

For driven women, this approach ensures the book’s profound lessons don’t become another source of exhaustion, but rather a wellspring of resilience and transformation.

Who This Book Is For (And Who Should Wait)

In my years as a trauma therapist, I’ve learned that timing is everything. Resmaa Menakem’s My Grandmother’s Hands is an extraordinary book, but it’s not for everyone at every stage of their healing journey. This is a deeply embodied, and at times raw, exploration of racialized trauma—specifically how white body supremacy manifests in and through our physical bodies and nervous systems. It’s a must-read for many, but it can also be overwhelming if you’re not quite ready for its intensity or the specific kind of reflection it asks of you.

Who This Book Is For

This book is essential for anyone who is committed to understanding how racial trauma is held in the body and passed down through generations. When I say “anyone,” I mean it in a clinical and systemic sense—not just people of color, but white people as well, especially those who want to dismantle internalized white supremacy and its somatic imprint. Menakem uses the term “somatic abolitionism” to describe a healing process that goes beyond intellectual understanding or social justice activism—it’s about changing what lives in our bodies.

If you’re a driven woman who feels called to deepen your awareness of how race and trauma intersect in your relationships, families, or communities, this book will expand your clinical and personal toolbox. I assign it to clients who are ready to engage with their bodies in new ways—those who’ve already done some trauma work, who can tolerate discomfort, and who are open to slowing down rather than rushing to “fix” things.

Menakem’s approach isn’t about guilt or shame; rather, it’s about recognition and somatic witnessing. He writes:

“We cannot heal what we do not first feel. And we cannot feel what we do not first acknowledge.”

This kind of acknowledgment requires a level of presence and safety in the body that many clients have to build over months or years of therapy. For clients who come from racialized trauma backgrounds—whether as survivors, descendants, or witnesses—this book validates the embodied experience of trauma that often goes unnamed in traditional talk therapy.

Clinically, I’ve noticed that when clients engage with My Grandmother’s Hands at the right time, it can catalyze profound shifts. For example, I worked with a Black client, “Jasmine,” who had struggled with feeling “disconnected” from her family history of racial trauma. After reading this book midway through our work together, she began to notice sensations in her body during moments of racial stress, which helped her regulate and ground herself rather than dissociate or react impulsively. The five anchors—breath, feet, hands, belly, and face—became tools she could use outside of sessions, connecting her to a lineage of survival and resilience. This somatic connection opened new relational possibilities with her family and community, where conversations about race and pain used to feel impossible.

Who Should Wait

On the other hand, I’ve also had clients who’ve picked up Menakem’s book too early in their healing process. Take “Emily,” a white woman in her early 30s, who came to therapy overwhelmed by anxiety and a vague sense of “something being wrong” in her relationships and social circles. She was eager to read everything about race and trauma, wanting to be an ally and “do the work.” But Emily’s nervous system was still dysregulated from childhood trauma unrelated to race; she’d never done somatic or body-centered therapy before. When she dove into My Grandmother’s Hands, the visceral descriptions of racialized pain and white body supremacy triggered intense feelings of shame and helplessness. She felt stuck and confused, and her anxiety worsened.

In session, Emily described feeling “attacked from the inside” by her own body. The book’s invitation to feel deeply and somatically was a double-edged sword for her—it stirred up sensations and histories she wasn’t yet ready to hold safely. This is a common clinical observation: the body-centered approach demands a certain foundation of safety and capacity for embodiment. Without that, it can feel like re-traumatization.

If you’re someone who hasn’t yet developed tools to regulate your nervous system or if you’re in the early stages of trauma therapy, I recommend waiting on this book until you’ve built some grounding. It’s not a reflection on your strength or commitment; it’s about honoring where you are and preventing overwhelm.

Another reason to pause is if you’re looking for a traditional academic text or a purely intellectual exploration of race and trauma. Menakem’s writing is poetic and visceral, often leaning into metaphor and bodily experience rather than clinical jargon or dense theory. That’s a strength for many readers but can be alienating or confusing for those seeking straightforward, step-by-step interventions.

Summary

In short: My Grandmother’s Hands is a transformative read for those who are ready and willing to meet their bodies where racial trauma lives. It’s for clients and clinicians who understand that healing the wounds of white body supremacy requires more than talking—it demands listening to our bodies and learning to feel what has been hidden or denied.

But if you’re early in your trauma journey, still building nervous system resilience, or need a more cognitive approach before diving into somatic work, hold this book close but come back to it later. I promise, when the time is right, it will meet you in profound and healing ways.

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Both/And — This Book Can Be Healing And It Can Be Harmful

There’s a paradox at the heart of My Grandmother’s Hands that I want to unpack carefully: this book can be deeply healing, and yet, for some, it can also be harmful if approached without the proper context or support. As a therapist, I often tell clients that healing is rarely linear or purely positive—it’s a both/and process. Menakem’s work embodies this complexity.

Healing Through Somatic Abolitionism

What Menakem offers is groundbreaking: a way to see racial trauma not just as a social or psychological issue but as one that lives in the body’s very tissues and nervous system. His concept of “somatic abolitionism” reframes racial healing as a bodily practice, where both people of color and white people engage in embodied witnessing and regulation to dismantle white supremacy’s hold on their nervous systems.

One of the most powerful aspects for me is how Menakem refuses to center white guilt or intellectual debate. Instead, he invites readers into the somatic experience of trauma and healing, writing:

“The body is a site of both trauma and healing. It is where pain is held, and it is where we can find relief.”

This emphasis on the body as a site of healing resonated deeply with many of my clients who had long felt unseen or misunderstood by traditional talk therapy. For them, learning to notice their breath, feet, and hands as “anchors” became a practical way to access calm and presence when racial stressors surfaced.

I’ve witnessed clients who, after engaging with this work, develop new capacities for empathy and connection across racial divides—not by talking more but by feeling more. This somatic shift can ripple into their relationships, their activism, and even their sense of identity.

The Risk of Harm Without Support

But—and this is a big but—the same intensity that can lead to healing can also trigger retraumatization or paralysis. Not all bodies or nervous systems are ready for the kind of deep somatic reckoning Menakem encourages. The book’s descriptions of intergenerational trauma, racial violence, and white supremacy’s imprint on the body can feel like reopening old wounds without a clear roadmap for safety.

I’ve seen this happen clinically. One client, “Marcus,” a Black man whose family had survived multiple generations of racial violence, found Menakem’s reflections validating but also overwhelming. Without the stabilizing container of therapy, Marcus felt flooded by the weight of ancestral trauma. The embodied practices felt insufficient to contain the depth of his pain. This underscores the truth that somatic work can’t stand alone—it needs to be integrated into a broader therapeutic and community-based context.

Similarly, for many white readers, the invitation to feel the body’s imprint of white supremacy can provoke defensive reactions, shame, or dissociation—especially if they haven’t yet developed the capacity to hold difficult feelings without shutting down or lashing out. Menakem is clear that this work is lifelong and requires patience, but the rawness of this process may discourage or harm those who expect quick fixes or purely intellectual engagement.

Systemic Implications

Clinically and socially, My Grandmother’s Hands pushes us to reckon with how racial trauma is embedded in systems and bodies simultaneously. It challenges the idea that racial healing is only about changing policies or attitudes. Instead, Menakem insists that healing the body is healing the system.

This is both hopeful and daunting. It means that the work is ongoing and collective. It means that individual therapy, while crucial, isn’t enough to dismantle white supremacy’s reach. We need community, systemic change, and embodied practices all working in concert.

For my clients who are activists or community leaders, Menakem’s book becomes a call to embody abolitionist principles—to bring their bodies into the work of racial justice, not just their minds. This integration can be transformational but requires ongoing care and boundaries to prevent burnout or harm.

Conclusion: A Call for Careful Engagement

The both/and nature of My Grandmother’s Hands is a reminder that healing racialized trauma is complex. This book can open doors to profound somatic insight and liberation, but it also requires respect for each reader’s pace, capacity, and readiness.

If you’re drawn to this work, I encourage you to approach it with curiosity, courage, and care. Seek support from a therapist or community who understands somatic trauma and racialized experiences. Use it as a companion on your healing journey, not a quick fix.

Menakem’s invitation is radical: to feel deeply, to witness honestly, and to heal collectively. It’s an invitation worth accepting, but only when you’re prepared to hold both the light and the shadow that come with it.

Review 37: My Grandmother’s Hands — Resmaa Menakem (2017)

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The Systemic Lens — How This Book Fits the Larger Conversation

Resmaa Menakem’s My Grandmother’s Hands arrives as a pivotal work in the expanding field of trauma therapy by centering on racialized trauma within the body — a topic often sidelined or approached superficially in mainstream mental health discourse. While many trauma frameworks focus predominantly on individual pathology or interpersonal dynamics, Menakem insists on the body as the site where collective, intergenerational racial trauma is stored, enacted, and ultimately, where healing must begin.

In my practice, I often see how racial trauma compounds other relational wounds clients carry. These are not siloed experiences but layers that interact, intensify, and shape a person’s nervous system. Menakem’s work is essential because it explicitly articulates the embodied legacy of white body supremacy — what he terms “white body supremacy” rather than “white supremacy” to emphasize the somatic, lived experience of systemic oppression. This subtle linguistic shift is clinical gold. It refocuses the conversation from abstract ideology to the nervous system’s memory, grounding the political in the physical.

Menakem offers a framework called somatic abolitionism, which expands the abolitionist impulse beyond the dismantling of racist institutions to include dismantling the trauma patterns in our bodies. He writes:

“Our bodies remember what our minds forget. To heal our society, we must first heal our bodies.”

This idea challenges conventional trauma therapy models that prioritize cognitive processing over somatic awareness. It also pushes against the notion that racial trauma is primarily a social or historical issue, spotlighting how trauma literally lives in our tissues, muscles, and autonomic responses.

The book’s clinical value lies in its accessible yet profound description of how trauma is transmitted intergenerationally through somatic cues. Menakem traces trauma down through generations — often through silence, avoidance, or implicit bodily communication — something I witness daily with clients. For example, when a Black client recounts a story of microaggression, the visible signs of autonomic activation (tightened jaw, shallow breathing, clenched fists) often echo the trauma stored from ancestors long before them. Menakem’s framing validates these bodily experiences as not only real but crucial data points in treatment.

The five anchors of body-centered healing he proposes—Feet on the ground, Belly breathing, Hands Ready, Heart open, and Mouth Soft—offer concrete somatic practices that shift the nervous system from survival mode toward regulation and integration. These anchors aren’t just mindfulness exercises; they are radical acts of reclaiming safety and agency in a body historically conditioned to fear and dissociate.

Menakem’s work also deepens the conversation about relational trauma by situating it within systemic racialized trauma. A relational wound between two people doesn’t happen in a vacuum. The racialized body memories each person carries can activate, escalate, or complicate relational dynamics. I often assign My Grandmother’s Hands when I see couples or families grappling with racialized tensions that feel stuck in cycles of misunderstanding or reactivity. The book helps clients understand that their personal conflicts are often entwined with ancestral trauma and systemic oppression, not merely individual failings or communication breakdowns.

The systemic implications of Menakem’s somatic abolitionism are far-reaching. Healing individual bodies ripples outward toward healing communities and, ultimately, institutions. It challenges clinicians, activists, and policymakers to integrate somatic awareness into anti-racist work. Healing the body becomes a radical form of resistance: interrupting patterns that uphold white body supremacy by reclaiming bodily sovereignty and safety.

Clinically, this means trauma therapists must develop fluency not just in talk therapy but in somatic modalities that address the nervous system’s embedded racial memories. As Menakem states:

“We cannot undo trauma that is locked in the body with words alone.”

This calls for a paradigm shift — one that recognizes the body as both a site of oppression and a fertile ground for healing. My Grandmother’s Hands fits into a larger movement toward trauma-informed anti-racist care, making it a foundational text for anyone committed to justice and healing in clinical settings.

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How to Read This Book If You Have a Trauma History

If you have a trauma history—especially involving racialized trauma—My Grandmother’s Hands can be both deeply validating and potentially triggering. Menakem invites readers into a somatic dialogue with their own bodies, asking you to notice sensations, tensions, and impulses that might have been buried or ignored. This process can bring up intense emotions, flashbacks, or discomfort, so it’s important to approach the book with care.

In my clinical experience, I recommend reading this book slowly and with support if possible. Take breaks when you feel overwhelmed. It’s okay to put the book down and return to grounding practices—like the five anchors Menakem describes—to soothe your nervous system. Engage with the material in small chunks rather than rushing through chapters.

One of the most profound gifts of Menakem’s approach is the permission to feel your body’s responses without judgment. If you notice tightness in your chest, a clench in your jaw, or a flutter in your belly as you read, acknowledge these sensations as messages from your nervous system. They are not signs of weakness or failure but signs of resilience and presence.

I often suggest journaling alongside your reading to track your bodily experiences and emotional responses. This can help you process what arises and identify patterns connected to your ancestral or personal trauma.

If you’re working with a therapist, consider sharing passages that resonate or disturb you. This can open a pathway to integrating somatic awareness into your therapeutic work. If you’re new to somatic practices, you might find it helpful to supplement the reading with guided body-based modalities such as sensorimotor psychotherapy, somatic experiencing, or trauma-informed yoga, all of which align well with Menakem’s principles.

Lastly, remember that this book is not about “fixing” your trauma in one go; it’s about learning to live with the legacy of racialized trauma in your body with more compassion and agency. Healing is a process, and My Grandmother’s Hands offers you a map and tools to navigate that journey thoughtfully.

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Related Reading

– van der Kolk, Bessel. The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma. Penguin Books, 2015.
– Carter, Rhea T. Race, Stress, and Resilience: Theory and Research. Routledge, 2007.
– Perry, Bruce D., and Maia Szalavitz. The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog: And Other Stories from a Child Psychiatrist’s Notebook. Basic Books, 2006.
– Ogden, Pat, Kekuni Minton, and Clare Pain. Trauma and the Body: A Sensorimotor Approach to Psychotherapy. W. W. Norton & Company, 2006. (PMID: 9384857)

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If what you’ve read here resonates, I want you to know that individual therapy and executive coaching are available for driven women ready to do this work. You can also explore my self-paced recovery courses or schedule a complimentary consultation to find the right fit.

Medical Disclaimer

Medical Disclaimer