The two novels we read for this blog contained some heavy content and themes, but they are certainly not topics to be shied away from. Both books include a large focus on trauma and the way that those who experience it are forced to deal with it and its consequences on their mind and body as time goes on. In relation to identity, trauma is tough factor to discuss. For those who experience trauma, getting to the other side, where one can process it enough to say, “It’ all just part of my past” is not easy. Traumatic experiences are not something anyone SHOULD have to accept as a factor that makes them who they. Nonetheless, it happens. Physiologically some brains are better equipped to deal with trauma than others, but for many, trauma can act as a huge block; a freeze on the progress of our mind, sometimes stunting one’s physical health. Both Jo’s story in “His Favorites” and Terese’s story in “Heart Berries” act sort of as a trauma narrative in the most formal sense of the term. They each show an important distinction between trauma and identity. Trauma is typically caused by something that happens to the person, unfortunately having to deal with it will influence the person- but the traumatic even itself maintains no bearing on their value or character even if it has shaped their struggles (It may seem silly to have to state, but there is sometimes a stigma on those who have suffered mentally from trauma, and a lack of understanding). To get a very brief and general overview of a trauma narrative, you can click here.
In His Favorites, Jo has a few different things going on. The book begins with her being a factor in, and witnessing her best friend’s death. This sets off a sequence of events that only add to her struggles. Her parents split, her mom moves, and she is shipped off to a boarding school where is she is preyed on and sexually and verbally abused by Master. When she comes forward with her story, no one helps her or believes her. It is this moment that she tells of an anger that she has in her. Through this, Jo manages to maintain a strong clear, mind. That is not say that she didn’t carry the pain of what had happened in her life every day. She had to disassociate at times to protect her mind. It seems she didn’t get the chance to truly tell her story until her early 30s, and it comes to us through the narrative itself. We don’t know if she is talking to a therapist or a detective who is on Master’s trail. Either way it seems like until this moment she had to move ahead in life carrying the weight of what happened to her. It is hard to say how her trauma affected her until then. Though she does tell us “The shadow of the Master” was in her life from the moment he first approached her at the restaurant. What Jo’s trauma narrative does say about her is just how courageous and intelligent she was as a young girl in an impossible situation. She processed it the best she could, she used Master’s critiques of her writing against him in her own narrative. Jo’s story helped her to process her abuse while helping others to see that her identity is so much more than what happened TO her, and allows her trauma to show how strong she was in dealing with it and how little it should be tied to her. While it should be obvious that the identity of Master and the Principle should be tarnished, often when someone goes through trauma, they are left bearing the mark. I think Jo’s story sheds light on the reality of that. In “Heart Berries” Terese’s narrative is less of a flashback and retelling of what happened during her childhood. Instead, she takes us with her on her journey of processing this trauma. It makes sense that Casey is the one she writes much of this narrative to, as many of her buried pieces of abuse from her parents likely came to surface in such an intense romantic relationship. While Jo’s story does a great job of laying out flat that this stuff (sexual abuse etc..) happens, how it happens, Terese offers a view into what it can be like to live with it. She tells us about her “Indian sickness” she has from the culture she grew up in, her abusive tendencies with Casey, and the PTSD she suffers from being molested by her own father as well as the death of her father. Her first examples of love, her parents, were absent and abusive. It makes sense that she would have a confusing and distrustful relationship later on. However, she doesn’t accept it as her identity. With many fall backs along the way she makes things with Casey work and sees a counselor who helps her to cope with memories of her father. She is still working on it when the book ends. Neither Jo or Terese embrace a victim’s stance or focus on how unfair life has been. They turn it around and prove that we are strong who beings who can survive a lot, though not necessarily resilient (nor should we be expecting to be under certain circumstances). When looking at both of these women we can see how trauma gets processed differently among all who suffer it. Even by the end of each book it doesn’t seem that the speakers have fully processed things, but they are moving further along. In telling their stories they provide a raw example of the reality of someone who has to spend their life fighting a battle that should never have been theirs to fight, while providing hope for in others in showing that it is possible. To say that these women are brave in strong in how the processed the pain and faced it is also not to discount those who could not do so as well. Terese says this of the women in her community: “Resilience is one’s ability to endure and recover, and I don’t place much value on the word resilience. So many people did not survive, and they’re no less extraordinary.” (see full articule on why she didn’t use the word “resilient” in her memoir here) I guess the problem with trauma and identity is that we want to focus on the stories of those who overcame and label them as the strong women they are, but we forget to acknowledge that there are certain things in this world that no one is meant to deal with when we think of those who couldn’t overcome. Simultaneously no one’s identity should have to be wrapped up in something that happened to them when they can be so much more and are so much more. What do you guys think about how trauma can influence identity?
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