WEBVTT - Circle Yes or No 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:03.800 Family Secrets is a production of I Heart Radio. This 0:00:03.840 --> 0:00:08.600 episode contains discussions of suicide. Listener discussion is advised. If 0:00:08.640 --> 0:00:11.240 you are a loved one is struggling with suicidal thoughts, 0:00:11.240 --> 0:00:21.800 please call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline. At three at 0:00:21.800 --> 0:00:24.240 my desk, I sped my beer and straightened my back, 0:00:24.400 --> 0:00:26.840 suddenly aware that I am watching us as a family, 0:00:27.600 --> 0:00:29.680 that I'm about to see what we were like together 0:00:29.760 --> 0:00:32.520 before time had scattered us off into our separate lives. 0:00:33.640 --> 0:00:35.800 Playing on the screen in front of me is evidence 0:00:35.840 --> 0:00:39.040 that we've been together, proof that we existed, with clues 0:00:39.080 --> 0:00:42.960 to our disintegration, the possibility that my memories are to 0:00:43.000 --> 0:00:46.879 whatever degree, real and verifiable. So I watch, hoping to 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:50.160 find answers to questions I hardly have language for about 0:00:50.200 --> 0:00:55.280 who we were during those years that shaped us. That's 0:00:55.320 --> 0:01:00.520 Margaret Kimball, illustrator, lettering artist, and writer, sir of the 0:01:00.600 --> 0:01:04.920 recent graphic memoir and now I spill The Family Secrets. 0:01:06.040 --> 0:01:10.360 Margaret's story is about silence and memory and the powerful 0:01:10.400 --> 0:01:13.199 need to peel back the layers of secrecy and shame 0:01:13.800 --> 0:01:28.680 in order to move forward with grace, strength, and dignity. 0:01:29.840 --> 0:01:33.440 I'm Danny Shapiro, and this is family secrets, the secrets 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:36.000 that are kept from us, the secrets we keep from others, 0:01:36.520 --> 0:01:43.679 and the secrets we keep from ourselves. We grew up 0:01:43.840 --> 0:01:47.920 in Connecticut and Glastonbury, which is a really cute suburb 0:01:48.080 --> 0:01:51.080 of Hartford, and we lived on this little street called 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:55.040 Marthew Drive, and there are all these colonial houses and 0:01:55.080 --> 0:01:57.720 it was a safe street, so we could just kind 0:01:57.720 --> 0:02:01.520 of roam freely around. And there was a little side 0:02:01.520 --> 0:02:04.520 street called Little Acres and we could roam down there 0:02:04.600 --> 0:02:06.880 into the creek and there were some woods and there 0:02:06.920 --> 0:02:09.960 was a field beyond that. It felt infinite to me, 0:02:10.080 --> 0:02:12.600 like when I go back there now, it's like such 0:02:12.600 --> 0:02:16.280 a tiny little street, but as a kid, you can just, 0:02:16.760 --> 0:02:19.280 you know, walking up the entire street felt like this 0:02:19.400 --> 0:02:22.280 giant journey. There was one time where my brother and 0:02:22.320 --> 0:02:25.080 I tried to run away and we went literally, I 0:02:25.080 --> 0:02:27.480 mean probably thirty ft down the road, but we felt 0:02:27.480 --> 0:02:29.840 like we were, you know, miles from home, and my 0:02:29.919 --> 0:02:31.960 dad just stepped on the porch and screamed for us 0:02:31.960 --> 0:02:35.000 to come back home, and we immediately did. It felt 0:02:35.000 --> 0:02:37.800 like we had gone like really far. And it felt 0:02:37.800 --> 0:02:39.360 that way when we went to Little aakres we build 0:02:39.400 --> 0:02:42.400 forts there. There were all these twigs and branches, and 0:02:42.440 --> 0:02:44.880 I remember sitting in our woods actually kind of near 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:47.960 the shed, and just dreaming of tree forts I could build. 0:02:48.320 --> 0:02:51.560 And I loved being in the really tiny woods. In 0:02:51.600 --> 0:02:54.160 the town, there was like a little downtown area so 0:02:54.280 --> 0:02:57.119 near our church, we could ride bikes and go get 0:02:57.240 --> 0:03:00.400 donuts at the little pharmacy. There was a cute restaurant 0:03:00.400 --> 0:03:02.240 called Lotties, which is still there, which I go do 0:03:02.320 --> 0:03:05.400 sometimes when I'm in Connecticut. You know, in many ways, 0:03:05.520 --> 0:03:10.400 it was a sort of visually idyllic childhood. And my 0:03:10.440 --> 0:03:14.160 mom was and is. She's like a very kind woman, 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:18.040 but you know, I remember her as very tired and distracted, 0:03:18.560 --> 0:03:21.720 and I think she was just having three kids. And 0:03:22.639 --> 0:03:25.880 I remember, maybe a little when I was a little older, 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:30.440 like maybe ten, her just constantly talking about this career 0:03:30.560 --> 0:03:32.040 she wanted to have. I think she wanted to be 0:03:32.080 --> 0:03:35.720 an English teacher, and that it made me feel guilty, 0:03:35.840 --> 0:03:39.000 like sorry that I exist, you know, I'm sorry for 0:03:39.160 --> 0:03:42.920 your career. So that's what I think of her. I 0:03:42.960 --> 0:03:45.920 just think of her as like really tired and nice, 0:03:46.520 --> 0:03:50.920 although sometimes very angry, but just like a tired person. 0:03:51.000 --> 0:03:55.960 Who kind of has limited resources to manage that exhaustion 0:03:56.240 --> 0:03:59.320 and her feeling of not having had the exact life 0:03:59.360 --> 0:04:03.080 she wanted. Was how I look at it now? And 0:04:03.160 --> 0:04:07.600 how about your dad? He is a workaholic. He was 0:04:07.920 --> 0:04:11.080 gone all week working, but he would play with us 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:14.960 so much. So I remember on the weekends. There's two 0:04:15.240 --> 0:04:18.400 games that I remember really well. One was I think 0:04:18.440 --> 0:04:21.279 we called it monster, where he'd just like to sit 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:23.920 on the living room carpet and we'd go near him 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:26.200 and he'd grab one of us and then we'd have 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:28.800 to try and escape. It would just go on for hours. 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:32.320 The other game we called Jail, and we'd go to 0:04:33.520 --> 0:04:36.760 one of the local elementary schools. I think button Ball 0:04:36.839 --> 0:04:39.480 was the one that had the best playground, so he 0:04:39.520 --> 0:04:43.479 would chase us around playing tag around the elementary school 0:04:43.720 --> 0:04:45.760 or the playground, and then when we got caught, would 0:04:45.800 --> 0:04:47.640 have to go into jail, and all the kids, any 0:04:47.720 --> 0:04:49.600 kid that was on the playground would start playing, so 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:52.599 he'd be, you know, chasing like ten kids. So I 0:04:52.640 --> 0:04:56.080 remember him playing a lot, which I also feel like 0:04:56.080 --> 0:04:59.000 it's probably not a super fair memory, Like my mom's 0:04:59.000 --> 0:05:01.440 exhausted and tired, and God's just so playful and great, 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:04.520 but I think he was having his own struggles. But 0:05:04.600 --> 0:05:08.960 when we were with him, that's what I remember. Yeah, 0:05:08.960 --> 0:05:13.880 there's so much in your story that really illustrates the 0:05:13.920 --> 0:05:18.320 way that memory plays tricks on us, or sometimes lays 0:05:18.360 --> 0:05:22.360 down tracks like invisible tracks within us that we can't 0:05:22.440 --> 0:05:26.560 really access or don't really know what images or snippets 0:05:26.600 --> 0:05:30.520 of conversation or any of it means until way, way later, 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:34.200 when the pieces of the puzzle sort of fall together. 0:05:36.960 --> 0:05:41.360 Within the idyllic, sweet landscape of Margaret's childhood, there were 0:05:41.440 --> 0:05:45.960 indeed hidden struggles, but as a small child, of course, 0:05:45.960 --> 0:05:50.159 she doesn't see them, even though perhaps she intuits them. 0:05:50.200 --> 0:05:53.239 She adores her older brother and wants to do everything 0:05:53.279 --> 0:05:55.760 he does. Not only do they get lost in the 0:05:55.760 --> 0:05:58.960 woods together and build forts, but when he starts to 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:02.039 ride a bike, she wants to ride one too. When 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:05.760 she's four, she misjudges a corner, falls down, and has 0:06:05.800 --> 0:06:08.840 a pretty bad accident. But this is just one of 0:06:08.839 --> 0:06:13.279 the seminal and destabilizing events that occurred that year. The 0:06:13.360 --> 0:06:20.400 other happens on Mother's Day. That morning, my mom asked 0:06:20.400 --> 0:06:24.880 my dad to take us to church as a Sunday, 0:06:25.000 --> 0:06:27.479 so he did I think I was four, and my 0:06:27.560 --> 0:06:31.240 youngest brother was ten months, and my older brother must 0:06:31.279 --> 0:06:34.960 have been six. So he took us to church, and 0:06:35.120 --> 0:06:37.880 she stayed home and I think kind of spun out 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:40.520 of control and was looking in the mirror and having 0:06:40.560 --> 0:06:44.000 all these really negative thoughts about herself and finally decided 0:06:44.040 --> 0:06:47.320 that we would be better off if she was dead. 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:51.400 And so she had been prescribed something like xanex. I 0:06:51.400 --> 0:06:53.440 don't know if it was actually zanex or something like that, 0:06:53.760 --> 0:06:56.760 some anti anxiety medication. She went up to the shed 0:06:56.839 --> 0:07:00.919 in our backyard and she grabbed a belt to just 0:07:00.960 --> 0:07:03.480 planning to hang herself. But she went to the shed 0:07:04.040 --> 0:07:06.480 and took all the pills. I mean, I think there 0:07:06.480 --> 0:07:09.920 were eleven or thirteen something like that, and then down 0:07:09.960 --> 0:07:14.680 goes in vodka and then immediately became unconscious. And so 0:07:14.760 --> 0:07:20.000 that's where my dad found her after church. You were 0:07:20.040 --> 0:07:25.240 four years old, So what, if anything, do you remember 0:07:25.280 --> 0:07:28.400 about that day. Our shed was kind of up a 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:31.920 little hill and there were these um stone steps that 0:07:32.560 --> 0:07:35.280 just were on a little path back into the woods. 0:07:36.120 --> 0:07:38.560 I remember this picture in my mind of my dad 0:07:38.720 --> 0:07:42.760 carrying my mom across his arms and bringing her into 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:45.800 the house and kind of brushing past me. It was 0:07:45.840 --> 0:07:47.480 like an image in my mind that I just thought 0:07:47.720 --> 0:07:50.360 was maybe fake, or I had dreamed it or something. 0:07:52.800 --> 0:07:56.960 Margaret has a hazy memory of that image from mother's day, 0:07:57.160 --> 0:08:00.840 but never fully knows the context of what happened. The 0:08:00.880 --> 0:08:05.080 details about the pills and vodka and belt those were 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:09.160 unknown to her childhood self. It isn't until fifteen years later, 0:08:09.320 --> 0:08:12.000 when she's nineteen years old, that she received a call 0:08:12.040 --> 0:08:14.960 from her brother who tells her he's just learned from 0:08:15.000 --> 0:08:18.480 their father that their mother had attempted suicide that day. 0:08:19.760 --> 0:08:22.440 And what does she do with that information, what so 0:08:22.600 --> 0:08:24.840 many of us do with what we can't yet handle, 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:34.520 She files it away. You know, one of the things 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:37.920 I often think about about secrets is that only part 0:08:38.000 --> 0:08:40.319 of the challenge when one finds out something that was 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:43.240 a secret is the secret itself. It's also when we 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:45.520 find out what we find out, and whether we have 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:50.240 the the muscles or the ability psychologically, emotionally, spiritually to 0:08:50.600 --> 0:08:54.839 absorb what we're learning. And I mean, to me, so 0:08:54.960 --> 0:09:00.240 much of your story is about this very powerful need 0:09:00.280 --> 0:09:05.479 that comes over you over time to learn and excavate 0:09:05.559 --> 0:09:08.440 as much of the truth as you possibly can. But 0:09:08.480 --> 0:09:11.240 that doesn't happen right away, right. That doesn't happen when 0:09:11.640 --> 0:09:16.160 you're nineteen and you get that information, right. I mean, 0:09:16.200 --> 0:09:18.880 I love the way you're describing that, like the excavation, 0:09:18.960 --> 0:09:23.000 because as you were speaking and I'm thinking that, my 0:09:23.120 --> 0:09:25.439 brother's phone call was like the stone on a pile. 0:09:26.120 --> 0:09:30.960 I was so angry about my mom. When I'm sixteen, 0:09:31.000 --> 0:09:34.600 she attempts suicide again, and I was so angry about 0:09:34.600 --> 0:09:38.200 that because it just seemed like she didn't care about us. 0:09:38.960 --> 0:09:41.679 I don't feel that way anymore, for the record, but 0:09:41.720 --> 0:09:43.839 when he called and told me that, I just kind 0:09:43.840 --> 0:09:46.439 of put it on that pile of anger and just 0:09:46.920 --> 0:09:49.920 I didn't have any way to think about it other 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:52.400 than to say, like, of course, of course that's what happened. 0:09:53.120 --> 0:09:56.080 And then it took me years. I mean, yeah, I 0:09:56.120 --> 0:09:59.520 think fifteen or seventeen years or something to really unpack 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:05.240 was your sense as you grew up that if someone 0:10:05.280 --> 0:10:08.480 had asked you, do you think is your mother depressed? 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:10.600 Or are you worried about your mother? What would you 0:10:10.600 --> 0:10:13.280 have said? As a kid, I would have said, what 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:17.000 is depressed? Did you have a sense that something was amiss? 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:21.079 You know, not until I was ten the first time 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:22.920 that I was aware, she went to the hospital and 0:10:22.960 --> 0:10:25.320 my dad talked to me about it. That's when I 0:10:25.400 --> 0:10:28.320 first became aware of it. Before that, I knew she 0:10:28.400 --> 0:10:34.160 got mad, especially at me. By this time, Margaret's parents 0:10:34.200 --> 0:10:37.080 had been divorced for a couple of years. When Margaret's 0:10:37.080 --> 0:10:39.560 with her mom, she's also on the receiving end of 0:10:39.600 --> 0:10:42.679 her mother's anger. She sent to her room all the time. 0:10:43.440 --> 0:10:47.240 When she's with her dad, she struggles to communicate with him. 0:10:47.280 --> 0:10:49.960 She's pretty sure her dad has a girlfriend, and the 0:10:50.000 --> 0:10:52.920 way she eventually confirms this is by showing him a 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:56.640 piece of paper on which she's written, Dad, do you 0:10:56.679 --> 0:11:01.920 have a girlfriend? Circle? Yes or no? So enough said, 0:11:02.640 --> 0:11:06.320 But in fact, the family's lack of communication stretches much 0:11:06.360 --> 0:11:08.880 further back, all the way back to her mom and 0:11:08.960 --> 0:11:15.600 dad's own secretive histories. You describe your father as someone 0:11:16.160 --> 0:11:19.920 who doesn't know how to put language to feeling, which 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:24.440 really comes from his own history, and you know various 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:28.160 difficult and even tragic things in his own history, his 0:11:28.600 --> 0:11:31.719 sister Peggy drowning at the age of thirteen in a 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:34.640 lake while he was there, and the way that these 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:38.120 things never got talked about. Now that there was this 0:11:38.240 --> 0:11:42.720 kind of silence on both sides of your family, and 0:11:43.880 --> 0:11:49.240 your mother came from a mentally ill mother, but that 0:11:49.360 --> 0:11:52.360 was never talked about. And there's a line in your 0:11:52.360 --> 0:11:56.160 book where you say your forebears want the secrets disappeared, 0:11:56.679 --> 0:11:58.160 Like if you don't, if you don't talk about it, 0:11:58.200 --> 0:12:02.360 then maybe it never happened. I think that's exactly right. 0:12:02.400 --> 0:12:05.199 I think you know secrets sometimes. I think secret is 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:08.920 another word for shame. And I just think my parents, 0:12:09.840 --> 0:12:14.520 in their own ways, feel so much shame over things 0:12:14.520 --> 0:12:18.600 that have happened, and so much disappointment about the way 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:23.400 their lives have unfolded in some ways, and I think 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:29.640 it's too much for them to talk about. Not long 0:12:29.679 --> 0:12:32.800 after Margaret's father circles yes on that slip of paper, 0:12:33.280 --> 0:12:37.440 he marries his then girlfriend Janice. At around the same time, 0:12:37.559 --> 0:12:41.400 Margaret's mother is hospitalized for a second time and diagnosed 0:12:41.400 --> 0:12:46.720 with manic depression. Just before her mother's hospitalization, Margaret notices 0:12:46.760 --> 0:12:48.920 that her mom is buying a ton of jewelry, but 0:12:49.040 --> 0:12:53.880 she can't remotely afford acting completely out of character. As 0:12:53.920 --> 0:12:57.680 time passes and her mom's behavior becomes more erratic, Margaret 0:12:57.760 --> 0:13:00.760 learns to read for signs like this, signs of her 0:13:00.760 --> 0:13:05.600 mother's instability. Her watchfulness becomes part of the texture of 0:13:05.679 --> 0:13:10.040 family life. I think it's it's an education you get 0:13:10.080 --> 0:13:15.240 really quickly. My mom was such a foundational figure for 0:13:15.320 --> 0:13:17.600 me at that point. She was still my best friend, 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:24.040 and I suddenly realized, or thought I realized that she 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:28.400 could disappear at any moment, and so I needed to know, 0:13:28.640 --> 0:13:32.120 like what would the signs be so I could help her. 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:36.880 So I learned pretty quickly, and you know, they stuck 0:13:36.920 --> 0:13:40.959 with me, like later on when she would have an episode. 0:13:41.600 --> 0:13:45.320 I mean, I can recognize it immediately. I think it's 0:13:45.320 --> 0:13:48.960 just something that once you can see those signs, it's 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:51.680 just it doesn't leave you, or at least it hasn't 0:13:51.720 --> 0:13:58.280 left me. We'll be back in a moment with more 0:13:58.320 --> 0:14:12.199 family secrets. When Margaret enters the sixth grade, she goes 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:14.960 to a new school, and at first she clocks this 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:18.360 as an ideal time for a fresh start, an opportunity 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:21.520 to peel away from her complicated home life. But the 0:14:21.560 --> 0:14:25.480 complications persist, and now her mom is not the only 0:14:25.520 --> 0:14:29.440 one grappling with illness. Margaret herself develops a number of 0:14:29.480 --> 0:14:35.000 inexplicable physical ailments. In the meantime, perhaps not coincidentally, her 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:38.520 parents are in a custody battle, which her father ultimately wins. 0:14:40.200 --> 0:14:43.920 I remember throwing up a bunch of times in Phitnancy's grade, 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:46.640 and I remember those moments, but I didn't realize that 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:49.160 they had had to end so close together and so 0:14:49.280 --> 0:14:53.360 consistently during that time period, during the gusty battle. So 0:14:54.360 --> 0:14:57.040 they seemed so strange. It wasn't like a headstrip throat like. 0:14:57.080 --> 0:15:02.080 I didn't have anything diagnosable. So I just wondered if 0:15:02.120 --> 0:15:05.400 they were related to the stress from, you know, going 0:15:05.440 --> 0:15:09.280 to psychologists and answering questions about my parents which were 0:15:09.320 --> 0:15:11.800 clearly going to put me into loyalty buyings, and going 0:15:11.800 --> 0:15:14.840 to therapists and talking to them about which house they 0:15:14.880 --> 0:15:18.160 felt safest at, or my issues with Janice. Now I 0:15:18.200 --> 0:15:19.840 just look at it and I'm like, oh, of course 0:15:20.120 --> 0:15:24.200 it was were related, like my getting sick and all 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:28.120 the stress of trying to navigate my loyalty to both 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:32.920 my parents. Your mother and Janice are about as different 0:15:33.000 --> 0:15:35.960 as two women could be in terms of the way 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:39.760 that they live, the way that they run their households, 0:15:39.840 --> 0:15:45.080 um just their energy who they are. First, Janice seems 0:15:45.160 --> 0:15:48.200 really worldly. She read the New York or the New 0:15:48.280 --> 0:15:50.680 York Times. She lived in New York City for a while, 0:15:51.800 --> 0:15:54.240 and she loves art and she loves music, and so 0:15:54.320 --> 0:15:58.480 she seems very cultured and she's fun like she you know, 0:15:58.560 --> 0:16:02.480 immediately subscribed me teen Bop and all the like tween 0:16:02.560 --> 0:16:05.360 magazines that I thought were like amazing, and would buy 0:16:05.360 --> 0:16:09.200 me posters of celebrities like Jonathan Taylor Thomas to put 0:16:09.200 --> 0:16:11.960 on my wall. So she's like cultured, but also loves 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:14.880 pop culture and so it's great. And she loves shopping. 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:18.600 And she seemed to me like a breath of fresh 0:16:18.640 --> 0:16:22.920 air at the time, but soon that breath of fresh 0:16:22.960 --> 0:16:27.400 air feels more like a cold wind. Janice's attitude towards 0:16:27.440 --> 0:16:32.040 Margaret changes. Unlike Margaret's mother, who has a sort of 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:36.200 anything goes approach to house rules, Janice runs a tight ship. 0:16:36.880 --> 0:16:41.720 Spills are not tolerated, some couches are off limits, and 0:16:41.760 --> 0:16:45.160 Margaret and her brothers are banned from the kitchen. I 0:16:45.200 --> 0:16:48.680 mean entirely. They are not allowed to enter the kitchen 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:52.200 of their own home unless Janice is there. As the 0:16:52.240 --> 0:16:55.720 tensions build, Janice and Margaret's father have a child of 0:16:55.760 --> 0:16:59.520 their own, a daughter named Katie, and the divide widens further. 0:17:00.560 --> 0:17:04.560 When Margaret calls Katie her sister, Janice corrects her and 0:17:04.640 --> 0:17:08.960 says she's her half sister. Janice does everything she can 0:17:09.000 --> 0:17:17.560 to keep them apart. That was shocking, um, And you know, 0:17:17.680 --> 0:17:22.440 I wonder if that divide was sort of always there. 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:25.679 Janice married my dad and they had never lived together 0:17:26.000 --> 0:17:29.639 until they got married, and we all had never lived together, 0:17:29.800 --> 0:17:33.080 and so I think she was kind of signing up 0:17:33.119 --> 0:17:36.879 for something and she just didn't have any clue what 0:17:37.040 --> 0:17:40.440 it might be like. And I think my dad didn't 0:17:40.480 --> 0:17:43.320 have any clue of what kind of person she was 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:47.000 to live with. But you know, before Katie was born, 0:17:47.640 --> 0:17:50.240 when they lived there was a year. I think that 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:53.159 they lived together before she was born for maybe two years, 0:17:54.080 --> 0:17:58.439 and the house was immediately filled with Janice's belongings. And 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:00.560 my dad would say, oh, it's because know, I lost 0:18:00.600 --> 0:18:03.040 everything in the divorce or something like that. And I 0:18:03.080 --> 0:18:07.239 remember when she got pregnant, she just started snapping at us, 0:18:07.240 --> 0:18:09.399 and my dad kept saying, Oh, she's just pregnant, you know, 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:12.840 she's just not feeling well. I wondered is it because 0:18:12.880 --> 0:18:16.760 she's pregnant or is it something else? And then when 0:18:16.800 --> 0:18:19.840 we all moved in together, became clear that she just 0:18:20.880 --> 0:18:23.520 you know, had her way of doing things and was 0:18:23.640 --> 0:18:28.040 not really interested in compromising. We weren't allowed to do 0:18:28.040 --> 0:18:31.359 our own laundry, which you know should sound like a dream, 0:18:31.359 --> 0:18:33.240 like I would love to not do my own laundry now. 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:36.520 But it was weird because at my mom's house, you know, 0:18:36.560 --> 0:18:38.439 from the age of ten, she was like, you're going 0:18:38.480 --> 0:18:40.280 to do your own laundry. You're old enough, you know 0:18:40.320 --> 0:18:42.080 how to do it. And then we get to Janice's 0:18:42.080 --> 0:18:43.800 house and all the laundry runs through her. I can't 0:18:43.840 --> 0:18:45.919 use the book. I couldn't. I never once used the machines, 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:49.160 and I don't even know what they looked like. And 0:18:49.200 --> 0:18:53.480 again the silence and the way that things don't get 0:18:53.960 --> 0:18:58.880 really talked about or get um sort of underplayed by 0:18:59.040 --> 0:19:01.800 your fathers like that's just how that's how she is, 0:19:01.920 --> 0:19:07.560 or making excuses until it reaches a point where you're 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:12.840 a senior in high school and that's the year that 0:19:14.000 --> 0:19:19.200 your mom makes another suicide attempt, and it's also the 0:19:19.280 --> 0:19:24.360 year that your dad and Janice split up. Yeah, Janis 0:19:24.400 --> 0:19:28.240 and I thought almost the entire time. But the fights 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:32.400 were never productive, and they, I don't think ever really 0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:40.280 addressed the underlying issues, which probably required a lot of therapy. 0:19:40.359 --> 0:19:42.320 For her to deal with her childhood is use whatever 0:19:42.359 --> 0:19:45.359 they might be, and then for me to try and 0:19:45.480 --> 0:19:49.080 understand why she was the way she was. So yeah, 0:19:49.119 --> 0:19:51.760 of course, eventually in that environment it reaches a fever 0:19:51.880 --> 0:19:56.520 pitch and then everybody disperses, and then my mom, I 0:19:56.560 --> 0:20:01.280 don't know, you know, I had become kind of distant 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:04.400 from her. She moved a bunch of times in that 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:08.600 time period. She moved two or three times, and I 0:20:08.760 --> 0:20:11.120 probably saw her or maybe every other weekend, and so 0:20:11.160 --> 0:20:14.520 I wasn't totally connected to what was happening in her life. 0:20:15.000 --> 0:20:17.240 And when I talked to her at one point and 0:20:17.240 --> 0:20:19.879 realized she was manic, I just said, you know, I 0:20:19.920 --> 0:20:23.800 think you're manic, and she just yelled at me, and 0:20:24.160 --> 0:20:30.239 I didn't agree. Now, Margaret is in her senior year 0:20:30.280 --> 0:20:34.800 of high school, a time usually filled with feelings of freedom, excitement, elation. 0:20:35.520 --> 0:20:39.080 But Margaret's senior year is instead weighed down by the 0:20:39.119 --> 0:20:42.479 heft of Janice leaving her father and her mother's ongoing 0:20:42.480 --> 0:20:47.800 struggles with mental illness. But here is where her resilience 0:20:47.840 --> 0:20:51.480 begins to really take form and shape. She finds comfort 0:20:51.520 --> 0:20:54.399 and therapy where she can safely examine the troubles of 0:20:54.440 --> 0:20:57.880 her family. In addition, she sets off on a number 0:20:57.920 --> 0:21:02.000 of healing expeditions too far away places through landscapes, which 0:21:02.040 --> 0:21:07.280 allow her to physically, psychologically, and spiritually distance herself from 0:21:07.280 --> 0:21:10.600 her family in order to turn inward to heal and 0:21:10.680 --> 0:21:15.919 to grow. I was angry, and I was just trying 0:21:15.920 --> 0:21:18.719 to be okay. So I did a bunch of backpacking trips. 0:21:19.240 --> 0:21:21.520 I took a backpacking trip in high school out to 0:21:22.200 --> 0:21:26.639 around moab Utah for three weeks with Howard Bound, and 0:21:26.720 --> 0:21:30.520 that helped me kind of center myself and feel capable. 0:21:31.040 --> 0:21:33.280 You know, when you're hiking and they say like, well, 0:21:33.280 --> 0:21:34.639 if you break your leg, you're still gonna have to 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:37.280 hike yourself out of here, you know, You're like, okay, 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:39.880 Like I'm gonna really focus. And then the other thing 0:21:40.440 --> 0:21:45.199 during that first backpacking trip was that I realized this 0:21:45.240 --> 0:21:47.399 sounds really morbid, but it was really helpful to me, 0:21:47.440 --> 0:21:50.600 which I was, you know, hiking in the mountains and 0:21:50.680 --> 0:21:53.800 the canyons and feeling like it doesn't matter if I 0:21:53.920 --> 0:21:57.159 die if I fall off the side, because at first 0:21:57.560 --> 0:22:00.159 it was really hard to kind of walk because there 0:22:00.520 --> 0:22:03.120 was like loose rock and it was hurting my ankles 0:22:03.160 --> 0:22:05.919 and I was carrying like a six pound backpack and 0:22:05.960 --> 0:22:09.680 I was really scared. And then I was like, if 0:22:09.720 --> 0:22:14.400 I fall up this mountain and die, the earth doesn't care. 0:22:14.680 --> 0:22:18.080 It just like absorbs my body. And that made me 0:22:18.200 --> 0:22:25.200 feel somehow calmer, Like my life is small and so 0:22:25.400 --> 0:22:28.040 I can figure out what my priorities are and what 0:22:28.119 --> 0:22:30.159 I want to focus on and try and aim for 0:22:30.200 --> 0:22:34.240 that I'm just like a blip and the history of 0:22:34.280 --> 0:22:39.000 the earth, and that smallness made me feel safe and 0:22:39.160 --> 0:22:43.720 like centered. So I took another backpacking trip to Alaska 0:22:44.080 --> 0:22:47.440 in college in a summer between years, I think after 0:22:47.480 --> 0:22:50.600 my freshman year. So that helped me a ton, just 0:22:50.640 --> 0:22:53.760 to kind of feel calm um. And then you know, 0:22:53.920 --> 0:22:56.920 I ignored it until I took a class with Lynn Bloom. 0:22:56.960 --> 0:22:59.560 She's retired now, but she was professor at the University 0:22:59.560 --> 0:23:02.760 of connectict It and she taught the autobiography class there. 0:23:03.240 --> 0:23:05.520 I read all these memoirs and I suddenly was like, 0:23:05.560 --> 0:23:07.639 oh my god, these books are teaching me how to 0:23:07.680 --> 0:23:11.720 live or like giving me guidance that I don't have otherwise. 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:15.520 And so from there I started writing kind of lightly 0:23:15.560 --> 0:23:19.840 about my mom and what had happened, and it just 0:23:19.880 --> 0:23:22.760 built up over time, and I took more independent studies 0:23:22.760 --> 0:23:25.720 with her and read more memoirs and just kind of 0:23:25.800 --> 0:23:29.240 slowly chipped away at that until I got to grad school, 0:23:29.280 --> 0:23:32.800 and then I really tried to unpack the story as 0:23:32.880 --> 0:23:55.280 much as I could. We'll be right back. So Margaret 0:23:55.280 --> 0:23:58.840 begins to unpack. She's moved by the art of memoir, 0:23:59.359 --> 0:24:01.080 and we realize is that this will be the way 0:24:01.080 --> 0:24:04.800 to ask and hopefully answer the questions that so defined 0:24:04.800 --> 0:24:09.240 her childhood, namely the nature of her mom's illness and 0:24:09.280 --> 0:24:12.240 the reason behind her multiple attempts to take her own life. 0:24:13.320 --> 0:24:16.040 But as is the case when we grapple with family secrets, 0:24:16.520 --> 0:24:20.560 it's a slow and rocky journey. Remember that call Margaret 0:24:20.560 --> 0:24:23.199 receives when she's nineteen and her brother tells her he's 0:24:23.280 --> 0:24:28.520 learned about their mom's first suicide attempt on Mother's Day. Well, 0:24:28.840 --> 0:24:32.639 it takes five years, and it isn't until Margaret's twenty four, 0:24:33.040 --> 0:24:36.159 when she's actively writing the story of her family, that 0:24:36.280 --> 0:24:39.920 she decides to directly ask the questions she needs to ask. 0:24:41.119 --> 0:24:46.800 I didn't have the wherewithal too articulate a question, and 0:24:46.880 --> 0:24:50.200 I didn't feel like I had one. I was angry, 0:24:50.520 --> 0:24:53.959 and I was just kind of like, oh, of course 0:24:54.440 --> 0:24:58.919 she did that. I wasn't empathetic. I wasn't really thinking 0:24:59.000 --> 0:25:01.080 about what it must have been like for her. I 0:25:01.160 --> 0:25:04.800 was just sort of shoving it away and not thinking 0:25:04.840 --> 0:25:07.120 it was anything I had to address or that there 0:25:07.200 --> 0:25:09.679 was any way to address it because it was so 0:25:09.760 --> 0:25:12.000 far in the past. And I'm like, while we survived, 0:25:12.000 --> 0:25:15.600 we're fine. She survived, it's fine, it doesn't matter. While 0:25:15.680 --> 0:25:18.160 also I think always in the back of your mind 0:25:18.280 --> 0:25:22.359