“This book is a memoir - not of specific life events, but of the processes of dissociation, and of re-enlivening emotions that are shameful to admit or even to feel. It is an account of the altered states that trauma… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
Some people's lives seem to flow in a narrative; mine had many stops and starts. That's what trauma does. It interrupts the plot. You can't process it because it doesn't fit with what came before or what comes afterwards. — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“How much of what we think of as an admirable response to trauma - the "stiff upper lip" - is actually dissociation, the mind's… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“Here is what I think now, reading what I wrote down for the police at age fifteen, right after I was raped. I was… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“I often feel like nobody," Skip says. "I ask myself: Why would you want to talk to me? Why would anyone want to talk… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“When I asked my father whether he thought that it was possible that his mother was raped behind that closed door, he said, "She… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“My breathe would catch at the sight of violets-so common in the woods at home, so surprising in the mountains. The violet's message was… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“What is courage?" I ask. "Bearing witness. That is a form of courage.” — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
I have listened and I have been quiet all my life. But now I will speak. — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“Why does the threat of violent death alter some of us, even if subtly, forever? Why does it make us unusually numb or calm… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
I will roar argon into chlorine, xenon into fluorine, all the noble gases into reactive ones My lament will terrify even the stars. — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
“After a series of traumas, one can lose the capacity to feel fear appropriately.” — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
Some people's lives seem to flow in a narrative; mine had many stops and starts. That's what trauma does. It interrupts the plot. You… — Jessica Stern Copy Share Image
