It would take years—decades, even—to understand that all my relationships perfectly met my low expectations. That it was not bad luck or a curse that doomed me to feel constant loss, but that my beliefs about the world would shape everything around me, that my childhood trauma would render it all as if through a glass, darkly.
I highlighted so many sentences and paragraphs in this book. I related to so much of it I eventually stopped highlighting because it just would've been the whole damn book. We didnt have the beautiful Appalachian woods as a backdrop to our little hell hole, but I did have a grandmas house to escape to and books and school. Only people who have been poor truly understand what it's like, and only people who had abusive parents understand how it shapes you and affects how you see yourself and the world and how hard it is to unlearn. It was hard to read at times, but shes a great writer, and I hope she writes more books.
