Izzy

“Often father and daughter look down on mother (woman) together. They exchange meaningful glances when she misses a point. They agree that she is not bright as they are, cannot reason as they do. This collusion does not save the daughter from the mother’s fate.”
― Bonnie Burstow, Radical Feminist Therapy: Working in the Context of Violence

“Later, years later, I would hear a song made of our meeting. [...] I was not surprised by the portrait of myself: the proud witch undone before the hero's sword, kneeling and begging for mercy. Humbling women seems to me a chief pastime of poets. As if there can be no story unless we crawl and weep.”
― Madeline Miller, Circe

“Things that have happened to me that have generated more sympathy than depression

Having tinnitus.
Scalding my hand on an oven, and having to have my hand in a strange ointment-filled glove for a week.
Accidentally setting my leg on fire.
Losing a job.
Breaking a toe.
Being in debt.
Having a river flood our nice new house, causing ten thousand pounds’ worth of damage.
Bad Amazon reviews.
Getting the norovirus.
Having to be circumcised when I was eleven.
Lower-back pain.
Having a blackboard fall on me.
Irritable bowel syndrome.
Being a street away from a terrorist attack.
Eczema.
Living in Hull in January.
Relationship break-ups.
Working in a cabbage-packing warehouse.
Working in media sales (okay, that came close).
Consuming a poisoned prawn.
Three-day migraines.”
― Matt Haig, Reasons to Stay Alive

“We are sorry, we are sorry.

Sorry you were caught, I said. Sorry that you thought I was weak, but you were wrong.”
― Madeline Miller, Circe