Experiencing and Overcoming Trauma

Joy’s multi-leveled experiences of different sorts of trauma define her identity, define her life and circumstances, and define the story she tells of how she changed all three – identity, life, and circumstances. As her story begins, she is very aware of one level of trauma and its effects – how being abandoned as a baby and raised in a succession of foster homes left her with what seems to be a permanent sense of being lost and unwanted. Several of the relationships she experiences and describes address this aspect of her identity – her affection for Mrs. Neuman, her connection with Marcus, her longing for the boy she once loved (who may have been Marcus), her desperation to resume her relationship with Louis, and above all her search for her mother are all aspects of her attempt to address the deep need to fill...