By Sara Hailstone
Content Warning: Reference to Sexual and Domestic Violence
We carry the stories of our childhood like tattoos, inking our pain or pleasures permanently, sharing or hiding these memories from others and ourselves. I recommend In Spite of all the Damage by Juliet deWal for those of us who think we carry baggage instead of colouring the world with the art of our stories, our lightning tattooed scars. In Spite of All the Damage is a compelling and self-facing narrative offered by an enigmatic protagonist working through the post-trauma of sexual and domestic violence from her stepfather. DeWal’s poignant writing pulls us into a journey with Ivy Jewel, a woman striving for asylum amongst the landmines of faces she runs from, and those warm vessels of love she gravitates to. “Inside of me, there is a trapped animal always waiting to run. I try to be someone better—one of the clean girls, the strong girls. But then, the other self takes over—she is cold and protective and running for her life.” Sometimes, this working through is not dependent on owning our tattoos, but on how others translate those stories as well.
Ivy Jewel is married but she is on the run from her husband, Peter Stone. The perimeters of an intimate relationship with this man are too overwhelming for her. DeWal is remarkable in depicting the essence of a strong man like Peter and how he unequivocally runs with a resisting Ivy Jewel, cementing the power of a love that honours the imperfect shading and outlines of those lightning tattooed scars. They’ve been married a year, yet the love remains unconsummated and restrained. Ivy Jewel is an unprotected character to the continued abuse from her stepfather. She hides these continued attacks from Peter and decides to distance herself from her current life with the hopes of working through her trauma alone.
Peter is willing to journey the path his wife needs to take on her healing. Peter sleeps on floors, camps outside the beach house, and lives in a tent by fires anticipating the final kindle when Ivy Jewel will trust the embrace of a man not trying to own and shape her to him. “I am trying to help you calm yourself down,” is Peter’s view, “I am trying to stop you from making the same damned mistake you’ve made over and over and over again.” We want to believe that we must work through trauma alone, but deWal depicts two emotionally resilient characters triumphing in owning these stories, together.
Author of the Stone Heart Book Series (In Spite of All the Damage, Broken As I Am, We All Fall Down, While My Love Lies), deWal offers powerful texts that show how we can keep our hearts open “in spite of all the damage.” She had once been labelled “Damaged Goods” herself, and In Spite of All the Damage is a heartfelt apology that echoes amongst those with the tattooed scars—how we each carry that fear of the ripple of our stories in those broken places.