Author of the Month Dr. Monica Buchanan on Healing, Resilience, and Writing Through Trauma
In this interview, author Monica Buchanan shares her powerful journey of healing from childhood emotional abuse and neglect. With a PhD in psychology, along with a master’s degree in Women’s Studies, Monica spent her career counselling, coaching, and providing psychotherapy. Now semi-retired, she continues her passion for helping others by developing strength-based community resources for marginalized and underserved communities.
Writing has always been an outlet for her, but turning personal experiences into a memoir was a deeply emotional and transformative process. She opens up about revisiting painful memories, the challenges of sharing such intimate parts of her life, and the healing that followed. We also discuss the importance of self-belief, mindfulness, and her advice for others looking to tell their own stories.
My healing process started in my adolescence years after moving away to another city to attend college. I met a psychologist at the nearby university who helped me.
Monica Buchanan
What inspired you to share your personal journey of childhood abuse and neglect in this book, and how did you work through revisiting those painful memories?
My inspiration to write about my lived experiences with childhood emotional abuse and neglect came from a few defining moments and events. First, as a child I kept a diary. During those early years I realized that when I wrote about my pain and hurt I felt better, lighter and less burdened. Second, in the mid-eighties during my undergraduate degree program when I entered my first Women’s Studies class, a lightbulb went on. I cannot recall who said it or where I read it, but somewhere in that course I heard the phrase “my story is your story too.” I remember thinking: If I write my story, more women will be inclined to open up and speak and write their stories of early abuse and neglect within their families.
Revisiting memories of my childhood abuse was painful. It was re-traumatizing and I had to focus on the need to forgive and let go. I had to let go of the desire to hold on to resentment towards my family for the pain they inflicted on me. This was very hard to do.
You mention that childhood abuse and neglect don’t have to result in a lifetime of pain. Could you share more about the process of healing that you’ve experienced and how others can start their own healing journey?
Honestly, I believe that we can all garner strength and grow from painful experiences in our lives. The way I see it, when we become aware that we have been abused and that all our suffering was not our fault, we are at the fork where we can make choices. We can make the decision to wallow in the painful past, feel sorry for ourselves, and remain stuck, or we can decide to heal and grow. I chose the latter.
My healing process started in my adolescence years after moving away to another city to attend college. I met a psychologist at the nearby university who helped me. She told me that none of the earlier childhood abuse and neglect I experienced was my fault. I believed her. From that moment I treasured those words in my consciousness. Of course, my growth was not smooth sailing. I continued to make mistakes and stumble along the way, but I knew I was going to be fine. My sense of self was assured by that early encounter and I started believing in myself.
Survivors can start by (1) seeking out intervention and support (for example, most local counselling centres offer free resources; YouTube videos and libraries are great resources too), (2) embracing a resounding sense of belief in oneself, and (3) accepting that the abuse was not your fault and that the adults did not protect you.
I strongly believe that all survivors can embark on their own healing path. Healing looks different for everyone. Survivors’ development pathways have been altered by selfish adults who did not protect them. The pace also looks and feels different for everyone. I encourage all individuals to start where they are at. The moment, space, and time when they become aware that they have been wronged in their childhood is where they need to start the healing process.
Your writing blends storytelling with a reflective approach to your experiences. How do you balance sharing such intimate details with making the narrative accessible and engaging for readers?
I consciously use a storytelling meaning-making approach to writing about my lived experience, because this methodology is interactive and engaging. For instance, as the author I invite my audience to join me as I weave through the different stories of my life and make sense of those experiences.
Deciding what to share and what not to share was tough. I don’t have a definitive answer except that I simply decided not to censor my writer’s voice. I trusted my gut feeling and followed my intuition. I decided to suspend judgment from myself and possible judgment from readers. I trusted myself and told my story because that was the story that was meant to be shared.
My writing style is not meant to be prescriptive. I encourage authors writing about tough personal issues to write their manuscript as it emerges and then decide what they wish to share with the outside world. For example, I tortured myself as to whether or not to share about the early childhood sexual abuse, took it out, put it back in, etc. But I weighed the benefits of helping others against my fear of being judged, so it stayed in the final manuscript. My purpose is to help others uncover ugly, dark, and uncomfortable lived experiences in their childhood.
What was the best part of the publishing process?
I loved my publishing experience. I guess mainly because I had a lot of input, a sense of control, including turnaround timelines, editing, and design. I knew that I did not want to feel rushed or have control taken away from me, and that did not happen with Tellwell Publishing. Every step of the way I was in a decision-making position, which worked perfectly for me.
Do you have advice for other authors who feel unsure about writing a memoir and sharing their personal journey?
If I can offer any advice it is this: just write. Do not worry about audience response, the book-marketing process, or fear of negative reviews on social media. Some people are going to like your book and some will not. It is your memoir and if you feel the urge to write it, then do it. I am glad I did. I now use my book in a purposeful way as a tool to show survivors (and non-survivors) who just want to write about their lived experiences how to do it. Whether they turn it into a published memoir or not, the process of writing is empowering and healing in of itself.
In the book, you talk about feeling like an outsider and struggling with low self-esteem. How did you eventually come to realize that those feelings were a result of your environment rather than something inherent in you?
If I was to pick a moment that I became aware that environmental factors were contributors to me feeling like an outsider and to my struggles with low self-esteem, that would be hard. Because there is not a single defining moment when I stopped feeling like an outsider or healed from my struggles with low self-esteem. It has been a lifelong journey.
After my initial therapeutic intervention when I was about sixteen years old, I continued to grow and heal. Formal education, self-awareness, and acceptance that I am OK all contributed significantly to changing the growth landscape for me. Be reminded, though, that traumatic childhood experiences can continue as permanent baggage and creep up on us when we least expect them.
For example, recently a four-year friendship with a male colleague ended abruptly without a goodbye or explanation for the end of the friendship. This was a relationship I had invested in emotionally. I wasted a couple days searching inside myself—what did I do to cause this friend to reject me and refuse to speak to me? What I might have done differently? Blah, blah. Of course, those lines of self-inquiries are directly related to my childhood father’s issues, yet it took me a few days to realize it.
You mention that resources for understanding your experiences were lacking during your childhood. What kinds of resources do you think are most vital for children and adults growing up in similar environments today?
As a child growing up in Jamaica in the sixties there was very little awareness of the lasting impact of emotional abuse and neglect on children. In today’s world there is a lot of information available for adults to stop causing harm to children. In today’s world, people who inflict emotional abuse and neglect (or any form of harm) on children are cruel and selfish. There are, for instance, YouTube videos, web sites, community parenting classes, counselling, and numerous psychological accessible resources. My parents did not have access to such resources, so they did the best they could.
In addition, there are resources for children in libraries, school counselors, recreational clubs, etc. It is important to note that I am not suggesting young children are able to empower themselves in reducing the harmful behaviours of adults. The responsibility lies with adults always for intervention and reductions of harm to children.
Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Some final thoughts. I want to encourage anyone considering writing a memoir to just start writing. Don’t get hung up on whether others will like (or approve) of your story. Think about how you want to release your story (self-publishing, traditional publishing, or oral storytelling). Remember, it is your story that you have lived and so it is your story to tell the best way you deem fit.
