Before You Met Me is a confessional poetry and prose book that was created in tandem with Agatha's therapist who helped guide her through the healing process. Agatha uses the art of writing as a way to unspool the murky web of memories inside our unconscious minds in an effort to bring them to conscious awareness. Before You Met Me provides insight into the underlying mental health issues that readers encounter but never reveal. The book includes snapshots of decades-old diary entries and authentic written correspondence between the protagonist and her loved ones. These stories were crafted around her own memories and explore her deepest thoughts and feelings, attempting to express the unexpressed.
Before You Met Me is a confessional poetry and prose book that was created in tandem with Agatha's therapist who helped guide her through the healing process. Agatha uses the art of writing as a way to unspool the murky web of memories inside our unconscious minds in an effort to bring them to conscious awareness. Before You Met Me provides insight into the underlying mental health issues that readers encounter but never reveal. The book includes snapshots of decades-old diary entries and authentic written correspondence between the protagonist and her loved ones. These stories were crafted around her own memories and explore her deepest thoughts and feelings, attempting to express the unexpressed.
June 1, 1999
Missing
The blacktop gleamed across the once-desolate road.
It was a typical hot summer day.
Sun
scorching
streets
spent.
Florida temps can be a killer.
Literally.
The housing market was booming.
A once-desolate area.
Many houses are being built
"right on the corner,
by the stop sign."
A red octagon has so much power.
But over whom?
You?
Me?
No.
Them.
Summers were spent in northeast Florida.
Pool swimming.
Disney visiting.
Alligator hunting.
Bible reading.
Crying at night.
I want my mom.
Why did she have to send me away every summer?
First time I flew, I was seven years old.
to where?
Here.
Grandma retired and built a house.
Next door to where her best friend built a house.
Sweet.
They were like sisters.
Except.
Grandma already had nine sisters.
and three brothers.
At times, grandma would venture off next door.
I would sneak.
Through her things.
In the office.
I always had questions.
Where is my father?
Where is my brother?
Who is my grandfather?
But no one ever answered me.
Dead.
I concluded.
Until.
I went through my grandmother's items in her closet one summer.
A box.
Filled with pictures
baby announcements
and other papers.
I recognized the name.
Could that be him?
I decided to hold my breath and ask my grandmother when she came home.
Is that my brother?
Yes, and one day I hope to find him and bring him here, every summer with you.
Find him?
Why was he missing?
I wrote down all of the information in a notepad.
One day I will find him.
Before You Met Me reads like a journal entry. There are pages of actual journal entries, postcards, letters, included, only unfortunately they are very hard to read. If these were transcribed (and then the photocopies included), I think I would have gotten even more out of this book.
This is clearly a very personal narrative, and it makes sense that it was written in conjunction with a therapist. The author had a very difficult childhood, full of death and abuse. She never had an adult that protected her or cared for her, and she describes the abuse fairly vividly.
This is told through prose, which is a great tool for this kind of writing. Even with the fragment sentences, the pain and fear comes through because of how well the author writes.
Her emotions of guilt, despair, depression and fear come through very clearly. This obviously someone who was attached to her grandmother at an early age, but is living with guilt because she chose not to see her grandmother one time and asked for a new bathing suit. While going to get her that bathing suit, her grandmother was killed in a car accident. No one helped this poor girl realize it wasn't her fault, and that accidents happen, and she has been living with guilt for years and years.
The entries are not chronological, which makes it hard to figure out what is when she was very little and when she was a teenager, but the emotion is all the same. She talks of boyfriends needing to understand, cousins and an uncle not understanding some things even though they were family, more death in the family, self-harm and many other things that may be triggering for others. Abortion is mentioned as well as multiple instances of sexual abuse. Overall this is a tough read but it is very well written.