Silent Patient Trauma

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The Silent Patient, a novel that deals with manipulation, possessiveness, and dysfunctional relationships. A mysterious yet instructive novel that teaches the reader about the impact of relationships. Beginning with an early traumatic childhood to adulthood that ends with more trauma. Readers get a sense of the consequences and the trauma that comes along with these negative experiences. In The Silent Patient, Michaelides illustrates the manipulation of women by a misogynistic society through Alicia's relationships with the men in her life. One of the main characters in the novel is named Alicia. She was raised in a traumatic environment, beginning with her mother's suicide while Alicia was in the car with her, and then later on her dad expressing …show more content…

Alicia ended up hating her father and wanting nothing to do with him. But once she heard about the passing of her father, she had a negative reaction to it. In the novel the text states, “After her father died, she took an overdose. pills or something. I can't remember exactly what happened. She had kind of a breakdown (Michaelides, 109).“ This demonstrates that even if Alicia did hate her father, she felt sad about the situation she got put into and deep down she wishes it was different. This added more trauma as a result and caused her to overdose. All of these things that her parents dramatically made Alcia go through and the bad relationships could have greatly impacted Alicia to remain silent and not want to talk. She had severe trauma at an early age, and it only became worse over the course of her life. This can have a huge negative impact on how she is as a person. In the article, Childhood Trauma and Chronic Illness in Adulthood written by Steven Mock and Susan Arai, explains how childhood trauma has a huge effect on a child and will still affect them as they …show more content…

It’s a feeling I’ve always had about Paul, since we were kids. I’ve always failed to live up to his expectations of me that I should be a mothering figure to him(michaelides 33).” This shows the highlight that Paul has high expectations of Alicia and how he wants to be treated by her. His relationship with her is no longer as tight as it once was, instead he only comes around when he needs money. This is since he is confident that she will help him out of feeling remorse. While Alicia was at the Grove, Paul did not visit her at all. Paul was aware of everything that Alicia went through as a child, as well as some of her later traumas. Even then, he did not take time out of his day to do so much as just simply visit her. Tying back to the childhood trauma in adulthood article: When a person goes through childhood trauma, they have long term consequences for their health. Paul was aware that Alicia was silent and not speaking due to the trauma and that she had PTSD. Instead of caring, he chooses his misogynistic behavior of not caring and thinking he is too good to care about her over being a good cousin. This relationship portrays Paul's dominance and power over

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