In her new book, Imprint: A Memoir of Trauma in the Third Generation, Salt Spring Island author Claire Sicherman braids her family’s past with the emotional and physical impact it had on her.
“The book is basically my attempt at breaking my family’s silence about the Holocaust,” says Sicherman. “I grew up knowing stories about the Holocaust, but other people’s stories, like Anne Frank or other survivors’ stories. It wasn’t really talked about in my family. I knew my grandparents were the sole surviving members of their families and a couple of snippets of what my grandmother would repeat, and that was about it. So after she passed away in 2014, it was a catalyst to explore my grief because she was the last survivor—my grandfather committed suicide many years ago—so it was a chance to explore my family’s history because I didn’t want to forget. I also wanted a way to talk about it with my son.”
With her family’s blessing, Sicherman decided to write about their history. She admits now, however, that the process wasn’t easy.
“I don’t know if it’s possible when you write about trauma to not be living it,” says Sicherman. “It was really hard to be in it and then go to work or pick up my son from school, but, as with anything that you have to go that deep in, you just kind of have to pick yourself up. One of the ways I managed was to just touch into it briefly, allow myself to write for maybe an hour and then go outside or just put myself back in touch with other people, surround myself with the living.”
One of those people is her son, the 11-year-old Ben, an integral part in the memoir.
“I took in a panel about writing about trauma at a conference I was at and it sort of registered that Ben’s birth trauma… he wasn’t breathing when he was born,” says Sicherman. “On the hospital report the word ‘asphyxiation’ was written on it and the link between that and how most of my ancestors were murdered in that sort of way sort of clicked when I was there, so I started writing to and about him.”
Sicherman says trauma is passed down generationally; that, along with the trauma of her son’s birth, became the focus of her story.
“Part of the book is me exploring how trauma is carried in the body. I think that’s probably an important piece, as well. For people who are trying to heal from trauma, I think we have to address the body, as well.”
The book is divided down into four smaller pieces, with the last one focusing on this concept.
“Book four is the journey back into the body,” says Sicherman. “Because so often with trauma, we can get disconnected from it.”
Imprint: A Memoir of Trauma in the Third Generationbook launch
2 pm Sunday, June 10
Free, Congregation Synagogue (1461 Blanshard Street)
clairesicherman.com