Scattering Ashes: A Memoir of Letting Go

In this blistering account, Rough, an artist and writer, depicts the many difficulties of supporting an elderly abusive parent. In 2001, she invites her ailing, alcoholic mother to move into her Virginia home. Their proximity opens many old wounds in their fraught relationship and forces Rough to confront painful memories of the physical and emotional abuse her parents inflicted on her when she was a child. Rough is unsparing about her complicated feelings of love, hatred, and guilt for her mother, whose more traumatic early home life she gradually learns about, and bravely honest as she examines her struggles to overcome a long-held identification as a victim. In her final years, Rough’s mother is diagnosed with stage four cancer. The pain medication, like alcohol, brings out vicious rages that she focuses on her daughter. Rough has two younger brothers, but they leave her in charge of their mother’s doctor appointments, medications, hospitalizations, and hospice. Only following her mother’s death in 2008 is Rough—now in her 60s—really able to begin a recovery. She initially resists a diagnosis of PTSD but realizes she needs to change long-held patterns and behaviors; trying to find forgiveness for two very damaged parents, she concludes they did the best they could. This is a moving narrative, and one that will ultimately serve a useful guide for families and their caretakers. (Sept.)