Did you, by chance, have an unconventional childhood? I suppose we all did, in one way or another, to a greater or lesser extent.

I’d like to tell you about an international bestseller, now available in English, about a boy who’s having an adorably wacky childhood, due to his adorably wacky parents. Here’s a passage from the book describing one of the many unusual aspects of the boy’s home:

“In one corner of the hall, there was a mountain of mail that my parents had tossed on the floor unopened. The mountain was so huge that I could toss myself onto it without getting hurt. Warm and welcoming, it was part of the furniture. Sometimes my father would say, ‘If you’re a bad boy, you’re going to have to open all that mail and sort it!’ But he never made me do it; he didn’t have a mean bone in his body.”

How whimsically lovely! Wouldn’t you have adored living in such a home? And so the boy does.

Waiting for Bojangles is a slim and sweet novel by the French debut author Olivier Bourdeaut. The story’s principal wisdom has to do with the pros and cons of living a carefree life.

That “montagne de courrier” in the hall is indicative of how the boy’s parents live. Who cares about paperwork, when you can dance and drink and have parties and tell fantastical stories? That’s their philosophy, and so they live, for a long time.

But . . . can you see a foreshadowing of desperation and despair in this idyllic picture?

The inquisitive one was having a busy day!

Before work, the inquisitive one went on a run. (The inquisitive one did a speed workout.)

At lunchtime, the inquisitive one took a friend’s dog for a walk. (The friend was out of town and had recruited several people to help care for the dog.)

After work, the inquisitive one took the nephew to soccer practice. (The inquisitive one was helping as an assistant coach.)

“How are you?” said the head coach, when the inquisitive one and the nephew had arrived.

Since the nephew was busy shouting “Watch this!” to another boy, the inquisitive one answered:

“Good! Busy day.”

“What did you do?”

“In the morning, I went on a fartlek run—”

The inquisitive one paused, feeling embarrassed at having said that word while surrounded by 6-year-old boys. But no one seemed to have noticed. So the inquisitive one continued:

“During lunch break, I took my friend’s Shih Tzu on a walk—”

The inquisitive one paused again, feeling even more embarrassed.* But again, no once seemed to have noticed.

It was time for practice to begin, so the head coach said “Cool!” to the inquisitive one and then called out to the young boys:

“Okay, everyone, come over here and sit on your ball!”

All the boys gathered ’round, most sat on their balls, and a few looked attentively at the head coach as he demonstrated how to do a soccer move. Suddenly, one of the boys shouted:

“My name is Poopy Pants!”

All the boys burst out laughing. The head coach continued talking about soccer. He had just quieted them down . . . when the inquisitive one, having reached the last straw in the personal tickle meter, suddenly laughed!

It was a short and loud laugh; and the inquisitive one immediately got very quiet.

Everyone within earshot—young boys, head coach, parents on the sideline, bored siblings—turned and stared at the inquisitive one.

And then, a moment later, and all at once, everyone burst out laughing.

You see, the inquisitive one’s laugh had sounded like a cross between a small dog’s bark, a fart, and a little kid pooping his pants.

And, I mean, that’s funny.

*The inquisitive one could've avoided embarrassment by pronouncing the name of the dog breed correctly.

Today I’d like to share with you an example of the importance of getting the words right. The language we use is immensely consequential in not just how we think about real-world issues, but also how we handle those issues as a society: how much money is allocated, what kind of care people receive, and other important effects.

Bessel van der Kolk, M.D., exposes the faulty language we use surrounding trauma, and then he makes a fascinating argument for a change in the language—with a corresponding change in people’s decisions and actions.

(Note that this blog post is a brief synopsis of and commentary on a long and complicated expostulation. I encourage you to read The Body Keeps the Score to understand and appreciate Dr. van der Kolk’s full evidence and argument.)

Dr. van der Kolk argues that, over the past century or so, there has been a cover-up surrounding the scientifically demonstrated fact that abused children experience detrimental psychological effects. Moreover, he explains, these detrimental psychological effects are not random; there is what he calls a “consistent profile,” which he describes in detail. Not all abused children exhibit the same symptoms (just as, for example, people can experience different symptoms despite being infected by the same virus). However, such children have commonalities such as trouble regulating emotions, trouble concentrating, trouble getting along with others, sleep disturbances, unexplained pain, and doing things like rocking and cutting to relieve tension.

But, Dr. van der Kolk laments, there is no established diagnosis for this consistent profile. Instead, children are being given multiple diagnoses that describe symptoms, not the underlying cause. For instance, many children are being labeled as having “oppositional defiant disorder” or “disruptive mood dysregulation disorder.” As a result, children who desperately need care that addresses trauma are instead receiving care that addresses bad behavior. Such care, since it does not focus on the core problem, does not come close to resolving the core problem.

How did we get ourselves into this predicament of language? Why has there been a cover-up surrounding childhood trauma? Dr. van der Kolk takes us back to the time of Sigmund Freud:

“In 1896 Freud boldly claimed that ‘the ultimate cause of hysteria is always the seduction of the child by an adult.’ Then, faced with his own evidence of an epidemic of abuse in the best families of Vienna—one, he noted, that would implicate his own father—he quickly began to retreat. Psychoanalysis shifted to an emphasis on unconscious wishes and fantasies, though Freud occasionally kept acknowledging the reality of sexual abuse.”

It’s a hard topic. It’s not a great issue to talk about, politically speaking. What would you rather give a public speech on, child abuse or unconscious wishes?

But Dr. van der Kolk gives the reader hope with his historical analysis of another kind of trauma, today known as post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. When governments came to realize that fighting in WWI caused “shell shock,” they worked to hide this fact. Publicizing shell shock would cost money (soldiers experiencing it would need treatment and disability pay) and destabilize the war effort (governments wanted to encourage men to enlist, not emphasize war’s dangers). So WWI veterans were not treated for shell shock. Neither were WWII veterans. The politics during the Vietnam War era, however, were different; and a new diagnosis, PTSD, entered the books and the lexicon. Along with this new language to describe a medical condition came new awareness, treatments, and funding.

There was another huge benefit of the language change. As it turned out, veterans were not the only ones who had this medical condition:

“The adoption of the PTSD diagnosis by the DSM III in 1980 led to extensive scientific studies and to the development of effective treatments, which turned out to be relevant not only to combat veterans but also to victims of a range of traumatic events, including rape, assault, and motor vehicle accidents.”

Dr. van der Kolk argues that we are overdue for a language change in the realm of child abuse. He proposes the term Developmental Trauma Disorder. I am not a doctor and cannot comment on his suggestion with authority. However, I can comment with authority that I have read over and over about falsehoods told for political purposes. I don’t know about you, but I am tired of the fake news. If there is a problem and a solution, let’s name the problem in plain language and implement the solution. Covering up the problem and addressing symptoms never works over the long term. The doctor says it best:

“You would not want to have your appendix removed when you are suffering from a kidney stone, and you would not want to have somebody labeled as ‘oppositional’ when, in fact, his behavior is rooted in an attempt to protect himself against real danger.”

Do you fight for truth in language . . . despite the risk that someone will label you as “oppositional”?

Sleep. That place to which we all disappear for hours at a time. Drifting off. The mysterious and intangible loss of consciousness. The strangeness of dreams. Waking refreshed . . . or not so much.

As a kid, I was scared of the loss of consciousness that is implicit and inevitable in falling sleep. As an adult, I have, at times, felt even more afraid of the continuity of consciousness that is implicit and inevitable in being awake.

The protagonist of the novel My Year of Rest and Relaxation, by Ottessa Moshfegh, falls into the latter camp. She does not want to experience life. She wants to fade away, to live in the darkest shadows, where she cannot be found—not by anyone, and especially not by herself:

“And that was exactly what I wanted—my emotions passing like headlights that shine softly through a window, sweep past me, illuminate something vaguely familiar, then fade and leave me in the dark again.”

The protagonist adores sleep like nothing else in life. That is a very oxymoronic stance to take. Sleeping, she does not exist. Waking, she fetishizes sleep:

“The bed was a king, low to the ground, and whenever I slept in it, I felt very far away from the world, like I was in a spaceship or on the moon. I missed that bed. The stiff blankness of my mother’s eggshell sheets.”

I am currently coming out of a period of “rest and relaxation” myself. Over the past few years, I have experienced a variety of physical and mental health issues that I am treating with wellness activities . . . and prescription drugs. My doctor recently changed the dosages when I explained that I was sleeping too much at night, sleepy throughout the day, and struggling to get things done. The past couple weeks have been a wonderful period of awakening. And yet, I remember the great relief I felt upon descending, initially, into the sleepiness that would rescue me from my ailments.

One could, I suppose, judge those who use drugs that cause them to descend into sleep as somehow lacking in the vitals of life. Perhaps I and Moshfegh’s protagonist—and I may as well add Juliet and Romeo—are poor, broken, creatures who cannot sustain the light of consciousness as naturally given to us. Or perhaps, as in the case of Rip Van Winkle, intoxicating ourselves to sleep is something that just happens to some of us, beyond our control and comprehension.

Are you feeling sleepy?

If you are a writer, you are probably familiar with Anne Lamott, as she is a hero among writers.

If you are not familiar with Anne Lamott, let me introduce her to you. She has a gift for homing in on the nuances of spirituality, anxiety, love, and other topics of great pertinence to our interior selves.

Among writers, she is renowned for authoring a beautiful nonfictional book called Bird by Bird. I read Bird by Bird years and years ago, and it helped me greatly as a young writer. In large part, the book is about seeing more clearly the inaccurate things we writers tell ourselves when we are feeling frustrated and vulnerable. It’s about the writing process, and how to think and go about the writing process in such a way that one does not destroy oneself or abandon the attempt. It’s about how to be gentle with oneself when one is trying to do something very, very hard.

But Lamott doesn’t just write about writing; if you’re not a writer, she has books to offer you, as well. She is a good author to read during hard times. She lifts the reader up; she understands what you’re going through. She doesn’t say too much. She seems to listen. She says just enough. She gives you space to think.

I know two wonderful mothers of very young children. Babies are great . . . but mothering babies is exhausting work. This past December, having noticed a new Lamott book on the bookstore shelf, I knew this was the right gift for each of them.

And then, having given away those two copies, and crossed over from December into January, I realized that it was the right gift for me, too. To me, from me. I checked it out from the library and devoured it: cozy beside her imaginary fire.

This recently published gem is called Almost Everything: Notes on Hope. In the following passage, Lamott references the title, illuminating its significance:

“Some days there seems to be little reason for hope, in our families, cities, and world. Well, except for almost everything. The seasons change, a bone mends, Santa Rosa rebuilds after the fire.”

Hope is the thing we need upon reading the headlines.

Hope is the thing we need in January.

Where do you seek and find hope?