The Unravelling tells the story of Manitoba writer Donna Besel’s pursuit of justice and journey to heal from childhood sexual abuse by her father. Besel focuses on the family destruction and engagement with the courts that follows her disclosure of the abuse. Deft yet unflinching, her narrative contributes significantly to the body of work written by survivors of sexual abuse about their experiences.
After the 1992 wedding of one of her younger sisters, Besel begins disclosing her father’s abuse to her ten siblings. The writer renders the disclosure’s impact with the powerful metaphor of a bomb exploding. After toasts to the couple, dancing and photos,
Wendy and her new husband Bill drove off into the darkness. Thankfully, they were far enough down the road and across the prairie before the detonation. After the honeymoon ended, they returned to a changed family, smoldering, grieving, wounded; no semblance of the happy, bright wedding crowd remained (6).
Speaking about the abuse becomes part of the narrator’s healing process, and she proceeds in stages, or layers of telling: first family, then friends and the small community she grew up in, and finally the legal system. It is an ongoing struggle, as many do not want to hear, and the silence is damaging. Besel comments, “At first, it seemed Warren’s [her husband’s] family would rather have their tongues pulled out than talk to me. It remained unspeakable. Therefore, I felt unspeakable” (75). But Besel persists, explaining to a friend “how it felt like I had been carrying a huge bag of stones all my life. Now, every person I told got a rock” (75). The widespread impact of the abuse is visually underscored by the family tree at the beginning of the book. I found this helpful; in fact, I would have appreciated a diagram that includes friends and other people in the book, as it can be hard to keep track.
Mothering is an important theme in The Unravelling. Also subjected to violence, Besel’s mother had been unable to protect her children from their father. Besel discovers that her father had also abused her five sisters. A vivid metaphor conveys the horror of the abuse:
I saw my family as a litter of snarling, hungry puppies, wanting love and licking. Our mother stood among us, exhausted. Sagging breasts, sagging spirit […] Then along came the old daddy dog. He hated the puppies for being needy and greedy. He taught them to fight and snarl […] But worse of all, the old dog humped and drooled, polluted the pups with his foul breath and foul thoughts (24-25).
When Besel was in her teens, her mother died of brain cancer. Besel writes to her sister Shannon about the lack of mothering that resulted and how Besel herself had assumed the role when she was only fourteen. Other women, including friends, siblings, and support groups, prove important to Besel’s healing. She writes to her aunt to find out more about who her mother was as a young woman, before she met the narrator’s father. Besel also values the belated mothering she receives from a friend and offers to be present when her sister Wendy gives birth.
Besel’s disclosure divides her siblings, and not along gender lines. Some support her quest to bring their father to trial, while others continue to socialize with him and their stepmother. About this, Besel writes, “It reminded me of salmon swimming back to their birthplace, battered and broken, responding to entrenched instincts” (136). Her siblings’ behaviour underscores the extent of the losses experienced by so many when sexual abuse is perpetrated. Although the actions of her siblings cause her pain, the writer’s understanding of and compassion for them is evident.
The legal process is protracted and inflicts its own harm. The case involves two Crown attorneys in succession. The first is sympathetic; nonetheless, the trial is delayed a number of times. The second Crown is hostile and only reluctantly proceeds with the case. Besel’s father’s lawyer argues that the accused is unfit to stand trial due to ill health. When court adjourns during an opportunity to testify about how the trial delays are affecting her, Besel describes a vivid image that comes to her:
I was Alice in the Queen of Hearts’ court, trapped in a serious-looking game, but a game nevertheless. The players did not appreciate spectators and we could not question their moves. We only served as game pieces and we did not matter. They could stop the game or change the rules at whim. It did not count that the game was being played right on top of our lives and we might get trampled (299-300).
Astonishingly, the judge hearing Besel’s testimony asks her why she wants to see the charges pursued. When Besel is unable to respond, he continues, “’Isn’t it enough that the people who love and care about you believe you?’” (307) Besel asks herself rhetorically, “Did he make the same comments to owners of stolen cars?” (307)
Almost three years after Besel begins the process of trying to bring her father to trial, he pleads guilty. She tells us how she learned that this is often a tactic to reduce the risk of the harsher sentence that could result from a trial by jury. Her father is sentenced to only two years of supervised probation, counselling, and no unsupervised contact with children under sixteen. No jail time.
Although Besel’s legal ordeal occurred three decades ago, it is disheartening that survivors of sexual abuse/assault continue to struggle for justice in the Canadian legal system. The Unravelling shows the ripple effect of sexual abuse, which harms not only victims but their families and the larger community. This destruction is wrought not only by the abusive acts themselves but by the unwillingness of many to believe and support survivors and by the inadequacy of the legal process. A tough but valuable read, The Unravelling is a testament to survivor strength, courage, and hope for healing.
The Unravelling: Incest and the Destruction of a Family
by Donna Besel
University of Regina Press, 2021, 380 p.p., $21.95
ISBN: 9780889778436
Janet Pollock Millar is a writer and educator living on lək̓ʷəŋən territory in Victoria, BC. Her work has appeared in publications including Herizons, Prairie Fire, Room, The Ex-Puritan, and The Malahat Review. She works in the Writing Centre at Camosun College. (janetpollock.ca)