Me writing the book and the subsequent interactions that we had were actually the cap on that experience. We were still in this weird purgatory about it when I published the book. When I gave them the galleys and what ensued after that, then I understood a lot more about our relationships and what the experience meant to them. I'd never wanted to know what they thought about it at all.

I could not kick heroin to save my life, literally, until I started telling my secrets. It was some of the clearest evidence I've ever found of anything. It was the only immediate change in behavior I've ever undergone. I told the most frightening truths, and I was free.

I think we all are born inside of our parents' narratives. We stay there for a good while. We are taught their narratives about everything: their marriage, the world, God, gender, identity, etcetera. Then, at some point, our own narrative develops too much integrity to live inside that story. We don't ever fully escape it, but we move into our own stories.

A lot of the experiences I write about could be described as grasping for boundaries, trying to find the limits of things.

Abandonment by a lover won't kill us. But it awakens the parts of us that remember when it could.

I have replaced my instinct for secrecy with an instinct for confession.

Letting go of the cozy stories you've been carrying around is devastating. But there's more room for new stuff after you do it.