Working through; The grandmother
In stark contrast to her husband, Mrs Schell seems to be coping much better with the aftermath of the Dresden bombings than Thomas She does not exhibit any physical symptoms such as the aphasia and is to some extent able to live in the present even after her husband leaves her. She is able to forge real emotional bonds with other people and she functions in day to day life. As we continue reading we find out that Mrs Schell is not dealing that well at all, she is merely keeping up appearances, sometimes to not appear weak in front of her husband, other times to stay strong for the people around her whether it be her husband or Oskar. But in reality she not coping well. After she first encounters Thomas in…show more content… Like Thomas grandma suffers from survivors guilt, this guilt it shown troughout several passages in her narrative chapters named MY FEELINGS. We find out that grandma used to collect letters when she was a little girl and even years later she still wonders if her letters were partly to blame for what happened; “Sometimes I would think about those hundred letters laid across my bedroom floor. If I hadn’t collected them, would our house have burned less brightly.”(Foer 83). This is not an isolated instance in the book, we find out in MY FEELINGS lll that grandma had a lot of regrets, she often wishes that she had done things differently and even thinks it might have made a difference. Typical for survivors guilt we find a women that thinks she should have done something…show more content… It’s always necessary. I Love you. (Foer 314) . Also typical for a victim om survivors guilt is the struggling with feelings of unworthiness and self-loathing. We see her self-loathing on almost every occasion that her opinion or advice is asked by Oskar, before reacting she will state that she is not very knowledgeable. But the most striking instance of her self-loathing combined with survivors guilt can be found on pages 231 and 232 ;
When I no longer had to be strong in front of you, I became very weak. I Brought myself to the ground, which was where I belonged (…) I was to selfish to break my hands for my only child (…) I had to go to the bathroom. I didn’t want to get up. I wanted to lie in my own waste, which is what I deserved. I wanted to be a pig in my own filth(…) I wanted so much for it to be me under the rubble. (…) It was as simple as wanting to take his place. And it was more complicated than that. (Foer
