2023/154: The Cure for Sleep — Tanya Shadrick

2023/154: The Cure for Sleep — Tanya Shadrick

I went without rest, searching always for ways to escape my self and the pain of living. To slip my skin and merge, forever, with something beyond me. I tried mothering, unpaid acts of service, immersion in cold water, the making of art, and then – lastly, disastrously – I hoped to get lost in love. [loc. 3257]

When Tanya Shadrick was 33 years old, just after the birth of her first child, she suffered an arterial tear and almost died. The experience made her feel that she had to break free from marriage and motherhood: simultaneously, she knew that she had to stay. The Cure for Sleep is her account of making public art, coming to terms with her difficult relationships with her parents (meek mother, absent father, ogrish stepfather) and her loving but perhaps claustrophobic marriage.( Read more... )