Journal #9

What I liked about the novel "Ophelia Speaks" was that it was a very relatable and unsensored novel. What I mean by unsensored was that the stories were told directly from the view of different girls, showing their stories and struggles. Some stories made me cry while other stories made me open my eyes, and others made me feel squeemish. For example, one story talked about how a girl took for granted her mother and when she finally lost her battle with breast cancer, she realized how much her mother really meant to her. This story made me cry because she was losing her mother and she didn't really care. Also, all of the stories about eating disorders and self abuse made me feel really squeemish. They went into such detail on how they would starve themselves, or hurt themselves and I found myself thinking how could they do that to themselves. Then there were the stories of how some girls were sexually assaulted or molested. When I read these stories it was sort of eye opening to hear that girl's my age across this country are going through more pain in their teenage years than I would probably never go through in my life time. One, story in particular about how a girl described how her brother raped her made me feel disgusted. I thought to myself, how can a sibling do that to his own sister?
All in all, Ophelia speaks was a very raw unsensored book of the struggles of teenage girls. It brought a sense of awareness to my life and the way I think about how tough being a teenager really is.