Queenie

Queenie’s mother, aunt, cousin, and grandparents all play prominent roles in the novel; despite their differences, they all care deeply about one another and show love in their own unique ways. As the book follows Queenie’s journey, it reveals how her family has shaped her specific thought patterns. One of Queenie’s obstacles is her inability to talk about her past and express her emotions; this problem is a large factor in her break with Tom and makes her life more difficult, as she can’t share the burden of traumatic experiences, like her miscarriage, with her loved ones. It eventually becomes clear that she learned this repression through her family, who often encourage her to bottle up her emotions. After experiencing her first panic attack, Queenie calls her Aunt Maggie because she’s embarrassed about other people seeing her in a messy, emotional state that she doesn’t consider “normal.” However, Maggie struggles to relate to her:

“Are you under a lot of stress?” Maggie asked, the sentence getting quiet so that by the time she said “stress” she was mouthing it. Jamaicans don’t typically believe in mental health issues. “And have you been praying?” (209).

As Queenie warms up to the idea of attending therapy, her grandmother greatly discourages her: