When writing THE WOODEN CHAIR, I drew on my clinical experience as a psychotherapist. Leini, the protagonist in THE WOODEN CHAIR, suffers emotional abuse from her mother, mainly

Although I’ve read a lot about different forms of abuse, emotional abuse is the one that continues to mystify me somewhat. Some of my colleagues say that one form of abuse or another always exists when bringing up a child. If you swat your child on the rump once, it can hardly be called abuse. I’ve come to understand that the severity and frequency of a parent’s behavior doesn’t determine whether it’s abuse or not. If a parent slaps a child in the face so hard the child goes deaf, it is definitely abuse. If a parent shakes a baby so violently, brain damage and death follow, it is definitely abuse.

Mira, Leini’s mother, uses emotional blackmail to make Leini agree to a risky eye operation. Mira’s promises that if Leini is beautiful once her squinty eye has been straightened then Mira will love her. The implication is clear; Mira can’t love her own child if she’s imperfect.

When Leini is about nine years old, Mira again calls her by an ugly name. To Leini, this is once too often. For the first time in her life she dares stand up to her mother, telling Mira her name is not twerp, not brat, never to call her by these names again. From this moment for the rest of her mother’s life Leini calls her Mira.

People often ask from where the title THE WOODEN CHAIR comes. While I was planning the book, one of the working titles was The One-Eyed Girl, which is pretty terrible, I think. As I was continued writing, the title THE WOODEN CHAIR jumped off the page at me. Leini tries to cuddle on her mother’s lap, but finds it hard and uncomfortable, like the wooden chair in their kitchen. The title was right there in mother’s lap. Mira’s unwelcoming arms, her lack of response to Leini’s need for affection constitute emotional abuse. When Mira let’s slip a term of endearment “my baby,” Leini is filled with joy, but doesn’t quite believe she heard right. She asks Mira to repeat what she said. Mira says it again, but leaves out “my baby.” This wouldn’t constitute emotional abuse if it happened occasionally, but Mira speaks words of endearment more by accident, in the presence of other people to make a good impression as the caring mother, never alone with Leini. Mira withholds expressions of love and affection, thus emotionally abuses Leini. She uses blackmail to obtain what she wants Leini to do. As a mother of two now adult children, this kind of behavior makes me shudder.

As is often the case with these children, Leini grows up emotionally needy, afraid to trust people. Her courage is remarkable in that she refuses to perpetuate her mother’s behavior on her own children. Leini gives herself the means to recover from the trauma the abuse has left and to put stop the abuse with her generation.