By Toni Crocilla PsyD LP CSOTP
“For it seems to me that an apology insists on a most primary intimacy.”
Overview
Eve Ensler (author of the Vagina Monologues) recently published a unique writing endeavor, The Apology, which puts us face-to-face with her suffering from years of physical, emotional, and sexual abuse at the hands of her father in the most interesting way – an apology, from her perspective, but in her father’s words. The first-person accounting is imaginative, as she never did receive an apology from her father regarding his wrongdoings. Part attempt to understand why he did what he did and part attempt to grieve and forgive, Ensler provides a graphic and insightful demonstration of what victims and offenders go through in their healing. The suggestion of the book is that a genuine apology, whether real or imagined in this case, may provide release and closure for victims. She ends her opening page, the only one in the book in her own words, by stating, “This letter is my attempt to endow my father with the will and the words to cross the border, and speak the language, of apology so that I can finally be free.”
Connection to Sex Offender Treatment
The book addresses, sometimes directly, but mostly indirectly, numerous concepts relevant to sex offender treatment, such as apologies, victim empathy, denial, cognitive schemas, minimization, justification, the role of the autobiography, attributing adult behavior to a child, emotional identification with children, behavior chain analysis, and more.
In particular, Ensler focuses most directly on the idea of an apology letter, what it means, and its utility for the victim, as well as the offender. What Ensler provides is not only the writing of an apology letter but her abuser’s qualitative experience of writing the letter itself – the process he went through in determining what and how to say it, including when he was struggling to write it and why. She lays out the inner workings that one must go through in providing a genuine apology, at times including words she probably did not want to hear as well while her father struggled to maintain empathy for her experience.
I have heard it often when providing treatment that offenders just wish they could apologize to their victims, often times without wondering if the victim wants to hear their apology, considering only their own desire to be “free” of the burden if the victim “forgives me.” As somehow the weight will be lifted – maybe it is for some. Ensler makes it clear that the release that may be provided to an offender through an apology requires significant work, insight, and honesty to even come close to obtaining. Ensler writes from her father’s thoughts, “I have asked myself. What is an apology? It is a humbling. It is an admission of wrongdoings and a surrender. It is an act of intimacy and connection which requires great self-knowledge and insight. I will most certainly come up short (p. 9).”
Relatedness to the Good Life Model (GLM) and Self-Regulation Model (SRM)
Although nothing specific about treatment for the offender was mentioned in the text, there are numerous examples and accountings that demonstrate many of the concepts inherent within the Good Life and Self-Regulation Models utilized in many treatment programs. This includes abundant descriptions regarding how her father’s early life shaped his schemas of self and others and molded him into an adult and, eventually, an individual who committed sexual abuse.
As you read the text with your GLM/SRM glasses on, you can see the particulars of the good life elements being impacted or altered for both victim and offender. Although the offender in particular had the means to meet all of his goals, they were flawed, small in scope, and often did not produce a truly meaningful outcome that resulted in a good life. Most, if not all, of his goals were offense-related and centered on the victim for meaning and happiness.
His Avoidant-Passive offense pathway in his early offending quickly evolved into an Approach-Explicit one. He initially tried to avoid thinking about his victim in a sexualized and objectified way, but without very many solid strategies or true desire not to, it did not take long before he actively sought her out and forcefully ensured compliance.
Review
Ensler’s way of writing this imagined accounting, which is based in truth, allows you to hear her father’s voice loud and clear. You can, whether you want to or not, visualize the traumatic events, and, so, there are portions of this book that are not for the faint of heart or those who may have been traumatized themselves.
Overall, I would certainly recommend reading the 112-page account as a treatment provider or as someone who supervises those who have committed sexual offenses; however, I would not recommend it to offenders to read it as a whole. Some of the depictions are extremely (porno)graphic and have the potential to be too arousing or triggering for some. Even so, there are many elements and passages that may be of use in treatment when working on things like forgiveness, empathy, and good life exploration.
For more information on the concept of apologies, please go to RadioLab for an audio entitled “Apologetical.”