ABSTRACT
This story attempts to give insight into how overwhelming and devastating shame is for a teenager’s developing identity. Feelings of self-disgust and a negative body image often express deep psychic wounds which do not always concern the individual in question, but which can be transmitted through intergenerational trauma as well as other unprocessed feelings of a parent. Layla, the main character in this story, becomes the container of her mother’s self-loathing and mental distress. In doing so, she increasingly loses sense of her own identity while she merges with the projected self-hatred and despair. Another theme in this story is how a complex ethnic identity can play into and reinforce feelings of shame and self-deprecation.
