SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
By mutual agreement and with some excitement, Jeannie Vanasco's mother, Barbara, moved into the renovated basement apartment of her daughter's home in Baltimore, then began to treat Jeannie with silence.
JEANNIE VANASCO: (Reading) Signs she's avoiding or preparing to avoid me - I open the door off my dining room, call down, Mom, and she doesn't answer, even though I heard her moving around moments ago. She texts two-letter replies, such as OK and no. She locks the door off the dining room. She takes out her trash before sunrise. She stops feeding the squirrels and birds. She keeps her lights off. She keeps her phone off. She stacks cardboard boxes in the laundry room or garage or on the deck. Sometimes she includes a moving checklist with the names of retirement communities hundreds of miles away in Ohio. She writes letters. Her cruelest claims, we never did get along. Her softest reads, I love you, but I think we do better at a distance.
SIMON: Sometimes the silent treatment would last a few days, once for half a year. "A Silent Treatment" is Jeannie Vanasco's new memoir, and she joins us from our studios in Washington, D.C. Thanks so much for being with us.
VANASCO: Thank you so much for having me.
SIMON: What would set off a silence? Or do you know?
VANASCO: I wouldn't always know. And I think that was what was so anxiety-inducing about it, was because I would end up in this loop of thinking, oh, is it because I went to Home Depot without her? Is she upset that my partner and I have COVID without her? I mean, she stopped talking to us at one point. It was, like, a week into my partner and I having COVID. And I thought, OK, surely I didn't do anything wrong there in not giving my 80-year-old mother COVID.
SIMON: You were trying to fill in the blanks.
VANASCO: It was constant. Constant. She would explain it as if this was a very mature thing to do. She would say, I don't want to say something I'd regret. And so for her, it was her removing herself from a situation so as not to cause pain. And so I stopped taking it personally, or I tried not to take it personally. I began to understand, OK, she's doing this for herself. It's a coping mechanism, that kind of retreat.
SIMON: You dedicate the book to your mother. Your mother knew that you were writing this book, right?
VANASCO: Oh, yes. I told her. So the idea for the book came after my mom's six-month period of silence, where I thought, well, that was awful, and maybe it would be interesting to write about. And so I did tell her. I said, I think I found a framing device. Then she said, that - well, that sounds interesting. And I have told her. I said, look, here are some things that are in it. Is this OK? And she's like, Jeannie, I'm old. What do I care what people think? It's your book. It's not my book.
SIMON: Did the silent treatment have the effect of making you think more about your mother?
VANASCO: It had the effect of I felt a lot more empathy for her. I would talk with friends or my therapist, and they're like, why can't you let yourself get angry at your mom? And I was like, well, she's going through such a hard time. And I was thinking a lot more about her and thinking about all the reasons she was inflicting silence and...
SIMON: She had had a rough first marriage, too, right?
VANASCO: Her first marriage was extremely abusive. And so her mother was extremely physically abusive. So I - my mom didn't view the silent treatment as abusive. I brought it up at one point. I wanted to be very cautious about using the word abuse, but I did tell her - I was like, you know, some people say it's abusive. And she said, really? And I was like, yeah. Like, it can be hurtful. And, I mean, some of the research I did - it - they have found that social ostracism activates the same area of the brain that physical abuse activates. And so it does feel - for me, it was one of the most painful experiences of my life. The only comparison I can think of is when my dad died when I was 18. It was extremely painful.
SIMON: You and your mother have the same name.
VANASCO: It's so confusing, yes. So I was supposed to be named Jeannie, and my dad then thought he would be doing something sweet by naming me after my mom. He thought it would be a nice surprise. So while she was asleep, he named me after her. It has caused a lot of problems. We got flagged for voter fraud recently 'cause we have the same name, and we - for a while, we had the same address. My credit score improved because...
SIMON: (Laughter).
VANASCO: ...They thought I opened my first line of credit when I was in preschool. So that - I mean, there was a plus. I mean, I thought it was very funny when, at times, my mom was using the silent treatment. And I'd gotten us gym memberships at this women - women's-only gym near us. And I had asked if I could put a hold on her account, and they were having trouble finding her in the system. And I remember they asked me - they're like, oh, your mom has the same - is listed as the same address. Is that a mistake? And I thought, yes and no.
(LAUGHTER)
SIMON: In a sense, it might be.
VANASCO: Yeah.
SIMON: She left you a very touching note once, after you filed her taxes.
VANASCO: Yes.
SIMON: Your mother wrote, it's all on me, not you. I don't know why I don't communicate. I love you.
VANASCO: I have never been so grateful in my life for my mom to ask me to do her taxes, 'cause I would often do them. Yeah. I mean, that broke a particular silence, and I know she felt awful when it was over. I really think it was beyond her control. This was something she had done throughout her life. It worked for her. And, you know, when a silence was over, I mean, my mom returned to becoming, in my mind, the most wonderful mother in the world. I mean, I love my mom. I just have a - I have accepted that this is something she does, and I am a lot more patient with it. She hasn't done it for a long time now, though, I will say.
SIMON: What's a long time?
VANASCO: More than a year and a half.
SIMON: OK.
VANASCO: Yeah.
SIMON: Did you ever seek professional help for your mother?
VANASCO: When she moved to Baltimore, a doctor had suggested to her that maybe she see a therapist. Like, you know, you've gone through a lot of changes. This is hard. And she shut it down right away. She said, I'm not crazy. So we let it go. And then after the six-month silence, I did suggest to her - I said, look, Mom, there's no shame. And she said, you know, I probably should talk to someone. I should've talked to someone after your father died. And then I was relieved. And then two weeks later, she's like, I'm not seeing a therapist.
SIMON: Yeah. Well, I mean, you...
VANASCO: So...
SIMON: ...Can't - no one can do it for you.
VANASCO: Absolutely. I'm OK with spoilers. I don't think this is a big spoiler, but she moved across the street from me. Like, directly across the street. So it's a straight line from my porch to hers. And I think having her own space made a huge, huge difference.
SIMON: I'm left, among so many other things, thinking, we sometimes tell ourselves we're doing something to avoid hurting someone we love, and then have to get used to the fact that what we're doing because we don't want to hurt them is exactly what hurts them. I don't know how to solve that either.
SIMON: (LAUGHTER)
VANASCO: I have no idea. I have no - I think that's why I turned to writing, to figure out questions I don't know how to answer. But I did write it out of love. So I hope that comes through, especially to her.
SIMON: Jeannie Vanasco - her new memoir, "A Silent Treatment." Thank you so much for being with us.
VANASCO: Oh, thank you so much for having me.
(SOUNDBITE OF ANDREW GIALANELLA'S "ANOTHER YEAR") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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