How writing about her medical trauma helped Kate Gies reclaim her body
The Toronto author discussed her book, It Must Be Beautiful to Be Finished, on Bookends with Mattea Roach
When Kate Gies was born without her right ear, plastic surgeons vowed to make her "whole" and craft the appearance of an outer ear.
The Toronto author underwent 14 surgeries before the age of 13, many of which failed, leaving permanent scars — both physically and mentally.
Gies shares her harrowing experiences and path to accepting her body through poignant vignettes that form her debut memoir, It Must Be Beautiful to Be Finished.
"Anytime a scalpel goes into the skin, there is a reaction in the body," said Gies on Bookends with Mattea Roach. "So we just have to be careful about our aim and why we're doing things. I know in my case I do feel there was more harm than healing. But that wasn't the intent. The intent was healing."
In It Must Be Beautiful to Be Finished, she examines her old medical files and rehashes her memories to make meaning out of what happened to her and try to understand why different bodies are deemed in need of fixing.
Gies teaches at George Brown College. Her writing has been published in The Malahat Review, The Humber Literary Review, Hobart, Minola Review and The Conium Review. She was also longlisted for the 2018 CBC Nonfiction Prize.
She joined Roach on Bookends to discuss It Must Be Beautiful to Be Finished and how it helped her heal.
Mattea Roach: Do you think it felt like there was this narrative from the very beginning, that there was always something that needed to be fixed and specifically, something aesthetic that needed to be fixed even beyond quality of life issues?
Kate Gies: All my parents wanted was to make sure that people loved me as much as they did. That was the big thing that they had on their minds. I think when you scare somebody by saying all these other things can be wrong and oh look, here's the easy solution now, that's hard to turn away from.
There wasn't any other choice on the table really. This was the late 70s, early 80s. So it was like this is what we do. In terms of my parents getting on board with that thinking is that this is the best way to make me have a good life.
MR: It feels very insidious to me that a lot of this seems directed towards not making sure that you feel good in your body, but making sure that your body would be presentable to others, would be attractive. It feels very much like you're being offered up to the world. Is that how you felt reading your old medical files?
KG: Yeah and also this idea, "Well, she's pretty, but what a shame because she's got this thing. So let's make it even more perfect."
We have to stop looking at individual bodies that present themselves differently, whatever that looks like, whether it's disability or facial difference or whatever, and start pushing back against the society that is saying just this is the only way you can be acceptable. This is the only way you can have an acceptable body in this world. It's so reductive.
Partly too, I had these surgeries ultimately to assuage a fear of people in this culture. These surgeries ultimately were not for me. Naively, when we were going through them, that was the hope. It's for me. It's so that I can fit in better.
But what a missed opportunity. We live as these humans. We all have this one thing in common. We all have bodies and what an opportunity to elevate the human experience to: there is this difference. Let's start thinking about how this is also part of the human experience instead of let's fix something so it can be part of the human experience.
That's the vulnerability and the creativity of how bodies are. That really is what we should be striving for.
MR: How has writing and sharing your story helped you heal? Has it helped you heal?
KG: There are times when writing a story can actually be more damaging if you don't have the space and you don't have the meaning. But I knew I was always going to write this. Even as a kid, I knew I was going to write this. Even knowing that I'm going to write it was healing because I knew that this was not a senseless thing that happened.
Parts of writing it were hard, but I have carried so much shame in my body. And I think that shame is so ubiquitous in our world and the one thing that shame cannot survive is sharing.
There were times, especially when I was starting to write the book, where I would be like, "Here are all these hospital experiences," and people would wonder, "Oh my God, what happened?" And I'd be like, "I'm not going to tell you." I couldn't yet say those words, "I was born with one ear." Those words could not come out of my mouth. Even through my 20s.
The one thing that shame cannot survive is sharing.- Kate Gies
Writing the book helped me say those words out loud and stay in my body as I'm saying them. It helped live in my body in a way that I don't think it could have before.
The other thing too, when you're writing a memoir, there's these two versions of you. There's the character of you that's going through the experience and then there's the writer at the desk and that is the person who has the perspective. They know what happened before, they know what happened after and they're also the adult.
I wrote this memoir not knowing my point. It took me 10 years. So it was through the writing that I got the meaning. It was through the writing that I got comfortable talking about it.
But it was also through the writing where I could step back and be like, wait a second, this is bonkers what they did. Seeing it all together and reading all the medical records, it helped me push that problem right out of me.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity. It was produced by Liv Pasquarelli.
