“I Finally Said It”

Can a person recover from deep emotional wounds? And if so, how?

This book is a work of non-fiction based on my own experience of undergoing counseling for over three years.

Struggling with difficulties in living—including ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder), childhood leukemia, and adolescent eating disorders—I knocked on the door of a counseling office in my mid-40s.

Contrary to my imagination that a counselor is someone who removes emotional troubles and that counseling is a healing experience, it was neither a flat nor a beautiful story. At times, it was a journey like crawling through a quagmire where I couldn't tell if I was moving forward or backward.

Nevertheless, one day in my third year of continuing counseling, I regained the memory of an incident that attacked me in my childhood, which had become my greatest past trauma.

I have read many books about counseling. Most were written from the perspective of the therapist, and from my point of view, they seemed like organized, safe, and clean stories of recovery.

In “I Finally Said It,” I wanted to record the days of recovery exactly as they were—days that sometimes felt life-threatening and where hope seemed invisible.

People with trauma sometimes engage in seemingly inexplicable behaviors in order to somehow survive while carrying those wounds. People looking from the outside may label these as disorders or illnesses. However, at the root of the behavior that appears as a surface symptom, there is the single point of being dominated by trauma.

I believe there is a limit to the power of medicine in helping someone recover who has been deeply hurt by people. Those hurt by people need to recover through people.

I exposed my path to recovery and depicted it including the confusion in the midst of it because of a strong desire to help those suffering just as I once did, and those who support them.

No matter how painful the experience, I believe we have the strength to live while carrying it with us.

“I Finally Said It” is the story of one individual, but it carries the universal theme of people living together. I hope that people from various walks of life will pick it up.

“I Finally Said It”
Mie Saito
Igaku-Shoin Ltd.
200 pages, 2,200 yen (tax included)