On the Ledge

A Memoir

Amy Turner

• Publisher: She Writes Press
• Year: 2022
• Topic: Social Sciences
• eBook ISBN:
  9781647422264
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: Social Sciences

In 1957, when Amy Turner was four years old, her father had to be talked down from a hotel ledge by a priest. The story of his attempted suicide received nationwide press coverage, and he spent months in a psychiatric facility before returning home. From then on, Amy constantly worried about him for reasons she didn't yet fully understand, triggering a pattern of hypervigilance that would plague her into adulthood.

In 2010, fifty-five years after her father’s attempted suicide, Amy—now a wife, mother, and lawyer-turned-schoolteacher—is convinced she’s dealt with all the psychological reverberations of her childhood. Then she steps into a crosswalk and is mowed down by a pickup truck—an accident that nearly kills her, and that ultimately propels her on a remarkable emotional journey. With the help of acupuncture, somatic-oriented therapies, and serendipities that might be attributed to grace, Amy first unravels the trauma of her own brush with death and then, unexpectedly, heals the childhood trauma buried far deeper.

Poignant and intimate, On the Ledge is Amy’s insightful and surprisingly humorous chronicle of coming to terms with herself and her parents as the distinct, vulnerable individuals they are. Perhaps more meaningfully, it offers proof that no matter how far along you are in life, it's never too late to find yourself.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Table of Contents
• Prologue
• 1. The Accident
• 2. Worrying
• 3. Looking for Normal
• 4. Revelations
• 5. Opponents
• 6. In the Crosswalk Again
• 7. Meditation
• 8. Laugh Lines
• 9. Blackout
• 10. One Step Away
• 11. Harold and His Purple Crayon
• 12. Isabella
• 13. Writing
• 14. “Strength in What Remains Behind”
• 15. My Father’s Renaissance
• 16. Somatic Experiencing
• 17. Goodbye to Tennis and All That
• 18. Panic at the New York Public
• 19. Trauma
• 20. The Ziploc Bags
• 21. Contact through the Ether
• 22. Staying Close
• 23. Listening to My Father
• 24. The Patio Cure
• 25. “Extra, Extra”
• Epilogue
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Selected Titles from She Writes Press