Past Tense: Facing Family Secrets and Finding Myself in Therapy

by Sacha Mardou

A brave and captivating graphic memoir about the power of therapy to heal anxiety and generational trauma

When Sacha Mardou turned forty years old she was leading a life that looked perfect. But for reasons she couldn’t explain, the anxiety that had always plagued her only seemed to be getting worse, and then she began breaking out in terrible acne. The product of a stoic, working-class British family, Mardou had a deep-seated distrust of mental-health treatment, but now, living the life she’d built in the United States and desperate for relief, she finds herself in a therapist’s office for the first time. There she begins the real work of growing up: learning to understand her family of origin and the childhood trauma she thought she’d left in the past.

Genres: Graphic Novels, Memoir, Nonfiction, Mental Health, Comics, Psychology, Biography

336 pages, Hardcover

Published October 15, 2024

About the author

Mardou was born and raised in Manchester, England in 1975. After gaining her BA in English Literature she started making mini-comics, mostly stories about women trying to figure life out. She has made comics for web, print and film and now lives in St Louis, Missouri with her cartoonist-husband, Ted May, and their daughter. She has written and illustrated two volumes of her graphic novel, Sky in Stereo. Her next graphic novel called 'Strange Kind of Love' be published by RevivalHouse Press in late 2021.

Reviews

[alicebme · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. Actual 5 stars. I really needed this book in this format. I feel seen and whatnot. Highly recommend for anyone with childhood trauma at any stage of processing it, but especially if you’re a grown ass person, and you’ve tried so many books and therapists, and your shit is still kicking your ass.

[Rod Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

I decided to read this book because it was on a list, so I started it knowing nothing about it, having read none of the dust jacket copy beyond the title. So it wasn't until page 30 when the author mentions her first graphic novel is being published that I finally looked at her bio info to see if I had read it. Imagine my surprise when I see it was Sky in Stereo, a book I despised and gave a 1-star rating here on Goodreads back in 2016.

Well, Sacha Mardou has gotten much better at graphic memoirs since then.

Sky in Stereo was about Mardou as an angsty teen doing drugs. In Past Tense she's an anxious woman in her forties finally trying to come to terms with trauma caused by her father's very poor decisions.

At one point, Mardou says, "My dad is seriously the worst person I know," and her book makes a pretty good case to back that up, outlining his infidelity, domestic violence, and child molestation (for which he served time in prison). Mardou is a child of divorce and cross-pollinated stepfamilies with half-siblings that resulted when her parents each married one of the people from another divorcing couple, who divorced because the wife -- a coworker and neighbor of Mardou's mother -- started an affair with Mardou's father, whom she met while he was having a custody visit with his children. Mardou's mother responds to all this turmoil by becoming a fervent member of Jehovah's Witnesses, which creates its own set of problems.

Yeah, the schadenfreude is off the charts!

With the help of a couple therapists and a strong commitment to the Internal Family Systems model of therapy, Mardou unpacks all her memories and the tangle of emotions they have caused, trying to find a way forward that won't pass her trauma onto her husband and daughter. It's a moving and interesting journey hindered only slightly by Mardou's limitations as a cartoonist.


(Best of 2024 Project: I'm reading all the graphic novels that made it onto one or more of these lists:
• Washington Post 10 Best Graphic Novels of 2024
• Publishers Weekly 2024 Graphic Novel Critics Poll
• NPR's Books We Love 2024: Favorite Comics and Graphic Novels

This book made the PW and NPR lists.)


FOR REFERENCE:

Contents: Part 1 -- Family Man -- Leaving the Past Behind -- Catching Up -- Face It -- Part 2 -- My First Session -- Parameters -- It's . . . Complicated -- Going Home -- Unpacking -- Her Divorce -- Her Love Life -- Summer 1983 -- #metoo -- Year's End -- Anniversary -- Parts Work? -- So What Is IFS? -- What is Self-Energy? -- Switching -- Part 3 -- The Parent Swap -- The Bad Year -- Incest -- Gail -- Forever -- Leaving -- Unblending Parts -- Therapy Is for People with Real Problems -- Motherfucker -- Legacy -- The Body Keeps the Score -- MysteryAanxiety -- Therapy Convert -- Someplace New -- Part 4 -- Leftovers -- Drawn Out? -- A Sudden Loss -- Upended -- Circling Back -- Checking Out -- Bibliography -- Acknowledgments -- About the Author

[Amber · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a good book! It’s such an up close look at therapy and it really has inspired me to use IFS for myself. I appreciate the author putting her story out there so we can all see the vulnerability and courage it takes.

[Theresa · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've been a fan of the author for several years, after discovering her on IG. I preordered her book, and it arrived late this afternoon. I opened it up to take a look, was immediately sucked in, and just kept reading. I read the whole thing from start to finish today. That's not to say that it's quick or light, but rather that I didn't want to put it down.

In this graphic novel, Mardou tells the story of her therapy experience between 2017 and 2020, and necessarily, that requires going back to her early life growing up in Manchester, England in the 1980s. She had a "messy" family, with an early parental divorce, multiple paternal infidelities, abandonment, domestic violence, and her father's sexual abuse of her step-sister. Furthermore, as she dives deeper into generational trauma, she realizes that the her grandmother's experience in World War II and her mother's rape at the age of 13 have contributed to her own view of herself and her relationship with her family. Wanting to avoid passing some of the same pain on to her own beloved daughter is a major incentive to keep at this emotional work even when it is working.

There was so much in this book that resonated with me and my own experience in therapy--from my own appreciation of IFS and the greater ease experienced once you bring gentle, comforting attention to exiled parts, to quitting my job as my therapy helped me realize that I didn't need to stay in a workplace that was anything but "an equal exchange of energy."

I will read this book again, more slowly the second time, to ponder how my own insights and experiences are similar and different from hers. I know this book will help me expand the way I think about my own therapy. I am so grateful to Mardou for her vulnerability and willingness to share the hard secrets of her life. It makes me, and no doubt millions of other readers, feel less alone with our own messy families and hard secrets.

[Angie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mardou experienced some incredibly dysfunctional family dynamics and heavy trauma as a child, which she later begins to heal from with the help of two therapists. There were some good points overall: the need to face trauma in order to heal, trying multiple therapists/modalities, the empathy and insight the author arrives at. However, I think the condensed nature of a graphic novel made some of the therapy and healing work and some of the internal family systems explanations feel overly simplistic.

[Dakota Morgan · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Past Tense, the author enters therapy after suffering from extreme anxiety attacks. Unsurprisingly, the kind therapist helps her unpack her truly wild family history, which (as the therapist suggests!) makes for great material in this book. So, Past Tense is partially a positive review of therapy (perhaps too positive...) and partially a can't-look-away train wreck of a family memoir.

I definitely enjoyed the memoir portions more, but they're tightly coupled with the therapy. Smartly so, because otherwise the scenes of Mardou and her lovely, gentle therapists (who consistently help her process her emotions) would not have held much oomph. The family portions are cringe-inducing; the therapist portions are syrupy-sweet - ultimately, it all goes down smooth. And makes one want to seek out such effective therapy??

[Estibaliz · Rating 3 out of 5]

I do not feel this graphic novel was for me, but I can see how some people can get a great value out of this memoir.

It does a good job in showing therapy as the useful tool it can be, beyond any kind of stigmas, and also the fact that there is an ample variety of therapies out there, and the key might be just to find the one that is right for you. (And I don't think IFS is the easiest one to see as relatable for a lot of people, including me; but, you know, if the shoe fits...).

Apart from that, one has to recognize the courage of the author on writing this graphic novel, as there is certainly a lot of trauma that she unpacks here. And, while I empathize with her, it was hard to relate with all of it, which made it feel a bit repetitive at times (though I would never used the term boring). Plus the art is good, but not that compelling to my eye, so the three visual stars are a good sum up for this read, with a final score of 3.5.

[Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

So vulnerable and a beautiful love letter to therapy. I cried multiple times and was a complete puddle by the end. Such a well done depiction of how childhood and generational trauma can impact someone, and the transformative power of therapy.

[Ann Lambert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a beautifully honest and vulnerable book. I have been following the author on Insta and have loved how she has documented her therapy journey, now consolidated in this book. Also the way she makes the IFS therapy model so tangible and understandable.

[Cara Wittich · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't usually read graphic novels but, in this case, I found the illustrations helpful. A beautiful story, deeply personal, a peek into a usually closed-off process. This book was the first I had heard of IFS. I found myself becoming more interested as I read on. It was an easy read and I completed it within one 24h period. I found this book to be a good reset from the material and types of memoirs I had been drawn to prior.

[Stephanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it. Beautiful, heartfelt book I could relate to a great deal.

[Ted · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting memoir. What never fails to amaze me is how men like her father, an abusive degenerate, always seem to have options with women. Agreeable males on the other hand get ignored.

[Dana · Rating 5 out of 5]

A graphic memoir that touched so many points and parts of me. Thoroughly enjoyed this book and will be watching for more from this cartoonist.

[Kenzie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love graphic memoir, I love IFS, I love therapy, I love women! Inspiring

[Nappell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic, honest, brave account of therapy and reckoning with dysfunction.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this graphic novel. You follow Sacha through her therapy journey and the disturbing memories and ephiphanies that accompany it.

[Melinda · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you have endured any family trauma, this is an important read. Very well done!

[Hope · Rating 5 out of 5]

(Note: In my review, there are no plot spoilers from the book, but I do touch on elements of the content in an abstract way.)
I find myself wanting to share this book with relatives who may also be in need of recovery insights. I definitely wish *child or teenager me had this book. But I still feel lucky to have it now.
(*No, it's not exactly a book for children, but in my case, as a child, I had already been exposed to "adult" content way too young, so reading this book would not have hurt my innocence; it would have helped me.)
The graphic novel presentation of this content makes it extremely approachable and palatable. So it's not at all a challenging read cognitively, which is good, because I think a lot of readers will already have a challenging time emotionally, as they read it and relate to parts of the story Sacha is telling. I know I related.

My only "negative" comment about the book really isn't a criticism per se; I just felt a bit put off by the (very mild and minimal) mentions of political opinions that occurred (only twice) in the book. This is just our current political climate today, that even a book that is totally unrelated to politics, a book that is about healing and recovering from the effects of childhood trauma and neglect, is still liable to contain *something* about politics because *everything does these days*. You simply can't escape it... But I do wish, in the same way that trauma recovery authors are delicate with mentioning religion because many readers suffer from religious trauma, that trauma recovery authors would similarly not bring up politics in publications that are completely unrelated to politics. In this book, the mention of politics was so immaterial to the overall message of the book that it seemed the book could leave it out and the message would still come across perfectly fine. In fact, in a country where the population is so politically divided (I also mean this statistically; there are essentially just as many conservatives as there are democrats/liberals), the author is running the risk of alienating a large portion of her audience due to a couple unworthwhile mentions of politics. If I were the author, I'd want to be careful not to turn people away over such a trivial piece of content; I'd rather just not mention the content. I want to welcome as many people as possible into the world of trauma recovery, no matter from what section of the political spectrum they come. I realize that the decision of whether to include mentions of political feelings or not is complicated by the fact that this book is autobiographical, and the author probably wishes to preserve the authenticity of her experiences and not leave something out just because it might offend or alienate some portion of her audience. I understand that the author's purpose of this book might have been more so to simply tell her own story (memoir) and less to introduce the public to information about trauma recovery. If that's the case, then of course it is simply the author's choice to make. But if the intention of this book was to help as many people as possible, then I'd personally think twice before saying something that wasn't central to the book's purpose but also might reduce its efficacy with the audience. 'nuff said! :)

This book's execution is excellent, the art is consistent and effective (complex facial expressions really come through despite the minimalist "cartoonist" style), and the organization / storytelling is perfectly done. I didn't feel this book was too short or too long. Sacha communicated thoroughly without being verbose, and I loved that she demonstrated IFS (I'd read about it before but never seen it actually demonstrated, which I found educational and helpful). This book has definitely turned my head in the direction of IFS again for my own recovery journey.

From an art perspective, I loved the colors, the friendly, approachable style, and again, how convenient it was for me to absorb the message through pictures. What a great idea to convey this journey in images. I'm excited for the positive changes this book is going to make across its audience. Thanks, Sacha!

[Wynnie · Rating 5 out of 5]

{This review is spoiler-free}

Today I went to my local bookstore specifically to seek out Past Tense and it was such a good book that I could not put it down. I sat in the bookstore for a total of two and a half hours reading the entire book cover to cover, and while it was not an easy read for me due to some of the heavy content of the book, I absolutely could not get myself to put the book down for even a moment.

I have known of the author from Instagram for several years and have known about the treatment modality of Internal Family Systems (IFS) for over 11 years now. I am an individual who struggles with the aftermath of my own trauma in the form of Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID), and while no treatment modality will fit every client perfectly, IFS has come closest to helping me with my DID the absolute most. I mention this to say that when I was reading Past Tense, it was another one of the rare reads that felt like someone could speak my language. Usually in reading certain books, it feels isolating because I cannot relate to certain things, but because this book talked frankly about parts, trauma, and stopping generational cycles, it felt like I was being given language to finally express what has been in my mind and heart for 28 years of life thus far.

After reading this graphic novel/memoir, I felt emboldened to purchase a $7 journal for myself to write my own story in. I know I have a lot to say, and it will take time to say it all, and that's okay. The point is that in us telling our stories in the open and honest way that Past Tense encourages while going at your own pace and the pace of your parts, we help others to see that they are not alone in their experiences, and we can all begin to see even more clearly that each of our stories matter in the grand scheme of things, no matter what our individual stories may look like.

If I've learned anything from Past Tense, it's that our stories have ripple effects throughout the lives of ourselves and others. The question is: Will we embrace the call to listen to our own stories and find those intersections? Personally, I want to embark on such a journey of exploration, and for that, I want to genuinely thank Ms. Sacha Mardou for her inspiring memoir on her journey using IFS to heal. May this book reach the eyes of all who need to read it.

[Jeanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

In her graphic memoir, Past Tense, Sacha Mardou describes her time in therapy and her work with two Internal Family Systems therapists. Her family of origin is, at the very least, confusing, but she and her therapists do good work in unraveling emotional pain and betrayal that spanned several generations, finding forgiveness and self-forgiveness.

This is high praise, as I think people are more likely to talk about bad experiences in therapy than good experiences. Mardou's therapists get her talking about the range of feelings she has toward parents, step-parents, siblings, etc., rather than only focusing on initially accessible feelings. There are many memoirs of mental illness that briefly talk about the therapy process; Past Tense talks much more about the therapy process.



Sylvie Kantorovitz (2022) said "In a graphic memoir, the story line is what tells me the big things. It’s the images that tell me all the little things, in addition to making the setting so easy to grasp." I agree, which is why I'm more hesitant about visually-spare graphic memoirs. Still, the facial expressions of Mardou's "parts" or family members in her memories (here in blue) can be priceless.

My first graphic memoir was probably Alison Bechdel's Fun Home, so I tend to compare every graphic memoir/novel to it (or Emil Ferris's sumptuous My Favorite Thing is Monsters). That's unfair. Past Tense's storyline is as rich as that of Fun Home but its drawings are more stereotyped. All graphic novels do not have to be measured by the same yardstick, do they? I don't know. This is a question I continue to struggle with.

[Ruth Gibian · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a psychotherapist, I'm often curious about portrayals of therapy in memoirs or fiction, and as a great lover of the graphic form, I was therefore doubly curious about Sacha Mardou's graphic memoir about her experience with therapy, Past Tense. She delivers. She's a gracious and bold storyteller and a brave participant in therapy, and she has an intense story to tell about her family. Raised in the U.K., Mardou moved nine times by the time she was nine years old, a number that suggests the chaos she gently tells about. Her father was abusive and absent, and eventually does time in prison for child sexual abuse. There are step siblings and half siblings, divorces and affairs and periods of poverty. Through therapy, she also starts to trace the legacy of pain and trauma back through the generations, and she starts to let herself experience her own feelings in a new way, which she attributes to the form of therapy called Internal Family Systems, or IFS. I've generally not been a huge fan of IFS professionally; I don't like its jargon or its formulaic approach, and I especially haven't liked that it acts like it invented the idea of us having different parts, when that idea has been around for at least fifty years in therapy. But her depiction of IFS in the skilled and compassionate hands of the two therapists she sees is so compelling that I'm happy to set aside my own reservations, as I have before - if it helps people, I don't really care if aspects feel stilted or the approach doesn't really honor the traditions that have gone before it. But back to the book itself: Mardou's journey is a lovely and gratifying one, hopeful and inspiring. The book can be a great way intro to someone wondering how they might face childhood trauma and come into a new emotional experience of themselves in the present.

[kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was really powerful for me mainly due to the subject matter and for that I'm rating this highly. If you have any type of abuse, neglect, or trauma in your family history this may be particularly interesting to you too.

I appreciated this author's struggle and ability to convey that through this memoir. It was informative about talk therapy and Internal Family Systems. I have been in and out of therapy for what feels like my whole life, but I've mostly just done talk therapy and I haven't really spent time learning about different psychotherapy models. As a new person to this way of treatment, her experience with it was very interesting and introduced me to some practices I may look more into and try for myself.

Things that were cool: Making up with her mom, going to different types of therapy, being candid about her therapy journey, finding herself more at peace and overall happier due to therapy, art style was really enjoyable, and the text was big enough to keep you turning pages in a satisfying way

We knew the premise of her story pretty quickly: her dad abused her step sister as a child and he went to jail for it, and even as the characters grow up, time and distance doesn't heal all wounds. Our main character is in a life that she loves, but her anxiety, acne, and discontentment was in abundance. Despite coming from an anti therapy background, she decides to go to process the things she couldn't ever talk about. We learn more about her and her traumas through her therapy just like she remembers and reveals to the therapist. I truly felt her pain with her, it was gripping.

There were some parts of therapy that I feel this book could have touched on more, but this was truly just about her experience so I cannot complain. She goes through some pretty unique things in my opinion with meditation and visualization, and it was interesting how she reached her memories of being so young.

One thing this book got me thinking about was how insane it can be that our bodies will remember memories that our brains shut out. I had heard that before as well, but it can be easy to forget about when you're just thinking about what's going on and how you're reacting to it.

[Savannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Past Tense follows author and illustrator Sacha Mardou's therapeutic journey as she explores her family history and begins to heal intergenerational traumas. Sacha details her hesitance to start therapy, and it is amazing to see her transformation as she takes control of her appointments. I really appreciated the inner dialogue Sacha provided and how to sometimes differed from what she said in session. Although Sacha's journey was long, this was a quick read and hard to put down. The drawings conveyed so much emotion and depth, expanding greatly upon the story being told in words. I read this immediately following Judith Herman's Trauma and Recovery, and although it wasn't my intent, these two books paired exceptionally well together. Despite not including it in her list of citations, Mardou's narrative feels like it utilizes Herman's stages of recovery.

There are a few trigger warnings for this story, and while some of them are on the first couple of pages, so not truly a spoiler, I'll put the ones I noticed below.
________________________________________________________
Incest (parent/child)
Rape/Sexual Assault
Sexual Abuse between children

[Harley Quinn · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25★: BETTER THAN EXPECTED, WITH UNEXPECTED BUT SOMETIMES CRINGY TWISTS. This is probably only the second time I've felt like a fly on the wall in someone else's therapy/counseling sessions, and both were graphic novels. The other was dealing with multiple personalities in Emma Grove's The Third Person, so in comparison, you'd think anxiety would be simpler... but mental health is never simple. One other aspect I appreciated was the comparison of how people deal with mental health issues and their openness (or not) to therapy between the United States and the UK.

CONTENT WARNINGS: Child sexual abuse / incest, domestic violence and parental abuse, childhood trauma & generational trauma, mental health struggles & therapy themes, emotional abuse and family conflict.

Published a year ago in October 2024, this book currently has a 4.39-star average by 565 GR peeps.

[Michelle Tuite · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading 2025
Book 2: Past Tense: Facing Family Secrets and Finding Myself in Therapy by Sacha Mardou

At the beginning of January, I set a goal to read all the graphic novels that had made various end of 2024 best of lists. I bought a bunch of books and grabbed others at the library. This is one I bought. This is a graphic memoir for adult readers.

Synopsis: A brave and captivating graphic memoir about the power of therapy to heal anxiety and generational trauma

Review: There are a lot of triggers in this book, horrors in Sacha’s childhood that she is trying to work through in therapy. She shows her therapy sessions as she works through all of her trauma. Definitely recommend this book, my rating 4⭐️.

[Amber · Rating 5 out of 5]

Memoirs around someone entering therapy usually focus on the tragedy before the healing, processing their story and letting the reader relate to them and then sort of skim over how they got out the other end. Few successfully talk about the healing journey - the lightbulb moments, the baby steps, self-help books, and how you then start therapy for the people around you. Mardou does a fantastic job and with sensitivity to how her story involves telling other's stories.

This is a story about the complexity of CSA, incest, and how a family works (or avoids) trauma. Sad, healing, never graphic, open. I am thinking about how many women face sexual assault, how common incest is, and how we don't know how to talk about any of it.

[Brianna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic graphic memoir told through the lens of Internal Family Systems therapy. Usually I struggle with memoirs that have non linear timelines, but the way this wove between the present and past was interesting and made sense. I love how much depth the author gave to her generational trauma. She also walks a fine line between privacy and disclosure that I respect. There is clearly more to her story that stays personal, but you don’t feel like you’re missing out on anything. While a lot of the therapy sessions she’s had mirror work that I’ve done, I felt like there were still a lot of pieces here and there that really struck me. Highly recommend to other therapy nerds out there.

[Jaxine Rivera · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this memoir has been quite the journey and I could deeply related to Sacha's therapy journey. Her family history definitely has a lot going on and I feel for her and I am so glad she is doing a lot better. I also like how she explored IFS therapy and how she switched therapists and how her own therapist has switched around six or seven other therapists as well. The story is quite empowering and very kind and healing as well to not just the author, but to its readers, at least in my opinion. I'm very glad Mardou and everyone who gave her permission to write this story did because it is one that needed to be shared. 

[Molly · Rating 4 out of 5]

There were so many parts of Sacha's therapy sessions where I felt my own epiphanies. When she realizes that her views towards therapy basically mirror how her mother feels towards religion? Or when she says that dealing with her past traumas will prevent her daughter from having to deal with her? I had to take a minute to sit with that! This was an incredibly honest display of vulnerability and personal growth, while offering hope to those who feel stuck in the "Am I ever going to get better/not need therapy?" cycle. I could not put it down.

[David Goodman · Rating 5 out of 5]

If im taking the time out of the day to write a review about a comic book, it’s because it seriously meant something special to me and moved me in a great way. I can’t thank Sacha enough for making this book and making me cry at the end during her last session with Chris. What a wonderful story and it was truly the easiest thing to keep flipping the next page to. My girlfriend (who happens to be a therapist) isn’t the biggest comic book fan by any means but read this one so quick front to back and it helped her realize why I love comics so much as well. This book is one to be remembered!!