Trysh Ashby-Rolls is celebrating the thirtieth anniversary of Triumph: A Journey of Healing from Incest with this second edition. She wrote the first sentence in summer, 1988, while recovering from emergency spinal cord surgery. She had developed cauda equina syndrome after deliberately plunging fifty feet down a cliff face at age thirteen. Triumph is the story of her nightmarish childhood, filled with abuse and secrets, groomed by her father until he used her in a child pornography ring, and the long physical and emotional recovery. Her story is almost unbearable to read, yet her fighting spirit, tenacity and resourcefulness drew people in. She received hundreds of letters, emails, and whispered, "You're the woman who wrote the book...it happened to me too." People still ask questions: What happened to your father? Did you ever see your mother again? Rob? Was your sister abused? Do you still write? Are you healed? This new edition answers many of those questions. Yet it also keeps the original story, recording the first three years of flashbacks and returning memories, and the ways in which she coped between counselling sessions.
Although Triumph is challenging, painful and often harrowing, it is ultimately an exhilarating book. It chronicles the rugged road of healing from realization through denial, shame, anger and revenge towards a plateau of peace and self-love.
In a caring relationship and with the help of a treasured counselor and supportive friends, Trysh Ashby-Rolls was able to find the child within and parent herself like the caring mother and father she never had. Standing up for the helpless child she was, Trysh wrote to her parents, confronting them with her memories and her anger. She even had her father charged and arrested. She developed some remarkable ways to cope and heal: buying herself flowers, baking herself cookies or making a childhood favourite, rice pudding. She cuddled a teddy bear, drinking warm milk sometimes from a baby bottle, taking long hot baths, and when bouts of rage hit beating her bed with a tennis racquet.
Today, Trysh has got to know the strong, well woman she really is, liberated from roles and pretense. Triumph lends hope to those starting out or struggling on their own journeys, so they know it's worth continuing. It is possible to heal.
