The House of My Mother: A Daughter's Quest for Freedom

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, informally known as LDS or the Mormon Church, is a branch of Christianity with over 17 million members worldwide. Headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah, the church was founded in 1830 and is believed by followers to be a restoration of the church originally established by Jesus Christ. The church is sometimes regarded as controversial by other Christian denominations. In The House of My Mother, Franke details how the strict traditional gender roles promoted by LDS place strong emphasis on marriage and motherhood as the only acceptable outlets for Mormon women, which Franke suggests stifled her mother’s ambitious nature and distorted her views of parenting.

Fawning is a trauma response that involves denying one’s own needs and feelings in an effort to appease others and avoid conflict. The traumatized individual often comes across as a “people-pleaser,” but the response is an attempt to protect oneself from criticism and dissatisfaction. In the text, Franke recounts how she developed an instinctual “fawn response” in the face of her mother’s abusive parenting, which she only began to recognize and overcome with the support of her therapist, Dana.