Book review: Blue Sisters by Coco Mellors
The darkest shades of chronic pain
I’ve had to take a little bit of time off as I’ve suffered some illness recently, but hopefully, as I wait for the first of at least two surgeries, I’m on the road to recovery now.
The day after I started reading Blue Sisters by Coco Mellors I woke up in pain. As always I went through my usual internal decision tree about whether or not to take painkillers - which was only named a decision tree that morning when I began reflecting on writing this post.
Firstly, it was my own fault because we’d been to Snowdonia the day before and I’d done some walking. Not a lot of walking, and I did sit on a bench and appreciate the gorgeous scenery while my partner did more walking, but I’d walked nonetheless and therefore brought the pain upon myself. My guilt (which I know is completely unreasonable but is there nonetheless because of, well, the world and our lives in it) said I didn’t deserve painkillers.
Secondly, I was working from home. Whether I’m in the office or at home is often a massive factor in whether or not I take painkillers; I’m probably 80-90% more likely to take them when I’m in the office.
Thirdly, the weather was scorching. Sun blazing, blue skies, the whole summer shebang. This meant my PoTS was likely to be playing up that day and painkillers might make me sleepy which might aggravate my dizzy spells when they inevitably happened, which they did.
All in all, I didn’t take any painkillers.
This seemingly self indulgent ramble on the painkiller decision tree is relevant to this book, I promise.
Blue Sisters was my book club’s pick for June, which is also Pride Month. Officially, I’m reading Her Majesty’s Royal Coven by Juno Dawson for Pride, but Blue Sisters does happen to have some strong but flawed same-sex relationships in it, in all the messy and beautiful glory you often only see heterosexual relationships represented in fiction, so it was on theme for the month. As always, I’m going to try and stay away from spoilers, but if you don’t like to know any details of a book’s plot, including events that happen early on, maybe read this after you’ve read the book!
I had mixed feelings about the book when I started it. It’s quite heavy on telling, rather than showing, but I did start to feel that the detached style enhanced the feeling of the sisters’ grief somewhat.
The sisters in the book are grieving for their other sister, Nicky, who died after taking painkillers, hence my ramble on taking or not taking them. Nicky had endometriosis which caused her chronic pain and she consequently took very strong painkillers. Having run out on the Fourth of July weekend (a big deal in the USA, but not so much here, though it was the day of our election this year!) she tried to source some from her sister, Bonnie, a boxer, who refused as didn’t want to be associated with using, and then got them from a street dealer. The book is not about endometriosis, but does touch on painkiller use and, through other family members, addiction in various forms.
Currently discussions around painkillers are often focused on addiction as a problem rather than them being a solution for pain. I recently received a lengthy lecture from someone whom I would describe as barely an acquaintance on my use of painkillers, to stop my pain on a day when they could clearly see I was almost completely unable to walk.
Of course, I live in the UK and the types of painkillers we are prescribed tend to be less strong and addiction prone than ones prescribed in the USA, where Nicky in the book lived, but I found this comparison particularly interesting because part of the book is set in London and the author, Coco Mellors, grew up between the USA and UK, so has experience of both cultures.
Pain, particularly chronic pain, is often treated as something you should “learn to live with” and not become “dependent” on painkillers for. But while painkiller addiction is a massive problem and has a catastrophic effect on many people’s lives, we should not assume that everyone taking painkillers is doing so because of addiction rather than because of the very simple reason that they are in pain.
We often see stories in the media about people who become addicted to painkillers after an accident, but people who take painkillers due to longstanding conditions do not receive as much focus. In particular, if someone has had a condition their whole life, including myself, you might even be told, including by doctors, that if you were born with a condition you shouldn’t need painkillers as you should be used to the pain.
But pain, of course, is a signal to yourself that something is wrong. My pain varies and some days I can manage without painkillers. But it’s still there. I’m never not in pain.
The invisibility of Nicky’s pain in the book is something the other characters can struggle with, wishing it had some visible sign, like a crutch, so that people believed her. This is something so common when people, especially women, experience chronic pain. It’s talked about how when Nicky describes the level of her pain to doctors, she dare not say it’s a ten because they’d dismiss her as “hysterical”. Hysteria is not a term you ever see used to describe a man.
Once, when I took my male friend to A&E, writhing in agony during a particularly acute attack of Crohn's disease, he was immediately given intravenous painkillers without being asked to describe his level of pain first. Personally, I always have to beg. Even after dislocating my shoulder, my GP practice refused to prescribe the painkillers the hospital had written to them to ask for, because they thought I had dislocated my own shoulder on purpose to get pills.
The book does offer a cure for Nicky’s chronic pain, in the form of a hysterectomy, but this isn’t actually a cure for endometriosis. It brought to mind years of my taking the contraceptive pill to mask symptoms of a problem which was becoming worse, while I believed the doctors who told me I was better. Women’s medicine, the book points out, is chronically under-researched and, desperate for children, Nicky refuses the treatment.
I remember being told when I was very young that if a man was in the level of pain I was, he would be admitted to hospital until they found out what was wrong. I didn’t want to believe it at the time, because that makes the world a far darker place than I wanted to live in, in my early twenties.
The book shows us all the usual features of pain management that people with chronic pain are familiar with, from alternative therapies to desperate pleas to the universe, but Nicky’s story is a tragedy that isn’t destined for resolution.
The day I finished reading Blue Sisters by Coco Mellors I was in agony. The source of this pain was different to the pain that opened the book and painkillers weren’t an option due to the rolling waves of nausea that accompanied the horrible pain I was in. The surgery will hopefully improve things and I’m hopeful that the waiting list won’t be too long. Blue Sisters is a book that hits most people hard, but it came at a time in my life where it was particularly difficult to read at times.
It is interesting that the book takes chronic pain and lays it side by side with addiction, comparing the two experiences so closely. Addiction is a horrible condition that has dreadful ramifications for sufferers, and the common assumption that all painkiller use stems from dependency rather than simply being in pain, while doctors, both in the USA and UK (and I’m sure many other countries I don’t have direct experience of) refuse point blank to give prescriptions because of dependency issues, means that the two issues are in fact far more inextricably linked than many people might like to admit.
And honestly, just like Nicky, I would be absolutely delighted not to take painkillers, but as no one has come up with an alternative they can offer me, I literally do not know what else I am supposed to do.
In this book, Nicky is dead because she buys painkillers on the street. In America. In hospitals across my country, people are writhing in agony on trolleys in corridors because doctors and nurses are too overrun to help them. In Britain.
The problem is not the painkillers.
Blue Sisters is fully of messy people with messy feelings who do things for selfish reasons and get hurt by things which are often their own fault and, while everything is shaped and affected by Nicky’s death, it’s clear that this family were on a dangerous course towards heartache anyway.
The book honestly reduced me to tears by the end, which thankfully has a core of hope that makes everything the characters go through worth it. I really got to know the characters in this book and was left wondering what would happen next with them, gutted that I wasn’t destined to find out, unless of course a sequel follows…
I recommend this book, and think it would work well as a cosy autumn read. I’m not sure summer was quite the right timing for it, but it’s been mostly freezing anyway, so it didn’t make too much difference!
Take care,
Donna
Self-care snippet
Afternoon tea for one al fresco
When we had some warmer weather a couple of weeks ago, I ventured out with tea, mini cheese sandwiches, and some lime, passion fruit and mango drizzle cake.
I love afternoon tea (not because of Bridgerton - never seen it!) and a summery one out of doors felt like just the lunchtime break I needed.
I’d love to hear the ways you make the most of your lunch break over the summer.
Things I’ve seen, heard, read and talked about
Trevor A brilliant flash piece by the (legendary) Matt Kendrick. No spoilers here, but definitely read this one.
What they'll say to you... Speaking of flash, I was lucky enough to have this piece accepted for this year’s National Flash Fiction Day Flash Flood. I’m so happy that it spoke to them and have had some lovely feedback on it too, including from Matt Kendrick himself!
Ready, willing and disabled: the Australian actors campaigning for more roles – and better training An interesting discussion on disabled actors and the opportunities they do not have. This is something I’ve talked about before and discussions around it are becoming more common, though my own experiences in theatre tell me we still have a long way to go with this one.
Very Unfair: The Nightmare of Institutionalization A piece about the terrifying conditions in the American care system. In the UK we often feel like we’re automatically better off than in the land of health insurance that is the USA, but a lot of this reads frighteningly similar to conditions in British care homes and during home care visits.
General Election voting is it accessible for Disabled people! We’re in the first few days of our new Government here in the UK, so hopes are still high that things are going to change very soon, hopefully at pace. This is an interesting look at the different accessibility aspects that affect our voting system. Hopefully this is something our new Prime Minister and his Cabinet will take note of as they work towards their goals.