Book Nook: Risking the Rapids: How My Wilderness Adventure Healed My Childhood

Noted writer Irene O'Garden grew up in what seemed like the perfect American Midwestern family. Behind the scenes, however, it was anything but. In her new book, O’Garden's revelatory account tells us of shocking cruelty, narcissism, neglect and the damage done to children of alcoholics. 

Risking the Rapids opens with the shocking death of O’Garden’s problematic older brother in 2014. His early passing prompted her and other family members to seek emotional closure with him and their family past by journeying through the remotest area in the lower forty-eight, Montana’s Bob Marshall Wilderness. What was described as a genial river “float” became a harrowing whitewater experience. That chronicle is woven with the story of her upbringing in a repressed mid-century Midwest Catholic household with six other siblings.

I had a chance to interview her to learn more.

Why did you decide to write this book?

I was born in the middle. In the middle of seven children, in a mid-size city in the middle of the country, in the middle class, in the middle of the twentieth century. In a leafy neighborhood neither urban nor suburban. In the middle of surprising anxieties, given the idyllic qualities a mid-century childhood afforded: freedom, autonomy, solitude. I grew up in a repressed and competitive Catholic household with a TV-personality father, an icy mother and rivers of martinis. 

Our parents never beat us. We had enough to eat and wear. But one brother cut all his pictures out of the family scrapbook. Another brother was committed to a madhouse. Another was hamstrung in hierarchy; another was crippled by chronic pain. One sister suffered and drank, one sister suffered from severe anxiety.  I ate myself upwards of 200 pounds. I started writing to explore why—a sort of Family CSI. 

Does the title Risking the Rapids allude to anything beyond the rafting trip?

Yes. Life--and family life in particular--is full of rapids: times and places where things accelerate and move unpredictably. I felt I had to risk the rapids of my childhood again—to explore the scary inner places, the old wounds that might have thrown me off course, and especially to risk the unforeseeable reaction of family members to this book.

How can families make adjustments if they find themselves falling into negative patterns?

First, be open to noticing family patterns, positive and negative. Give the lion’s share of attention to the things that are working right in the family. We are often brought up to focus on what is wrong to the exclusion of all that goes right.

That said, when you find something that isn’t working for your family, talk about it. Communication is the first step. We had a pattern of asking certain family members to convey or withhold messages from other family members and you know that doesn’t go well! Finally we talked about it and agreed that it was up to each of us to ask for what we need. 

Also, it can help break patterns when families put themselves in a different setting—in the wilderness, or even a park, where they can enjoy each other’s company. There are so many ways we can bond with each other.

What do you hope readers will get out of this book?

I hope my readers will realize that it is never too late to heal. I lived with the anxiety of my upbringing for many years, which I expressed through eating disorders and other damaging behaviors. I found that risk is a natural part of healing. Risk assists recovery.

Taking a risk immediately improves our self-respect, an antidote to the shame we feel from emotional or family damage or from addictive behavior. The risk can be a conversation we’ve been putting off. Or it may be a physical challenge. Whatever it is, commit to risking your rapids and someone will be there to help.