BLUE HERON: Jeremy’s Behavior: A Psychoanalyst’s Thoughts
One child’s trauma affects the whole family. Especially when you try desperately to get help, don’t get the answers you need, and everything falls apart. There’s nothing worse. Sophy Romvari’s heartbreaking and tragic film, Blue Heron, captures that devastation as adult Sasha (Amy Zimmer) struggles to understand her brother Jeremy (Edik Beddoes). I work with adults traumatized as children. When a child uses dangerous acting-out behavior to defend against his deep sadness and distrust of love, it can be difficult to turn around. Yet if I can ask questions and make some connections to Jeremy’s history, there are ways to understand the story his behaviors tell …
But let me say this first: The best interpretations are only the best hypotheses. And hypotheses aren’t facts. These hypotheses need confirmation from the person they’re talking about and an active, trusted relationship to work things out. So, I offer my thoughts with the intention of understanding behaviors that look like Jeremy’s.
“Memory.” Sasha says: “I struggle now to remember much of my childhood. It comes back to me in small fragments, and even those memories are hard to trust. I do remember his maps. I’ve spent most of my life being angry at him. The older I get, the more I feel like I never really knew him at all.” It’s hard to remember when you’ve been traumatized. Because you can’t feel the pain, but it’s there inside you still. When no one knows how to help you, you’re in the dark. And troubling behaviors can lead to disaster – like Jeremy’s tragic death. The family, Sasha, they’re left suffering, trying to figure it out alone. You don’t forget. You don’t get over the trauma.
My Questions About Jeremy
Memory returns in bits and pieces as Sasha reconstructs her childhood in Blue Heron. You can’t avoid knowing Jeremy’s there. He’s: Disruptive. Provocative. Frustrating. He’s center stage. The question is: Why does he need to put himself there? We watch him push a cereal container in front of one of his brothers, saying, “I don’t want to watch you eat.” Why is that? Does Jeremy want no evidence of his brother’s hunger? Maybe it interferes with his own hunger for his mother’s (Iringo Reti) exclusive love. So, does he have to fight off the intruders, feeling he’s been displaced? And because he can’t know or say how he feels and no one understands, he makes his presence known in “loud,” annoying, irritating ways. But what else drives Jeremy’s behavior?
We know that Jeremy is the oldest of 4 children. But he is a half-brother to the other 3. Their father (Adam Tompa) adopted him and considers Jeremy his own. Yet does Jeremy see it that way? Does he feel that he belongs? It certainly doesn’t look like it. And he makes it seem like he doesn’t care at all. That is very unlikely. Children express feelings and pain by doing the opposite.
To understand Jeremy, we need to know more. Memory lives in feelings. And. If you’re too young to remember or you don’t have the words, your behavior will tell the story.
Here are my questions about Jeremy’s early history:
1. What was Jeremy’s life like before his mom remarried?
2. How was Mom’s pregnancy, his birth, or any birth trauma?
3. What was the original environment that Jeremy lived in?
4. Who and where is his biological father? What was he like?
5. Did Jeremy have a relationship with him? What happened?
6. Did that dad run off? Abandon the family? Abuse him or Mom?
7. How old was Jeremy when his mom met her new husband?
8. How were they living before Mom remarried and had more kids?
9. What was Jeremy’s reaction to a new man in Mom’s life?
10. How old was he when the first new sibling was born? The others?
11. How did he react to each new sibling? Did he show jealousy?
12. Was there a time when Jeremy was bonded with his mom?
13. If so, when did that bond break, and what happened to break it?
What we know: Jeremy once, at least for a few years, had his mom all to himself.
Jeremy’s Troubling Behaviors
So, yes. Jeremy makes his presence known. Bouncing a ball repetitively, in a non-stop, “thump, thump, thump, thump, thump,” by throwing it against the house. He won’t stop when his mom tells him to. Ignoring her, he spins the ball on his finger. Did she forget him? Does she love the others more? These are ways he expresses his hurt. He never listens. He frustrates her. He makes her feel as helpless as he feels. Jeremy must be angry. He had no control. He controls things now.
Mom starts the car. Jeremy comes, finally, but in his own time. Later, he disappears on the beach. While the other kids sit in the car, Mom frantically looks for him. He has all her attention, even if it’s negative. That’s better than none. It’s not that Jeremy is being ignored. It’s that he feels he is.
Thunder rolls in. It’s raining hard, and Mom doesn’t find Jeremy. He constantly terrifies her. Her mind is always on him. Even if he can’t let himself come close; even if he looks like he doesn’t care about what anyone thinks, he does. He’s engaging them in the only way he can. Finally, Mom starts the car to leave. She tells him to come now. He slowly gets in the car. But he’s rattling the car seat, frustrating her more and more. “Stop it. Do you want me to crash?” There’s tension. Unhappiness. Sasha sits still, looking into the distance. It’s sad. So sad. Terrifying. Wearing. Everyone is powerless. That is exactly what Jeremy feels too. It doesn’t stop there. It never stops.
Now, Jeremy walks on the roof. Both parents plead with him. “What the Devil’s got into you? Are you out of your mind? Come down.” Mom’s terrified he’s going to die. The food burns on the stove. Mom, in a softer voice, pleads for him to get down. A slight smile creeps onto Jeremy’s face. He’s “got” her. But what does he really have? Whatever it is, it never feels like enough.
Glass shatters, and Mom finds Jeremy’s hand cut and bleeding. He punched through a window. But there’s a barrier he can’t break. He sees people on the other side. But he can’t reach them, and they can’t reach him. Mostly, he can’t break through something in himself. Something that won’t let him reach out for love. A wall inside him blocks out connection and the love he needs. Because. You can lose it. “Jeremy, what have you done?!” Mom tends to his arm. Lovingly. But it doesn’t seem to register. He can’t take it in. Jeremy can’t accept love. So, he runs on empty.
Here's What Jeremy Says
Jeremy’s answers to three questions are clues to his emptiness and pain.
Here’s what he says:
His three wishes: “Becoming rich and famous” and having “a machine that allows him to travel through time.” “To have lots of money and be old enough to drive.” To have enough. To be free. To go back in time. What does he want to go back to? A time when he was Mom’s only child?
The best time of his life? “I can’t think of one.” That shows us how sad he is.
The worst time of his life: “When I got caught stealing twice in a row.”
Why does Jeremy steal? He must feel there’s never enough. And he can’t ask for what he needs. If he can’t open himself up to love that’s offered, he lives with a hole inside and continually starves. The police brought him home for shoplifting. “He’s stealing from us. We can’t leave any money in the house. Sometimes he takes things from the house ... to the pawnshop to get a few dollars. One day, he stole a bicycle from a yard. He came home totally beaten up, and his face was blue. He told me it was just for fun.” None of this is for fun. It all expresses his pain.
The worst thing that could happen: “To be like a junkie and to have a life I don’t like.”
A junkie can’t stop numbing because he already has a life he doesn’t like; a life of too much pain. Jeremy is addicted to stealing and his other behaviors. He can’t stop. They all both distract and express what hurts him. He’s numbing his need, his fears of being unloved, his sad, sad life.
Who is “In” & Who is “Out?”
Here’s the thing about being a psychoanalyst. I observe and think about the unconscious messages below the surface of any behavior or words. So, let’s put my musings together to flesh out the essence of Jeremy’s emotional struggles. The bottom line? “Who is “In” and who is “Out?”
The question of who is “in” and who is “out” goes on in the minds of most children with siblings. It’s common to want to be the special (or only) one, especially if you’re the oldest. Because the ones that come next are intruders into your exclusive relationship with Mom. You feel cast aside by Mom and the new baby, left on the outside. Or, in Jeremy’s case, also by Mom and a new Dad.
All families have their particularities. The family in Blue Heron does too. It’s a blended family, with a child, Jeremy, from Mom’s previous relationship. Jeremy’s new dad considers Jeremy his son. He’s as devoted and loving as he can be. But that doesn’t mean Jeremy feels safe or like the others. There’s a very touching scene when Jeremy throws things at Dad, yelling, “Get away from me!” and Dad pleads, “Talk to me, talk to me, calm down, calm down!” Then, Dad grabs Jeremy and holds him tight. Jeremy relaxes and lets himself be held for a moment. This is what Jeremy needs. Safety in love he doesn’t feel. A background song plays: “I’m on the outside looking inside.”
We see the ambivalence. Jeremy fights what he needs. He has a huge dose of love/hate; need/rejection of need. This only comes out of fear. Loss. He puts himself on the outside. If he’s the one doing it, Jeremy has the control. He rejects them instead of feeling that he isn’t wanted.
Watch him. Is he “in” or is he “out?” Jeremy’s always on the outside. He makes it that way, removing himself from his younger siblings, who look happy enough. They’re close in age. They play together while Jeremy (usually) stands aside. Or removes himself quickly if he feels he’s let himself get too close. People say that Jeremy’s kind. Maybe it’s too scary to be gentle or let down his guard. He stays away. He keeps others away. High up, removed, on a rock near the ocean.
A seagull cries from the sky. Blue Heron begins with seagulls crying, as Jeremy must cry deep inside. Sadness that’s hidden and no one sees. Jeremy watches a film about a heron in the museum he and his family visit. He steals a blue heron keychain. Jeremy identifies with the heron. He is one …
“By the time they finally leave the colony, the bonds have completely disappeared.”
Jeremy keeps himself distant. He can’t let himself feel what he feels. Likely, it’s a huge amount of sadness. In one notable scene, he plays dead on the porch for hours, making the family step over him. But they don’t know how to decode the meaning of his behavior. And they get no help.
Dad claims, “They told us to ignore him so he can get tired of his jokes.” But this is so, so wrong. Jeremy’s behavior is no joke. It’s desperate. It’s a cry for help. There are messages in it if someone knows how to see. And, when feelings aren’t seen, they turn into symptoms and barriers to love.
Barriers to Love
Dead is how Jeremy must be. Dead to his feelings. Dead to his pain. Looking like he doesn’t care. As numb as he can be. No child behaves as Jeremy does unless he’s suffering and trying not to feel it. Or, making others suffer instead. Then, maybe, they will know just how much he suffers.
“He had gasoline in the room, not very much, but I remember your mom being so scared because he had made this threat that he was going to burn the house down with everybody in it.” This isn’t “not caring.” This is rage. Maybe intense jealousy. Maybe even revenge for being pushed out and supplanted by a new dad and three other kids. Mom said, “I know he hates me.” But the “hate” covers up love. His need for love. His hurt. His hunger for the love he must feel he lost.
Jeremy’s maps? The words “Fantasy,” or “Fantasyland” feature prominently. Jeremy can’t live in the real world. It’s too painful. “He won’t let anyone guide him. He won’t listen to anyone.” He’s lost and can’t find his way, but he doesn’t trust anyone not to hurt him. So, he turns inwards. Away. Jeremy erects barriers to love. He must need to. To protect himself from the fantasies he has, buried deep inside him, of what kinds of catastrophe opening up to love would bring.
As he sits high on a rock above the beach, the two younger boys play together below. Sasha sits with her mom as her mom puts sunscreen on her face, playfully tapping it on her mom’s face too.
Jeremy notices. He can’t miss it. There, before his eyes, are connections that Jeremy has not, won’t, or can’t forge. If he interacts with the other kids, it’s to interfere, to interrupt. Perhaps he feels that their entrance into his mother’s life broke his connection to her. She was all he had.
Because no one sees and no one helps that bond to heal. Jeremy’s behavior becomes increasingly dangerous. A social service worker suggests he go to foster placement. Bone tired and helpless, Mom recalls, “I said yes, I just said yes…”
Hanging up the phone, she looks out the window at Jeremy sitting with headphones on, looking innocent, vulnerable, sweet. Sweet as everyone says he is. The little children happily bounce on the trampoline. Oblivious to what is happening. And Jeremy? He’s on the outside once again.
The seagulls cry at the end of Blue Heron, as they cried at the beginning.
Sadness matters. A lot.