At times hard to watch but always compelling, Reckoning With the Primal Wound deals with issues of identity, loss, and adoption. Director Rebecca Autumn Sanson delivers a raw, personal film that many viewers can relate to.
The film begins with Sanson wondering about her own birth mother. Revealed to be Jill Hawkins, Sanson, and Hawkins connect. Hawkins reveals that she offered Sanson’s adoptive parents a bunch of keepsakes, unbeknownst to the director/subject. Unfortunately, the keepsakes were in a box that is now lost, and the two can only reminisce about how those trinkets could have connected mother and daughter.
Trauma threads its way throughout the film. Author Nancy Newton Verrier offers her insight into the trauma of adoption. Verrier’s work The Primal Wound: Understanding the Adopted Child discusses the unnatural act of a birth mother giving away the baby. The separation of these two inevitably leads to trauma that at some point must be addressed. The documentary doesn’t portray Sanson and Hawkins at odds with one another. They are merely trying to coexist and understand one another. Issues of adopted children not fitting in, as well as being put into uncomfortable situations about why they were adopted also feature prominently
Reckoning With the Primal Wound may seem uncomfortable for some viewers, especially those who put up children for adoption or were adopted themselves. However, it offers a fascinating insight. The documentary would work well for social workers, those studying interpersonal relationships, psychologists, and those who are adopted/have put up kids for adoption.