Educated: A Memoir

Westover documents memories of the year she spent on a fellowship at Harvard. When she returned to her dorm from class one morning, she found an email from her mother. Faye and Gene were coming to Harvard. Westover realized that they were coming to try and save her.

Faye and Gene arrived during mid-fall. During their sightseeing in the city, Westover began to see the scarring and disfigurement from Gene’s accident through the eyes of strangers on the street; people stared at his face and hands as they walked around. The next morning, Gene finally admitted why they came to visit: “The Lord has commanded me to testify. She may yet be brought to the Lord” (302). They wanted Westover to reconvert to Mormonism. Westover herself wished she could reconvert. She believed that if she could just go back to seeing the world through Gene’s eyes, she could have her family back.

Gene insisted they visit a nearby Mormon temple. When they arrived, he wanted Westover to touch the temple because “its power would cleanse [her]” (302). She did it, but all she felt was cold granite. Where Gene saw and felt God, Westover saw and felt nothing.

The night before her parents left, Gene said he had a gift for Westover. The reason he came to Harvard, he said, was to offer her a “priesthood blessing” (304). In Mormonism, this kind of blessing is a way to cast out demons. If she accepted, God would cast out the demon that Gene believed possessed her. But Westover said no. Gene lectured on the seriousness of Westover’s sins, and he and Faye testified to the power of God, proven repeatedly through the many healings Faye had performed without the help of modern medicine.

After Westover declined the blessing, Gene testified that he saw disaster ahead for her. He offered one more time to give her a blessing. Finally, Westover realized that if she accepted his offer, even only as an attempt to win back favor with her family, it would not be a demon that Gene cast out of her. It would be Westover herself, the new person she had become: “I love you […] But I can’t. I’m sorry, Dad” (306).

Gene said there was an evil presence in Westover’s dorm room. Although their flight did not leave till the next morning, Faye and Gene packed quickly and left immediately. 

Westover details the aftermath of the confrontation with her parents. A couple of weeks before Christmas, she decided that it had been a mistake to choose her education over her family. She bought a plane ticket to Idaho, believing she could still fix things.

Faye was ecstatic when Westover arrived and bustled into the kitchen to make her breakfast. Westover said she needed to send a quick email. When she got on the family computer, she saw her name in an open email thread. It was a series of emails between Faye and Shawn’s ex-girlfriend, Erin. In the emails, Faye told Erin that Westover was a threat to the family, and that she was lost without her faith in God. Although, months before, Erin had confirmed all of Westover’s suspicions about Shawn’s abusiveness, there, in the emails to Faye, she agreed that Westover was lost without faith.

Westover realized that it was impossible to reclaim the life that she came home to save. She looked around the house and asked herself: “What do I need from this place?” (311). The only thing that came to mind was her memories. She found a box under her bed, carried it out to her car, and drove away.

Tyler called Westover while she was on the road. She had not spoken to him in months, believing that Faye had called everyone in the family and turned them against her. Westover was right: Faye did contact everyone in the family, but she made a mistake when she called Tyler. Faye assumed that Westover would have already called Tyler, and that he would have sympathized with her. When Faye called Tyler, she began frantically denying a whole slew of things that Tyler had never heard a word about, like Shawn stabbing and killing a family dog, and Shawn threatening Westover with a knife.

As soon as Tyler got off the phone with Faye, he called Westover and immediately accepted her version of events. But Westover was wary—after making the mistake of believing that Audrey was on her side, she could not trust that Tyler would choose her over the family.

Westover continued unraveling when she got back to Harvard. She sent a rage-filled letter to Gene and told her parents she was cutting off contact with them in order to take a year to heal herself. Faye begged her to find another way. Gene said nothing.