Educated: Chapter 24 Summary & Analysis

Tara takes an introductory psychology course, and, one day, as the professor lists some of the symptoms of bipolar disorder—"depression, mania, paranoia, euphoria, delusions of grandeur and persecution”—Tara is shocked to realize the symptoms perfectly describe Dad. The professor also notes that mental disorders such as bipolar disorder have played roles in some “famous conflicts” like Waco and Ruby Ridge. Tara looks these “famous” incidents up on the internet, having never heard of them, and realizes that Ruby Ridge is the story about the Weaver family which Dad always told—the story responsible for some of Tara’s false and fractured childhood memories.

Tara becomes “obsessed” with bipolar disorder and chooses it as the subject of one of her research papers. As the semester goes on, Tara learns that disease is not a choice and that sufferers of mental disorders are victims of circumstances beyond their control—but Tara can’t stop feeling that she, her siblings, and Mother have had to pay for Dad’s cruelty and paranoia for too long.

Tara visits home, but winds up arguing with Dad and blowing up at him over his paranoid delusions and his terrifying stories about the Weavers. She drives back to BYU full of shame and anger, and when the semester ends, she doesn’t return to Buck’s Peak for the summer. She avoids her father’s phone calls, effectively cutting him off. Tara is determined to “experiment with normality,” and learn to live outside of the narrow rules of her father’s world. She quickly meets a boy named Nick at church and they begin a relationship, but she is careful not to tell him anything specific about her past or her family.

At the end of May, Tara gets sick. She feels fatigued and achy, and her throat is on fire all the time. She stops going to work and sleeps day in and day out, and one day, Nick comes over to demand she see a doctor.. Alone at the clinic, Tara has no idea how to talk to the receptionist or deal with nurses and doctors. Within a few days, the results of her tests are back—she has strep throat and mono. The doctor prescribes penicillin, and Tara reluctantly takes them. She waits for something awful to happen—for her eyes to bleed or her tongue to fall out—but nothing does.

One day, Tara receives a phone call from Audrey. Audrey tells her that there’s been an accident involving Dad—and that if she leaves right now, she will have time to “say goodbye.”