An Interview with R. Wayne Winchester
Born in Geneseo, IL, Wayne’s life is a living testament to the quiet, courageous work of healing from childhood abuse. His Journey began not with clarity, but with silence – a private reckoning in the shadows of his memory. Over time, through therapy, creative expression, and emotional excavation, he transformed trauma from a buried wound into a source of insight and connection.
His memoir is not just a story – it’s a woven offering of truth, tenderness, and symbolic motifs. It pulses with knots, mirrors, broken ornaments, and clinking sounds, each one carrying the weight of survival and the shimmer of possibility. Wayne doesn’t write to be brave; he writes to be real, to show that resilience isn’t a shield, but a rhythm born from compassion and a refusal to be defined by harm. And that the human spirit, though bruised, can rise – not just to survive, but to sing.
What inspired you to start writing this book?
The inspiration came to me after letting my therapist know about the dream I had of my book’s title. He suggested that writing the book may be what I need as a release to help put my past behind me, and now that it is almost finished, it is what I needed.
Tell us the story of your book’s current title. Was it easy to find, or did it take forever?
Last year, the title of my book and the inspiration to start writing it both came to me in a lucid dream. I would never have given thought to writing a book, let alone it being about surviving childhood trauma from the tender age of five until I became of age to be on my own, to discover who I really am, while on the road to years of therapeutic recovery.
Describe your dream book cover.
Having a degree in commercial art, which includes graphic design and layout, I designed my book cover myself. I then, with the assistance of AI, was able to bring forth the motif envisioned in my head.
If your book had a soundtrack, what are some songs that would be on it?
This Is Me from the movie The Greatest Showman.
What other professions have you worked in? What’s something about you that your readers wouldn’t know?
Fast food, C.N.A., riverboat casino slot attendant, and currently disabled. I live with my two wonderful dogs and a side gig in the direct sales industry with a company that’s currently celebrating its one hundred and fortieth anniversary.
What’s one thing you hope sticks with readers after they finish your book?
If you survived childhood trauma, even if you aren’t a middle child, you can become whole again. You are seen, you are heard, you are enough.
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