Family Life

Augusten blames himself for the way his parents hate each other and the life they all had. They were getting in huge fights all the time and not even giving a second thought to their son just sitting in the other room, listening to them scream at each other. But the real problem came in when the fighting got physical and his father had his hands wrapped around the neck of his mother, and he could kill her in a second. After watching this episode, he got a sense of calm by going to his room, picking out an outfit for school the next day and shining some jewlry from his shelf.

So far it is clear that Augusten values clothes and jewlry, but he also loved medical doctors and celebrities. When he grew up he wanted to play a doctor on a TV show, so he could have the best of both worlds. He would use his imagination and things around him to practice and pretend he had the life he hopes to have when he grows up. Augusten would trick his mother into bringing him to the doctor's office just so he could see there white jackets. One doctor he didn't always love to see was Dr. Finch, his mother's psychiatrist. The first time Augusten meets him is when the doctor has to come to their house at night because his father is drunk and Diedre is scared that he will kill her for real this time.

When he was forced to go to Dr. Finch's office on Saturdays, he would sit in the waiting room and talk to the receptionist, who happens to be Dr. Finch's daughter, Hope. She tells him about all her siblings and how their house is always busy with people. When she tells him he should stop by sometimes, he is thrilled with the idea of going to a real doctor's house. And soon it wasn't the once a week sessions with Dr. Finch, now it was an everyday thing. Augusten looked at the divorce as a way to start fresh.

Augusten is facinated with the more valuble things in life. He doesn't have anyone who really cares about him yet, so he is more interested in material objects. I think it is kind of a good thing Augusten doesn't have any friends because he has never seen a relationship actually work in his life, so how is he expected to make them work himself.