Research Paper On Lucy Grealy

Lucy Grealy: A Masterpiece That Could’ve Been Many masterpieces never made it to the floor of a gallery. The artist abandons the piece in frustration because it’s not good enough, or not how they wanted it to work. In the art world, perfection is a given expectation, an impossible standard where each artist has their own personal definition. In constant contest to be better than another, they forget the individualistic qualities necessary to make true, personal masterpieces. Like a frustrated artist, Lucy Grealy was a vulnerable, insecure person who felt that she constantly needed to change herself in order to look better in the eyes of others. Grealy often felt like she failed herself or others in some way because she believed she was too

The 'Grealy 90'. Grealy believed that, after everything she had been through, she wasn’t strong enough and the world would view her as a weak person. Having half her jaw removed at a young age forced her to hide her emotions in order to be seen as strong in a body she wasn’t confident in. Not only was she compensating for a physical deformity, Grealy was also being held to a higher standard by her mother. Grealys mother believed that one must “never complain or struggle”, instilling a deep fear in Grealy of being seen as weak and incapable due to her emotions (Grealy 29). Although one could admit Grealy’s mother helped her tremendously through her procedures and taught her how to be strong in the face of adversity, the detrimental effects of the harsh disregard for Grealy’s emotions left her feeling invalidated and alone. Her vulnerability was a big source of her fear, and she turned off her emotions to fit into the box she was expected to fit into, rather than just living and accepting the emotions and fears as they came. Grealy also used many facial reconstruction surgeries to try and fit into society's expectations and to feel better in her own

Her deep-rooted insecurity from childhood drove the belief she was only valued by her physicality rather than her personality. This shows when Grealy admitted that her body was the “one thing” she felt she had “control over” and used this to validate getting facial reconstruction surgeries done over and over (Grealy 208). She often compared being “loveable” and being “ugly”, convinced you couldn't be one without the other (Grealy 211). Simply, Grealy felt a constant need to patch herself, trying to fix or cover up her disfigured jaw, hoping people would then find her attractive, and thus worthy of love. However, due to the imminent melting of a reconfigured jaw back into its malformed shape, Grealy had “cemented” the fact that she was “unloveable” (Patchett 42). She often tied her value as a human to her looks, and with society's ever-varying stance on the standards of beauty, she gave up her life and her money to change how she looked. Mainly, she hoped someone would find her attractive enough to love, but she forgot love was deeper than the skin, so she spent more time fixing her face than patching her