Do you think there's any way Aaron could understand what Rachel has been through? How do you think she helps or hurts his ability to sympathize with her experiences?

Rachel often tells Aaron that he "doesn't understand." Do you think there's any way he could understand what she's been through? How do you think she helps or hurts his ability to sympathize with her experiences?

I don't believe there is any way Aaron can fully understand what Rachel has been through,but she doesn't give him a chance to. She doesn't share her experience with him or his family. I can fully understand why Rachel is afraid to share what happened and continues to haunt her.

I don't think there is any way he could understand. There are some things one must experience in order to feel them. Withholding how she feels about what she did to the young girl is a major impediment to his understanding. She needed to open herself up to him for him to sympathize rather than closing herself off.

Aaron, hard as he tries, has no way to understand what Rachel has experienced. Her unwillingness or inability to open up to him doesn’t help. She feels trapped within herself and sees no way to include him.

I agree that Rachel has not opened up to Aaron and shared with him the horrors she went through. Also she believes she has killed the young girl and that is hard for her to relate to others, especially her husband.

I do not think there is anyway that Aaron could understand what Rachel has been through one would have to live through it themselves to appreciate what does to ones fear of expressing their emotions. Thus she must first try to put these fears behind her or at least be able to live with them before sharing her past life.

I don't think Aaron could fully understand - he wasn't there - but Rachel also doesn't make much effort at helping him. I think one of the saddest parts of the book is that she's got all this STUFF running around in her head - so much baggage - that she can't seem to discuss with anyone. It was quite surprising to me that she found herself telling Tyrell things she hadn't been able to discuss with her husband or her therapist.

I don't think anyone can fully understand what it was like to be a Jew in Nazi Germany. I do think one be compassionate and sympathetic. I think Aaron did a good job of being sympathetic and trying to understand. I think Rachel shut Aaron out of that part of her life.

I don’t think Aaron could understand Rachel’s experiences during the war. Aaron tried to be supportive and sympathetic to Rachel. However Rachel let her shame and guilt keep her from accepting the compassion and love her husband offered her.

I don't think Aaron could understand what Rachel had been through, especially if she never told him anything! What frustrated me the most was that they were spending all this time and money on her therapy, and she wasn't telling the doctor anything! I was hoping that one day she would finally talk to him and he would make her understand that she was just a child and wasn't responsible for the girl in the beret's death. Even though that didn't happen, I hope that it will someday. I think she was turning a corner near the end of the book when someone died and someone else became pregnant (I don't want to give it all away), but I still feel with all the trauma and survivor guilt that she had, that she needed professional help to get over her anxiety, depression, and guilt.

I also don't think there is any way Aaron could possibly understand the horrors of what Rachel went through. It's unimaginable. I don't think Aaron really "tried" to understand either, even though Rachel did not open up and share her feelings.
Her psychiatrist didn't seem to be effective in helping Rachel work through some of her feelings, anxiety, etc. The author did a good job of portraying the stereotypes of women and men in that era - women were "crazy" if they had emotional issues and men were still stoic and strong.

I don't think that anyone can totally understand things that have happened in someone else's life. He had a very loving upbringing and even though he knows the basic details of what happened to the Jewish people during the war, there is no way that he could understand the pain of what she went through. I think Rachel did the right thing by not trying to explain it to him - it would have just frustrated her more.

Ther is no way Aaron could understand what Rachel went through. I don’t think any of us could fully comprehend the horrors the Jewish people went through. At times it helps to share things from the past with our loved ones for a sort of understanding but this was beyond that.

Although Aaron seems earnest and caring, there is no way he can fully comprehend what Rachel went through or the guilt she carries with her. Rachel seemed unable to even verbalize her experiences, which only contributed to their disconnect. Ultimately, time, and the experience of motherhood, were the forces that finally compelled Rachel to forgive her past.

I don't think Aaron is able to understand what Rachel survived. He wasn't even overseas so he has really no real connection to the atrocities. It is removed from him. Rachel doesn't help because she doesn't share what she saw or did. She internalizes it and therefore has the melt down. Americans had no understanding of what really occurred. It is shameful that we still have people in this country that deny that the Jewish Holocaust even occurred.

I dont think theres any way that Aaron could understand what Rachel has been through... even if she could find a way to talk about it, it would be difficult for anyone to fully be able to understand what she had gone through.