Eileen Fenske: The Mother Behind the Mirror in The Breakaway

Overview

Eileen Fenske, Abby’s mother, appears at first as a controlling, weight-obsessed parent who sends her daughter to fat camp and monitors every meal. As the novel unfolds, Eileen’s own hidden history—a teenage struggle with obesity and a later gastric bypass surgery—reveals that her harshness toward Abby is a projection of deep-seated shame and a desperate wish to spare her daughter the same pain. The character serves as a catalyst for Abby’s body‑image conflict and, eventually, a symbol of the possibility of intergenerational healing.

Plot Role

Eileen enters the main plot in chapter 9 (Sebastian’s perspective), when she appears unannounced on the Breakaway bike trip, having been told about it by Abby’s boyfriend Mark. Her presence forces Abby to lie about how she met Sebastian and to navigate her mother’s intrusive questions about her relationship with Mark. Eileen’s role evolves from antagonist to confidante: she helps Abby secretly assist a pregnant teenager, Morgan, by distracting Morgan’s mother Lily. In chapter 41, Eileen confesses her past weight and surgery, apologizes, and supports Abby’s decision to end her relationship with Mark. Finally, in the epilogue (chapter 42), Eileen’s earlier encouragement to “call him” influences Abby’s willingness to reconnect with Sebastian.

Motivations and Traits Shown Through Actions

Eileen’s primary motivation is love—though it is expressed through control and criticism. She sends Abby to Camp Golden Hills because she remembers the cruelty she endured as a fat girl and wants Abby to “have choices.” Her obsession with Abby’s weight stems from her own unresolved pain: she burned her fat‑girl photographs and refused to discuss her past. Her actions reveal a paradoxical blend of self‑discipline and secret‑keeping: she meticulously controls her own diet while hiding the surgery that actually allowed her to lose weight. Her quickness to help Morgan, despite moral qualms about lying to another parent, shows a capacity for empathy that Abby had not previously acknowledged.

Chronological Arc

• Before the novel: Eileen was a lonely, overweight teenager who underwent gastric bypass after Abby’s birth. She erased photographic evidence of her former body and projected her shame onto Abby.
• Abby’s childhood (chapter 2): Eileen serves vegetables exclusively to Abby, criticizes her eating, and sends her to fat camp at age 13. Abby’s father complies for “peace in the house.”
• Breakaway trip (chapters 8–9): Eileen joins the bike tour, interrogates Sebastian, and pushes Abby about Mark. She later helps with Morgan’s clinic visit.
• Yom Kippur (chapter 41): Eileen shows Abby a photo of her younger self, confesses the bypass, explains her loneliness, and apologizes for her mistakes. She admits that Mark was not the right fit and urges Abby to call Sebastian.
• One year later (chapter 42): Eileen’s advice echoes in Abby’s decision to meet Sebastian. The two women have achieved a tentative, more honest relationship.

Relationships

• Abby (daughter): The central relationship. Eileen’s criticism and control created decades of resentment, but her confession opens a path to understanding. Abby realizes her mother was also a victim of diet culture.
• Mark (Abby’s ex‑boyfriend): Eileen initially approves of Mark (a Jewish doctor) but later admits to Abby that he was not a good fit, surprising her daughter.
• Sebastian (Abby’s love interest): Eileen is suspicious of Sebastian at first, but by Yom Kippur she encourages Abby to pursue him, showing growth from judgment to trust.
• Bernie (ex‑husband): Eileen married Bernie partly because she felt she had limited options; she later divorced him. She admits she doesn’t know if the marriage was based on love or lack of choice.

Key Decisions and Consequences

Theme and Symbol Connections

The novel’s central themes—body image and self‑acceptance, mother‑daughter relationships, breaking free from societal expectations, and reproductive autonomy and secrecy—all intersect in Eileen. She represents the generational transmission of body shame: the mother who passed on her own insecurities without understanding the harm. Her secret surgery symbolizes the lengths women go to conform to thinness. Her eventual honesty mirrors the novel’s emphasis on authenticity as the path to freedom. The bike itself, which Abby rides to escape her mother, becomes a symbol of agency that Eileen, in joining the trip, tentatively adopts.

Book‑Specific Questions and Answers

1. Why did Eileen never tell Abby about her gastric bypass?
The text shows Eileen was deeply ashamed of her former body and believed she was helping Abby by hiding that struggle. She feared Abby would judge her or that the confession would undermine her authority.

2. Does Eileen ever truly understand the harm she caused?
During the Yom Kippur scene, she admits she made mistakes and apologizes for making Abby feel “not beautiful.” This is presented as a sincere realization, though Abby remains ambivalent—an interpretive choice the novel leaves open.

3. Why does Eileen help Morgan get an abortion despite her own discomfort with lying to parents?
As Abby notes, Eileen immediately grasps the problem and offers help. The novel suggests that Eileen’s own history of being controlled makes her empathetic to a girl in need of agency.

4. Is Eileen’s relationship with Mark really as positive as she initially pretends?
Eileen’s praise of Mark is partly genuine (he is a successful doctor) but also reflects her fear that Abby’s options are limited. By the end, she admits Mark was not right, indicating she was projecting her own insecurities onto Abby’s choices.

5. How does Eileen’s story connect to the epigraph quotes?
Mary Wollstonecraft’s call for self‑governance connects to Eileen’s journey from control to honesty. Einstein’s metaphor of riding a bicycle to stay upright mirrors Eileen’s need to keep moving forward—she finally breaks her silence, allowing both mother and daughter to ride on together.

For deeper exploration of related themes, see our analyses of body image and self‑acceptance, reproductive autonomy and secrecy, and mother‑daughter relationships.