Elise Mask, mental health professional and researcher, unveils Ninou’s secret, breaking 30 years of denial and loyalty to reclaim her voice, in L’Aîné (Balland, 2026).  

Introduction: “The Eldest” (L’Aîné) is the story of an unspoken incest—the kind that remains hidden: sibling incest, abuse disguised as children’s games. It is the story of a tight-knit bourgeois family, seemingly above all suspicion.

It is the story of a memory suddenly emerging from its lethargy, awakened by another’s anger. It is the story of Ninou, breaking free from silence after thirty years of denial and unwavering loyalty. It is the story of a voice now unrestrained, stripped of false modesty, addressing the protagonists of yesterday and today.

The Eldest is a narrative. And it is mine.

This narrative was born from silence—a silence spanning several decades, woven from repression, denial, and survival. This is neither a theoretical text nor a clinical essay, but an intimate testimony, carried by a woman who is both a victim and a mental health professional. A psychologist, a researcher, and the author of numerous scientific publications, she steps forward here without her titles, without her markers. What she offers is her story—a descent into a fractured childhood, into the winding paths of a memory long locked away. The originality of this book lies precisely in this dual legitimacy: that of lived experience and that of professional insight. It speaks both to those who support victims in giving voice to their stories, and to those who are still searching for their own.

The preface mentions abuses “disguised as children’s games,” which raises questions about mechanisms of trivialization and non-recognition.How does clinical practice make it possible to distinguish what belongs to normative childhood exploration from what constitutes real incestuous violence? What are the risks of blindness, including for those around?

EM: Trivialization is a major issue, and undoubtedly even more acute in the case of sibling incest. It often rests on a confusion between childhood exploration and violence. There is indeed a strong temptation to reduce these situations to “children’s games” or to supposedly normal bodily curiosity. This interpretation is in reality a psychic refuge: it makes it possible not to see the violence at work.

Clinical practice nevertheless makes it possible to clearly distinguish these situations. Normative childhood exploration is generally reciprocal, occasional, without constraint or secrecy, and does not occur within a power relationship. By contrast, incest involves a transgression of fundamental prohibitions, but also a dynamic of intrafamilial violence: asymmetry of age or power, control, secrecy, and impossibility of informed consent.

In the narrative mentioned, the choice to describe explicitly what happens “behind the bedroom door” is essential. It aims precisely to remove any ambiguity and to prevent this trivialization. Naming the acts, without euphemism, makes it possible to recognize the reality of the facts.

This is an indispensable condition for making these situations visible, allowing speech, and opening the way to appropriate support — for the victim, but also for the entire family system.

The narrative takes place in a “bourgeois clan-like family above suspicion,” suggesting an environment where social appearances can reinforce silence.To what extent does the social and cultural context influence the visibility — or invisibility — of sibling incest? Are there specific forms of denial depending on social environments?

EM: I do not have solid empirical data establishing a direct link between social environment and sibling incest. However, it seems essential to emphasize that there is no typical profile: these situations can occur in all environments, whether precarious or, on the contrary, socially privileged.

The issue lies less in social class than in family functioning. Incest is never explained solely by the presence of a “deviant” individual: it is part of a relational system that, in one way or another, makes the establishment and repetition of abuse possible.

Some families highly valued socially, perceived as exemplary, united, and harmonious, can paradoxically reinforce the invisibility of this violence. When a family appears “above suspicion,” it becomes more difficult to question, both from the outside and from within.

Yet every family is marked by tensions, conflicts, and adjustments. It is their verbalization and regulation that ensure healthy functioning. The apparent absence of these movements should, on the contrary, invite vigilance.

The preface describes a memory “emerging from its lethargy,” awakened by the anger of a third party.How can these phenomena of delayed recollection be understood from a psychic point of view? What roles do affects — notably anger — play in lifting denial and accessing memory?

EM: This is a central question, and often difficult for those around to understand: why does a traumatic memory sometimes “return” decades later? In reality, it is not a memory that disappeared and then suddenly reappeared. Traumatic memory is continuously active, but in a particular form: fragmented, sensory, often not verbalized.

The body plays an essential role here. It retains a trace of traumatic experiences that escapes time: for it, there is no clear difference between past and present. Thus, certain stimuli — a smell, a situation, a gesture — can reactivate states of intense distress, without the person immediately understanding why. In L’aîné, the urological examination triggers a state of shock: the body “remembers” even before the mind gives meaning.

For years, different defense mechanisms make it possible to contain this memory: denial, dissociation, control, hyperactivity. They function like watertight compartments that prevent the trauma from invading psychic life.

But sometimes an event, apparently trivial, exceeds these regulatory capacities. Here, the partner’s anger acts as a major trigger, because it resonates with deep issues related to the body, desire, and guilt.

At that moment, defenses give way: it is not the memory that returns, it is the person who finally becomes capable of encountering it. The memory can no longer be kept at a distance, and a process of working-through becomes possible — and necessary — often with the help of a third party.

The testimony highlights “thirty years of denial and unwavering loyalty” before the emergence of an “unrestrained” speech.How do you analyze these dynamics of family loyalty that maintain silence? What, in an individual trajectory, ultimately allows the rupture of this implicit pact and access to addressed speech?

EM: The dynamics of family loyalty that maintain silence are part of a process in several stages. Before revelation, loyalty is often absolute. It is based on secrecy, but also on a deep sense of guilt. The victim may experience themselves as complicit: they feel ashamed, think they participated, notably because their body reacted or they could not oppose. This guilt fuels silence.

To this is added a strong dependence on the family system. In some configurations, the clan functions as a closed space, structuring each person’s identity. There is then a fear that by speaking, everything will collapse: relationships, one’s place, even the very feeling of existing.

Revelation often occurs under constraint. It erupts more than it is decided. And yet, even at that moment, the hope persists that everything can continue “as before.” This expectation is rarely realistic. Speech disrupts the balance of the system, and may be met with denial, or even accusations, reinforcing the sense of fault.

Finally, there is often a phase of exclusion. When the family cannot integrate the revealed reality, it rejects the one who speaks. This rejection constitutes an additional trauma. But it can also mark a necessary rupture: leaving the system makes it possible to free oneself from an alienating loyalty and to open a path toward reconstruction, for oneself and for one’s own children.

What’s your perspective on the words of Boris Cyrulnik?

EM: I have deep respect for the journey of Boris Cyrulnik, both on a human and scientific level. His work is not limited to the dissemination of the concept of resilience, even if he has been a remarkable transmitter of it to the general public. He has also contributed significantly to the articulation between neuroscience, ethology, and developmental psychology, by shedding light on the links between brain functioning, early attachments, and life trajectories. He has this rare ability to bring people together, to transmit with clarity and humanity, and to make complex questions accessible without oversimplifying them, always with deep benevolence.

His own journey, marked by the ordeals of childhood — notably as a Jewish child hidden during the war — gives a particular resonance to his commitment. He has managed to transform this experience into a force directed toward understanding others, which nourishes a perspective that is both lucid and deeply empathetic.

It is therefore a real honor that he agreed to write the preface to this work. The form he chose, that of a “letter to Élise,” demonstrates great clinical finesse and remarkable sensitivity. His text accompanies without ever confining, illuminates without judging, and opens a space of recognition that seems essential to me.

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)