The Tower and the Trade: Rapunzel and Generational Trauma

We all know the story of Rapunzel. The girl locked in a tower. The golden braid she lets down. The prince who climbs it. The healing tears that restore his sight.

But the real story begins earlier — long before the rescue, the story of Rapunzel's generational trauma.

Rapunzel’s mom was pregnant. She wanted rampion — a leafy green — growing in a witch’s garden.

“If I can’t have it,” she told her husband, “I’ll die.”

So Rapunzel’s dad, trying to keep the peace, climbed the wall, stole the plant, and was caught.

The witch said: “You may go. But I’ll take the child.”

And her dad? He didn’t argue. He didn’t offer himself. He simply said yes. A child was traded before she took her first breath. That’s generational trauma.

Not all inheritance is visible. Some is passed in silence.

We carry:

 • Guilt no one talks about.

 • Roles cast before we were born.

 • Shame disguised as duty.

 • Emotional contracts signed before we arrived.

A silence passed down like family silver.

What the Research Says

Dr. Marshall Duke and Dr. Robyn Fivush found that children who know the full arc of their family story — the ups and the downs — are more resilient and more grounded. Because when you know others have fallen and recovered, you stop needing life to be perfect. You learn that struggle is survivable. And that recovery is part of the pattern.

So let’s return to the tower. Because one day, like Rapunzel, you wake up and ask: “Why am I stuck? What am I still paying for? And what do I have to climb out with?”

That golden hair — once used by others to reach her — becomes her ladder. Because she was never just the girl in the tower. She was the one who was traded, yes — but also the one who transformed.

When the witch cast her out, Rapunzel didn’t wither. She found her prince in exile. And when he returned to her, blind and broken, she wept — and her tears healed him.

That is the power she carried all along. Not just escape, but restoration. Not just survival, but sight. She didn’t just end the story — she rewrote the inheritance. And maybe that’s the final gift: not freedom from what we’ve been given, but the strength to transform it.