one big wound

i am very much interested in history and the world wars are probably what i like to find out about the most. i have a cousin who teaches the subject and last month on a long car journey at night (my favourite kind) she was telling me about world war 1 and some of its effects; she's so interesting and intelligent and i think i need to talk to her in more depth about what she knows.
anyway, yesterday i was half watching a documentary (the holocaust and my father: six million and one) about a world war 2 survivor's four children who had all grown up. one of them, david, was leading his reluctant siblings as they find out about their dad's time in the concentration camps. something i really remember is what the only daughter of this survivor, esti, said at one point:

i can't connect to this any more than i already have my whole life. i don't need this holocaust trip to know where my parents were. it's already in me, i'm one big wound. i'm trying to see it through david's eyes, trying to close those wounds. i don't need anyone to point them out. i bleed every day. do i look normal to you? did i grow up in a normal family? don't you see that everything about me is holocaust? you think you had to bring me to mauthausen to make me feel it? i'd never been there before, but i knew what it looked like.

that was so deep and i literally nearly cried. the siblings are hungarian and she speaks in their native language. there are subtitles but even they can't distract you from the emotion that comes out in her voice. i didn't catch the whole programme yesterday so i watched the whole thing on bbc iplayer today.
it fascinates me to know that there were people who survived the war and somehow managed to sort of rebuild their lives. they might have had children who are still here today and their descendants will always carry a personal part of the world's history with them. although it isn't a pleasant history, it most definitely is important.