The Grand Grimoire began with the silliest random question Matthew
and I discussed a hundred times: How many repeat actors were there on
Supernatural?
That question became this enormous project. It is not just a database
or a fandom exercise to me. It is one of the conversations I still get
to have with my son.
What Dean Isn’t Talking About
When Dean returns from Hell at the beginning of Season 4, he tells
Sam that he does not remember what happened there. That is not true. He
remembers all of it. He is walking around, hunting monsters, making
jokes and trying to act like Dean Winchester while carrying forty years
of Hell inside him.
Four months passed for Sam. For Dean, it was forty years.
For thirty of those years, Dean was tortured. Every day, Alastair
offered to take him off the rack if Dean would become the one doing the
torturing. For thirty years, Dean refused. Eventually, he could not
endure it anymore. He accepted the offer, stepped off the rack and began
torturing other souls.
That is what Dean is not talking about.
He is not hiding only what was done to him. He is hiding what he
eventually did to escape the rack and the guilt of knowing that the
torture stopped for him when he began inflicting it on others. He
returned from Hell with the memories of being a victim and the memories
of becoming a torturer occupying the same mind.
Sam sees that his brother is hurting and wants Dean to talk to him.
Sam wants to help carry what Dean is holding. But Dean knows that saying
the words will not place Sam on that rack for forty years. A
conversation cannot make Sam see what Dean saw, feel what Dean felt or
understand what it cost him to survive.
In “Wishful Thinking,” Dean admits that he remembers everything, but
he still refuses to tell Sam the whole story. In “Heaven and Hell,” part
of that story finally comes out. Dean tells Sam how long he endured the
torture and what happened when he could not endure it anymore. By
“Family Remains,” even saving another family cannot erase what he
carries. Doing something good does not reach backward and undo Hell. It
cannot fill the hole.
What happened to Dean and what happened to me are not morally
equivalent. Dean’s confession includes the souls he tortured. My story
is about desperately trying to save my son. The parallel is not in what
we did. It is in what happens inside a person who is required to
function during something unbearable and then expected to return to
ordinary life carrying memories that ordinary language cannot hold.
Then I watched Dean Winchester sitting with Sam at the end of
Supernatural’s Season 4 episode “Wishful Thinking,” trying to
explain what remembering Hell felt like. Suddenly, I was not simply
watching Dean. I was hearing something I have been unable to put into
words since the day I tried to save Matthew.
I remember everything.
— Dean Winchester, S04E08 — Wishful Thinking
I remember every horrible second, beginning with Lydia saying,
“Karen! We have a problem! I need you now!” I remember desperately
trying to get my son’s heart pumping. I remember feeling his ribs
breaking every time I compressed his chest. I remember how blue he
was.
I remember the terror of his four-year-old daughter running through
the bedroom door, seeing me performing CPR on her daddy and asking, “Is
my daddy dead?”
I had to do something almost superhuman while maintaining calm for my
four grandchildren. I had to be Matthew’s mother, try to save my baby
and protect his children at the same time. I could not call anyone until
after the ambulance arrived because I had to concentrate on him. I had
to keep going long enough to hand him over to the paramedics and give
him a fighting chance.
I remember the police not allowing me to leave the house. I remember
nearly missing the chance to see my son for the last time at the
hospital. I made it by literal seconds. Only I was allowed to go back
and see him before the medical examiner took his body to Nashville for
the autopsy.
The things that I saw... there aren't words.
— Dean Winchester, S04E08 — Wishful Thinking
There are no words I can find that will make another person
understand what I felt or what I saw. There are no words for being torn
between saving my baby, protecting my grandchildren and somehow still
being a mother to all of them at once.
This was not simply a bad day. It was the worst of the worst days,
multiplied by a couple hundred thousand, and that still does not cross
into the territory of what that day was for me.
My sister, my mother, my husband and even my best friend keep
expecting me to talk about what I went through with Matthew. I know they
love me. I know they mean well. But talking is not magic. Talking cannot
undo what happened, and pushing me to talk cannot create words that do
not exist.
You wouldn't understand. And I could never make you understand.
— Dean Winchester, S04E08 — Wishful Thinking
There is no nice way to say, “You were not the one who felt his ribs
breaking every time you compressed his chest.” You did not see how blue
he was. You did not feel the terror when that four-year-old came running
into the room and asked whether her daddy was dead.
You cannot handle what I went through that day. I still do not know
how I managed to handle it.
How I feel... this... inside me... I wish I couldn't feel anything, Sammy. I wish I couldn't feel a damn thing.
— Dean Winchester, S04E10 — Heaven and Hell
I do not have to let anyone help me with this part. I know they mean
well, and I appreciate it, but this is one thing I must work through on
my own. I have to heal before I can begin to understand how to live as
the person who survived it. I still love myself, and if I ever stop
loving myself, I promise I will ask for help. But this is not only a
wound in my heart or my mind. I feel it massively deep in my soul.
I can't fill this hole. Not ever.
— Dean Winchester, S04E11 — Family Remains
There is no forgetting. There's no making it better.
— Dean Winchester, S04E08 — Wishful Thinking
Remembering Matthew also means remembering the trauma. Seeing his
things around the house brings it back. Getting mail for him eight
months later rips open the scar tissue. Lucas does something that
reminds me of his dad, and I call him Matthew. I have done that a lot
since January.
Holidays carry their own kind of pain. I am still Yaya, and I will
always be Matthew’s mother, but I will never receive another Mother’s
Day card from my son.
The invisible parts are creating distance between me and the people I
love because I cannot give them what they want from me. Even simple
things, like cleaning the house, have been incredibly rough. Matthew’s
belongings are here. His memories are here. The trauma is here too, even
when I try to pretend it is not.
I have said that I am not the same person I was on January 3, 2026.
She died with her son. The person speaking to you now is a very
different Karen. I just have not completely discovered who she is
yet.
Please do not tell me that time heals everything. Please do not tell
me I will eventually forget. Honestly, just tell me you are sorry he
died. I know that can feel awkward because you had nothing to do with
his death, but it is kinder and more honest than promising me that time
will erase something I know I will carry forever.
Matthew Alan DeBoard was my son. Remembering him means remembering
the funny, loving and ridiculous conversations too—including the
question that started the Grand Grimoire. How many repeat actors were
there on Supernatural?
- I am still working on the answer.
- Supernatural, Season 4, Episode 8, “Wishful Thinking,” The
CW, November 6, 2008. Dialogue spoken by Dean Winchester, portrayed by
Jensen Ackles. Quotations verified against the English subtitles in
Karen’s purchased Amazon streaming copy. - Supernatural, Season 4, Episode 10, “Heaven and Hell,” The
CW, November 20, 2008. Dialogue spoken by Dean Winchester, portrayed by
Jensen Ackles. - Supernatural, Season 4, Episode 11, “Family Remains,” The
CW, January 15, 2009. Dialogue spoken by Dean Winchester, portrayed by
Jensen Ackles.
Sources