Category Archives: book reviews

book reviews, healthcare

A review of Amy Silverstein’s My Glory Was I Had Such Friends: A Memoir…

On April 18 of this year, the New York Times ran a beautifully written op-ed by the author, Amy Silverstein. I knew who Amy Silverstein was, because about 15 years ago, I read her amazing book, Sick Girl, which she published in 2007. Reading Sick Girl was life changing for me. At the time, we were living in Germany the first time, and I had ordered the hard copy of the book, because I didn’t own a Kindle. I’m not even sure if Kindles existed at that time. I think I decided to buy Silverstein’s book about her experiences as a heart transplant recipient after reading a review of Sick Girl in People. I love books about real life health crises… or, at least I used to love them when I was younger and the crises seemed less like something I might experience personally.

I read Sick Girl in 2008 and reviewed it for Epinions.com. I reposted my review here, combining it with another review I wrote about a book called Change of Heart, which was written by Claire Sylvia, another transplant recipient. The two books were very striking to me, as they had such different moods to them. Claire Sylvia’s book about being a double transplant recipient (heart and lung) was overwhelmingly positive and grateful. After she wrote her book, Claire Sylvia went on to also receive a kidney transplant. She died August 19, 2009, 21 years after her heart and lung transplant.

Amy Silverstein’s book, Sick Girl, by contrast, was a lot more negative and honest. Silverstein wrote a no holds barred account of what it actually means to be a transplant recipient. She received her first heart in 1988, when as a 25 year old law student, she had health problems that revealed a congenital heart defect. In Sick Girl, Silverstein explained that many people believe that organ transplants are miraculous cures for people whose organs fail. But really, organ transplants just trade one health problem for another, as recipients have to take medications that keep their immune systems from destroying the foreign organs. Amy Silverstein had a life expectancy of about ten years in 1988, after she accepted a heart belonging to a 13 year old girl who happened to die in an accident at just the right time to save Amy’s life.

In 2007, when Sick Girl was published, Amy had already defied her doctors’ expectations for her survival by an additional ten years. But even though she’d had 19 years, when she was expected to only have ten, and even though she’d become a wife and adopted her son, Casey, Amy had seriously contemplated suicide. She was tired of being a “sick girl”. In 2005, when Amy was thinking about taking her own life, she was fixated on how difficult the regime was, and how she didn’t want to live that way anymore.

When I read Amy’s book, written a couple of years after she had those suicidal feelings, I empathized. I could totally understand why she was so tired of being sick and tired all the time. She had to submit to a grueling regime that included procedures like heart biopsies, and taking medications that made her throw up and put her at risk for every virus in the atmosphere. A simple cold could leave her bedridden for weeks. And people didn’t understand what it was like for her and made clueless comments that were infuriating in their innocence… and ignorance. So she wrote her book to educate the masses.

Not everyone liked Sick Girl. A lot of people thought Amy Silverstein was ungrateful and unpleasant. Some people found her whiny and self-absorbed. Quite a few folks seem to believe that anyone who gets an organ transplant should shut up and be eternally grateful, even if they are constantly sick and having to see doctors for painful, invasive, and expensive treatments and screenings. I, for one, heartily disagree, because if no one ever complained about the experience of having transplanted organs, scientists and doctors would never know what to improve about the experience for future patients. Moreover, I don’t think that just because someone gets a new lease on life, they should be expected to just shut up and act happy. I also don’t believe Amy Silverstein was ungrateful.

Amy’s first heart lasted an astonishing 24 years, before it started to fail due to the ravages of her immune system, antibodies that her body developed to attack the heart, and the many powerful anti-rejection drugs she had to take to stay alive. She needed another heart transplant, but having undergone one already and knowing what receiving a second heart would mean for her, Amy Silverstein hesitated. But then she got by with a little help from her friends.

***

In 2017, Amy Silverstein wrote another book, titled My Glory Was I Had Such Friends: A Memoir. I downloaded the book in September 2020, but never got around to reading it until this month. I read it after reading Amy Silverstein’s obituary in The New York Times, which appeared just a few weeks after her lovely essay, titled “My Transplanted Heart and I Will Die Soon”, appeared in mid April. In the essay, Silverstein wrote that she had taken excellent care of her second heart, which she received in 2012. However, because of the drugs she had taken since 1988, Amy developed several types of cancer. From the op-ed:

Organ transplantation is mired in stagnant science and antiquated, imprecise medicine that fails patients and organ donors. And I understand the irony of an incredibly successful and fortunate two-time heart transplant recipient making this case, but my longevity also provides me with a unique vantage point. Standing on the edge of death now, I feel compelled to use my experience in the transplant trenches to illuminate and challenge the status quo.

Over the last almost four decades a toxic triad of immunosuppressive medicines — calcineurin inhibitors, antimetabolites, steroids — has remained essentially the same with limited exceptions. These transplant drugs (which must be taken once or twice daily for life, since rejection is an ongoing risk and the immune system will always regard a donor organ as a foreign invader) cause secondary diseases and dangerous conditions, including diabetes, uncontrollable high blood pressure, kidney damage and failure, serious infections and cancers. The negative impact on recipients is not offset by effectiveness: the current transplant medicine regimen does not work well over time to protect donor organs from immune attack and destruction.

After I read the New York Times op-ed in April, I remembered that I had downloaded Amy Silverstein’s second book about her second heart transplant, and how her friends had helped her (and her husband, Scott) through the experience. I made a mental note to read that book, but didn’t get to it until I read Amy’s obituary, which ran in the New York Times on May 16, 2023. Amy died on May 5, 2023. Two weeks after reading about her death, I’ve finished reading My Glory Was I Had Such Friends. Once again, I’m left very moved and better educated about organ transplants than I was before I read the book.

Although Amy’s op-ed indicates that transplant science hasn’t changed a lot since the late 80s, when she received her first heart, her second book indicates that things have actually changed somewhat. Because of her unusual circumstances, and the fact that she’d had her first heart for so long, Amy Silverstein was advised to go to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California, which has the most advanced transplant program in the United States. Amy’s first heart transplant was done in New York, and she’d spent the ensuing decades seeing doctors in New York. But even though they knew her better than anyone else, her doctors told her she should be treated by Dr. Jon Kobashigawa, a renowned transplant surgeon there. So that’s what Amy did. She packed and went cross country for treatment in Los Angeles. But she needed help, and that’s where her posse of friends came into the picture. They all had their own unique strengths that helped Amy survive in her hour of need.

Amy Silverstein was blessed with several female friends who loved her dearly. And those friends picked up their lives to be with Amy and her husband, Scott, as they waited for a new heart to become available to her. It was a very difficult time, and in the brutally honest and somewhat negative style of her first book, Silverstein explains how difficult it was… and how much a lot of it really sucked. Again, I could hardly blame her. Some of what she endured sounded absolutely horrifying. Also, as Amy got older, she became much less interested in indulging the egos of some of the people who treated her. I found her stories of what she endured both fascinating and dreadful… and again, I could hardly blame her for complaining. Meanwhile, she had these devoted friends who were there for her, in spite of Amy’s apparently difficult and demanding personality. There must have been good reasons for them to love her as much as they obviously did.

When I read the reviews on Amazon.com, I wasn’t surprised to see that, once again, some readers found Amy Silverstein abrasive and ungrateful. And, once again, I think they missed the point and probably didn’t think very long and hard about what Amy was enduring. As the negative reviewers complained about Amy Silverstein’s apparent lack of gratitude, they failed to have any empathy for her situation. It’s easy to think that if you or I were in such a grave situation, we wouldn’t be perfect patients, endlessly patient, sweet, compliant, and never once failing to constantly thank everyone profusely. But the reality is, if you are, yourself, in that situation, cooped up in a hospital room, unable to breathe or sleep, using a pacemaker that constantly sends painful shocks into your body because your heart is so diseased, and not even able to enjoy sunlight or fresh air, your attitude might suck, too. You might become demanding and unpleasant. Moreover, I don’t think Amy Silverstein was, at all, ungrateful.

If Amy Silverstein had really been an ungrateful patient, she never would have lived for as long as she did. Amy Silverstein respected both of her donors by taking excellent care of both hearts. An ungrateful person would not have done that. They would have simply given up, stopped taking their medications with the unpleasant side effects, quit seeing their doctors, and just up and died. Amy’s second donor was also a thirteen year old girl, who had been an athlete. After she received her second heart, Amy recovered within weeks. She went running, because she felt well… In fact, she felt better than she had since before her first transplant. Of course she was grateful! And she got another ten years to enjoy that heart before she died… not because the heart failed, but because of the drugs she had to take to keep it beating. I would imagine that the COVID-19 pandemic was especially hard for Amy, who was regularly wearing face masks years ago, because she was a transplant patient.

When I read My Glory Was I Had Such Friends, I could relate to Amy Silverstein’s story, and I knew she wasn’t blowing any smoke up my ass about what it’s like to be a transplant recipient. Yes, it’s important to be grateful, but as I mentioned up post, if no one ever complains, then improvements can’t be made. No one would ever see the need for improvements. That makes it harder for the patients of the future. Moreover, sometimes people should be told the brutally honest truth, so they can have a more realistic perspective. Yes, organ transplants are kind of miraculous, but they aren’t a cure. Amy Silverstein helped me realize how fine the line is between life and death for transplant patients. She would have turned 60 on June 3rd of this year, and she managed to accomplish so much in her lifetime. No one expected her to live beyond age 35, yet here we are. Maybe the reason she did live for so long is because she was so very “difficult” and “demanding”. Not complaining might have meant giving in… and giving up.

Anyway, I really enjoyed both of Amy Silverstein’s books, and I am grateful that she shared her experiences so candidly. I agree that sometimes she was negative, and I’m sure some staff at the hospitals she attended thought of her as a pain in the ass. But, I found Amy’s accounts of her experiences authentic, realistic, and important, and she is a very expressive writer.

I’m glad Amy didn’t simply shut up and stop whining. Those who found Amy insufferable can now take comfort that she won’t ever bother anyone again with her “negativity”, but she no doubt taught countless healthcare professionals through her remarkable case and astonishing longevity. Anyone who regularly reads my blog probably knows that I’m big on being real and occasionally “inappropriate”, warts and all. For me, Amy Silverstein’s books check all the boxes. I highly recommend them both.

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bad TV, book reviews, fashion, fiction, narcissists

A review of The Wig, The Bitch, & The Meltdown, by Jay Manuel…

In a recent blog post, I mentioned that I was reading Jay Manuel’s 2020 novel, The Wig, The Bitch, & The Meltdown. In that post, I wrote that I understood and appreciated what Jay Manuel was doing with his first novel. He was processing trauma by turning it into a fun fictionalized read. I’ve done the same thing on multiple occasions, so I already had a warm feeling about Manuel’s debut into fiction.

I also can’t stand Tyra Banks, even though I watched her reality show for years. My devotion to America’s Next Top Model was less about idolizing a retired supermodel than watching a trainwreck. I don’t actually care much about fashion, and those who have seen me in person can attest to that. I just find narcissists fascinating, even if I want to keep them at an arm’s length. ANTM was chock full of narcissists, and its resident Queen Bee, Tyra Banks, was the most toxic of them all… as far as I can tell, anyway. Obviously, I’ve never met Tyra in person, but I have heard what she says and observed how she behaves. She makes my N chimes ring even louder than Meghan Markle does.

I downloaded Jay Manuel’s satirical novel about reality TV modeling competitions back in January 2022. I decided to read the book when I started watching episodes of ANTM while Bill was away in Bavaria. As I watched ANTM and cringed, I read up on Jay Manuel and his now non-existent relationship with Tyra Banks. I remembered that they once used to be friends. What happened?

Well… Jay wrote his book, and that sure didn’t help their friendship. But there was a lot that led up to the book being written, and having been around a lot of narcissists myself, I spotted all of the red flags in The Wig, The Bitch, & The Meltdown. Clearly Mr. Manuel had loads of experiences and incidents to fuel his creativity when he penned his novel. If only a fraction of the crazy in this novel has any basis in truth, Jay Manuel went through Hell to birth this book. And the price of writing the book was losing his “friends” from ANTM, as it was reported that Tyra Banks was angry about the novel. She allegedly asked people from ANTM not to interact with Jay, or help promote the book. Apparently, people from ANTM value relationships with Tyra enough to grant her request/demand.

I can understand why Tyra Banks would be upset about Jay Manuel’s novel. The novel is clearly based on Jay Manuel’s relationship with her and others from ANTM, even though the book is fiction. I’m sure she sees him as disloyal, and narcissists can’t abide disloyalty. Moreover, Jay Manuel really took the piss out of Tyra, including plots that were obviously based on things that actually happened on the show. The end result, for a reader like me, is pure entertainment and occasional laugh out loud moments. Obviously, Tyra Banks doesn’t want to be laughed at, and even though she’s made a lot of money and become very powerful in the entertainment business, she doesn’t want to be upstaged in any way.

Jay Manuel is still not as powerful as Tyra is– or was– (like Donald Trump, she seems to have lost some of her popularity). However, writing this book probably boosted his prestige. I was definitely impressed by the imagination and creativity he showed in his novel. There’s a good reason why Jay Manuel was the creative director on ANTM for so many years. On the other hand, a lot of what he writes was obviously inspired by crazy stuff that actually happened on the show.

So… on with the plot…

Pablo Michaels (Jay’s alter ego) is the silver haired, silver eyed creative director of a reality show called Model Muse. It’s a rip off of America’s Next Top Model, set in the present. I mention that the novel is set in the present because Manuel mentions a lot of technology that didn’t exist when ANTM started in 2003, or even when it finally ended in 2018. He seems particularly wedded to Apple products, as he mentions them a lot in the book.

Pablo is not naturally silver eyed or silver haired. This is a look that the supermodel he works for, Keisha Kash (Kash is perhaps a play on the last name, Banks?), wants him to look that way. Pablo and Keisha met when they were both a lot less famous, and they were friends. Over the years, they had shared a lot of pints of Dulce de Leche ice cream. Pablo had become Keisha’s rock, fixing things that went wrong, and always having Keisha’s back. She started her reality show, and he was the one person she trusted to be the creative director. She was right to trust him, though the job means that he never gets any time to himself, nor can he do things that he wants to do.

Pablo and Keisha work with other “legends” from the fashion industry. Noted British fashion photographer, Mason Hughes (modeled after Nigel Barker) is onhand, as is the world’s “first” supermodel, Sasha Barenson (Janice Dickinson). Miss Thing (J. Alexander– Miss J.) serves as a judge and a runway coach. Joe Vong (perhaps Ken Mok) is an executive producer. And De La Renta (perhaps Sutan and/or Christian Marc combined) is in charge of hair and makeup.

Sasha still wears a size four dress, even though she’s in her 60s. But she constantly nurses a sippy cup full of “water” that smells a lot like Chardonnay. Mason is “happily married” to a boyish looking Indian woman, although he seems to like men. Miss Thing is hilarious and witty, but also a bit catty and two-faced. Joe Vong has created many successful reality TV shows, but is completely dictatorial and manic. And De La Renta, like Pablo, seems to be one of the “good” guys who cares about the models somewhat. Keisha’s mother Brenda Paris (Tyra’s mom, Carolyn London) is in prison for trying to steal jewelry from a safe at the morgue where she worked as a photographer. Carolyn London, in real life, is a medical photographer. Tyra always presented her mother as wonderful, but in Jay’s novel, she’s a criminal.

Pablo Michaels is doing all he can to keep the show together, as Keisha and the rest of the cast misbehave in a multitude of ways, showing a complete lack of regard for those who aren’t narcissists. Pablo ties to be the voice of reason as Keisha does everything she can to make more money, become more famous, and expand her brand. Manuel really went to town on this– bringing up Tyra Banks’ memorable foray into the music business by making Keisha release a song, even though she’s tone deaf. In real life, Jay Manuel studied opera, and presumably, he can sing. I’ve heard Tyra’s song, and as a musician myself, it didn’t impress me.

I dunno about this… This was one of the challenges for the models, but she barely used them. The video was all about Tyra.

Manuel also covers Tyra’s attempts at writing, as he has Keisha write a novel. Tyra also famously wrote a novel for teenagers. I have it downloaded, but I can’t seem to bring myself to read it. Maybe I’ll punish myself by reading it soon.

Throughout the book Manuel skillfully illustrates the classic ways of a malignant narcissist, to include having Keisha have a huge meltdown in panel. Tyra Banks also famously screamed at a contestant in Cycle 4, angry that the young woman wasn’t “upset” enough about being cut. The circumstances of Keisha’s meltdown are somewhat different, but the behavior he describes is the same as what all ANTM fans witnessed when they watched that episode.

More outrageous behaviors are described, and if you were a viewer of ANTM during its prime years, when Mr. Jay and Miss J. were on it, you will easily recognize some of the contestants. Manuel blends some of them into new people, including some famous and memorable statements some of them uttered during the show’s run. Some of the incidents are clearly based on things that happened on the show, but others are pretty diabolical (and hilarious) mashups based on things that a malignant narcissist supermodel might do. The part about the wig, for instance, is pretty scandalous. If you’ve ever seen one of Tyra Banks’ famously crappy makeovers, you might have a good laugh… as you also cringe in horror.

Manuel’s writing is often pretty snarky, and there’s a lot of objectionable (but believable) language in this novel. Sometimes, I wish he’d hired an editor. He misspells some words and names. For instance, he repeatedly refers to Mommie Dearest (the book and movie about Joan Crawford, written by her adoptive daughter, Christina Crawford), but he spells it Mommy Dearest. He refers to “door jams”, rather than “door jambs”. He also employs some words that are what one might call “fifty cent words”. At times, he doesn’t quite use them correctly, or he uses them when a simpler word would better suffice.

I got a kick out of how Manuel describes Keisha, who is obviously based on Tyra in almost every way. He repeatedly writes about Keisha’s “creepy” little girl voice. If you’ve seen ANTM, you know what he’s referring to, as Tyra does the same thing. He describes what she looks like, and her tendency to not like contestants who look, in any way, like her. Manuel also makes Model Muse rigged– blatantly stating that the winners were chosen long before the runway show at the end of the season. I don’t know if that’s actually how it worked on ANTM, but I’ve always suspected that the winners were ringers. What’s sad to me is that a lot of the young women, who tried out for that show, legitimately thought it would open doors for them. Although some contestants went on to form careers in entertainment, only a few became legitimate working models.

Overall

I enjoyed Jay Manuel’s book, The Wig, The Bitch, & The Meltdown. I found it a fun and entertaining read. I’ve seen a lot of people saying that Manuel isn’t much better than Tyra Banks is. I don’t know if that’s true, but he does appear to have some real talents. I think it would be pretty difficult for him to have an ego larger than Tyra’s. Moreover, while I think Tyra has some talents in terms of self-promotion, I also think she totally got off on being worshiped by the contestants on the show, even when she gave bullshit advice, contradicted herself, or cut them for ridiculous reasons. Jay, at least, seemed to have some sensitivity… and he has the excuse that he wasn’t the boss of the show. Tyra was. He was working at her behest.

I found some of the elements of Jay’s personal story– which he weaved into Pablo’s story– fascinating. Jay Manuel was born in the United States and grew up in Canada. He was adopted when he was a baby, and he puts part of that story into the book. Jay also has a very interesting racial makeup; many people think he’s Hispanic, but he’s actually got Italian, Czech, and South African ancestry and thinks of himself as Black.

I think I’d give The Wig, The Bitch, and The Meltdown four stars out of five. I don’t read a lot of novels anymore, but I legitimately enjoyed Jay’s snarkfest. I laughed out loud several times, or just exclaimed in disbelief; I think that counts for a lot. I also liked the ending. I found it very satisfying.

I’m taking off a star for the editing glitches, although I am impressed by how well-written the book is, given that Jay Manuel isn’t primarily a writer. I hope he’ll write another novel, and next time, hire an editor to give it some polish. And I hope he’s as likable in real life as he is in his writing and on television… although I’m sure those who knew him on Top Model are probably no longer sending him any emails. 😉

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book reviews, mental health, psychology

A review of Good Girls: A Story and Study of Anorexia, by Hadley Freeman…

Leave it to Amazon’s suggestive selling feature to sell me things I didn’t think I wanted. Before last month, I had not heard of journalist Hadley Freeman, or her new book, Good Girls: A Story and Study of Anorexia, which was published on April 18, 2023. Now that I’ve just finished reading Freeman’s personal story about her experiences with anorexia, along with anecdotes from people she knew when she spent months in eating disorder programs in London, I can say that I’d definitely read another one of her books. She has a very engaging style, and her talent for turning phrases makes her writing interesting and an overall pleasure to read.

I also enjoyed Hadley Freeman’s story, because she and I are somewhat close in age. I’m almost six years older than she is. There was a time when that would have been a significant age gap, but once you get to middle age, that gap really isn’t so wide anymore. Her book was interesting to me, because we were young at the same time. I got a lot of the cultural references she made. Good Girls is about her experiences with anorexia nervosa, but it’s also about the experiences of people she met while “in hospital”. A number of the women she interviewed are my age or slightly older. I could relate to them and their stories because of that closeness in age.

Freeman included some interesting anecdotes about some of the cases involving her fellow patients that invite more research and study for my blog. Regular readers know I’m a sucker for a scandalous story, and she made me aware of a couple of them in her book. Perhaps on a day when I have writer’s block, I will think to revisit Good Girls and be reminded of those stories, which I will then write about. As I’ve discovered through blogging since 2010, I’m not the only one who is a sucker for a scandal… even the low level ones that are only interesting on a local level. 😉

Everyone has a story, and Hadley Freeman is no different. She is a British-American journalist who was born to a Jewish family in New York City. Freeman spent her early life in New York, where her father worked in finance. Freeman has dual American and British citizenship, and continues to live and work in both countries.

When Hadley was eleven years old, her family moved to London, and Hadley was plunged into a similar, but different culture. I could relate to that. I was born in Virginia, but moved to England when I was about three years old. I stayed in England until I was almost six years old. Although I was in England as an “Air Force brat”, that experience really left a mark on me, and I can remember being bewildered when we moved back to the US, having doubled in age. Granted, Hadley Freeman was eleven when she moved, so surely she had a concept of countries and continents and such. But there are some significant differences between life in the United States and life in England. As Freeman points out, New York and London, though both big cities, are very different. Hadley had some trouble adjusting.

When she was about fourteen years old, Hadley began suffering from anorexia nervosa severe enough to land her in the hospital. She spent the next three years in and out of different psychiatric hospitals in London, occasionally being treated by an arrogant doctor who apparently did more harm than good. Most of the hospitals where Freeman was treated are not specifically named in this book; Freeman does mention one clinic that was eventually renamed where a fellow patient had spent time and was exposed to a predatory male nurse. I did some preliminary research about the nurse and found his case was covered in the news. I’ll be reading more about him.

Freeman’s experiences put her in contact with other people who suffered from eating disorders, including a few men. Not everyone she met had anorexia; some were diagnosed with bulimia, while others were compulsive or binge eaters. Because the hospitals were residential, she had the opportunity to get to know the other patients. She eventually lost contact with her fellow patients, as social media wasn’t a “thing” in those days, and she had been discouraged from keeping in touch with them. Therapists had told her that staying in contact with other people with eating disorders could encourage her to keep up the destructive behaviors that had led to anorexia.

Years after her final release from hospitals, Hadley Freeman decided to reach out to some of her old friends. She found that a number of them were eager to speak to her about their experiences. So, while Freeman writes about her time on the eating disorder wards in the 1990s, she also includes stories from others she knew back then. In one case, the story didn’t come from the fellow patient, as she had died by her own hand. Instead, Freeman spoke to the woman’s family. This particular patient was a talented actress who had starred in some television and theatrical shows before she ended her life. I had not heard of her before I read Good Girls, but I looked her up and now I want to know more about her.

The theories and treatment modalities for treating eating disorders were different in the 1990s than they are today. I read several Amazon reviews from irate readers claiming that Freeman’s book is “dangerous” because she doesn’t delve into the most recent research regarding eating disorder treatment. I don’t think this book is supposed to be about current treatments or theories. It’s a memoir. Freeman is writing about her experiences in the 1990s. There is an audience of people who would be interested in reading about Freeman’s experiences during that era, even if the information she includes is not as useful to people who suffer from eating disorders today.

Many years ago, I read Cherry Boone O’Neill’s 1982 book, Starving For Attention. Cherry Boone O’Neill is Pat Boone’s eldest daughter. She suffered most extensively from anorexia nervosa in the 1970s. Her book includes theories and treatment modalities from that time, which would probably be thought of as “wrong” and “dangerous” today (even though Cherry ultimately survived and has five adult children). I wouldn’t go to Cherry’s book for information about how to help someone with an eating disorder in 2023. I don’t think that’s its purpose. It’s a story about her experiences, which has worth in and of itself. I think I feel the same way about Hadley Freeman’s book, Good Girls.

I wouldn’t recommend Good Girls to a worried parent or spouse of someone with an eating disorder, desperate for solutions or answers as to why eating disorders happen. There are other books written by experts for that purpose. Freeman does include comments from physicians and mental health professionals about today’s treatments, but I didn’t really feel like that was the main idea of her book.

Freeman eventually became a “functional anorexic”, after “cramming” at different British schools to pass her “A-levels”. She wound up earning her university degree at Oxford University, and then curiously embarked on a career as a fashion journalist. She found she had an “in” with people in the fashion industry, because she was very thin. After about ten years of that, she moved on to other areas. She’s written for The Guardian and The Telegraph, and she has also penned other books. I enjoyed Good Girls enough that I would seek out her other books– after I’ve read a few that have been sitting in the “to be read” queue for awhile.

I do wish Freeman had expanded a bit more on the British education and healthcare systems. I wouldn’t have expected an in depth explanation per se, but a little bit of information about the differences between the U.S. and British systems may have been helpful to the many American readers whom I suspect will read this book. The U.S. healthcare system is much more expensive for consumers than the British system is. Freeman also mentions “sectioning”, which could be a foreign concept to US readers, as the U.S. system doesn’t really have “sectioning”, which allows healthcare professionals and family members to involuntarily commit adults for mental health treatment for illnesses that are life threatening.

Yes, a person can be involuntarily committed in the United States, but it’s my understanding that the system is broader in Britain, which allows for commitment for illnesses like anorexia nervosa that put a person’s life at risk. In the United States, the criteria for commitment is set by individual states and is more focused on an individual’s civil rights and potential for harming or killing other people. A look at the number of people who have been recently killed by gun violence in the United States might offer a clue at the discrepancy between the U.S.’s system and Britain’s system.

Overall, I’m glad I read Good Girls. I know a lot of people with eating disorders might not like it and will protest that it lacks value due to its “dangerous and outdated” discussions of eating disorder treatments and theories from the early 90s. I would like to remind those readers that discussions about past treatments and theories are still worth reading about, if only because they provide a historic view of how things were handled in the past. History is useful, as it offers a look at where we’ve already been. This book isn’t a volume on how to treat eating disorders in 2023, although it does include some commentary from healthcare professionals of today. It’s mostly a memoir, and should be regarded as such.

On a side note… maybe one distressing side effect of reading Good Girls is that Freeman mentions the fashion industry and certain models of the 1990s and 00s. Because of that, I fell down a rabbit hole, watching America’s Next Top Model. Talk about toxic! I’ve written about that show a few times, but I have a feeling this latest look will spawn some fresh content… particularly after I watched Cycle 8, which starred Renee Alway and the late Jael Strauss. I hadn’t watched ANTM in years, but I’m hooked again, and I think it merits some discussion. So stay tuned, if that piques your interest.

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book reviews, celebrities, narcissists, politics, sports

Reviewing Nadia Comaneci and the Secret Police: A Cold War Escape…

A couple of years ago, I became aware of a new book about legendary Romanian women’s gymnastics champion, Nadia Comaneci. The book, titled Nadia Comaneci and the Secret Police: A Cold War Escape, was written by Romanian author, Stejarel Olaru, and published in 2021. For a long time, it was only available in Romanian. I was very eager to read this book, because not only am I fascinated with old school women’s gymnastics, but I’m also intrigued by Cold War politics, particularly in Romania.

Although I haven’t yet visited Romania, I have read several books about the Ceaușescu era, and watched some really interesting films about Romania before the fall of the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc states. So, the prospect of reading about Nadia’s experiences in Romania after she became a national treasure was very exciting for me. I was very pleased to see that the book was going to be translated into English (and other languages).

I just finished the Kindle English translated edition of Nadia Comaneci and the Secret Police: A Cold War Escape. Stejarel Olaru’s book was translated by Alistair Ian Blyth and made available in the US Amazon store this month. I had originally pre-ordered a print edition; that’s how much I wanted to read this book. I canceled that order when I realized I could get the Kindle edition sooner. As of just a little while ago, I have finished reading after a couple of weeks of effort. I’m glad to be finished with the book, which was very interesting, although less exciting than I had expected it to be.

I want to be very clear. This is NOT a book about Nadia’s life story. Elements of her life story and some information about her family are in the book, of course, as it’s not possible to deliver this story without those elements. But it’s important to note that this book is ultimately about the high price Nadia Comaneci paid when she made history at the 1976 Summer Olympic Games in Montreal. Those who read this book should also come with some knowledge of who Nicolae and Elena Ceaușescu were, and what their regime was like. Remember that until the former Romanian president and his wife were executed by firing squad on Christmas Day in 1989, Romania’s government was an oppressive totalitarian regime.

One month before the Ceaușescus were executed, Nadia Comaneci defected with several other Romanians. She did so out of desperation. She couldn’t take life as it existed under Ceaușescu and his Securitate (Secret Police) anymore. But Nadia was a “national treasure”, and as such, she was highly valued by the Romanian dictator’s regime. Nadia worked very hard to be able to achieve Olympic greatness, but after she reached that pinnacle, she was rewarded with constant surveillance at home… phone taps, interrogations, and constant pressure to maintain her physical prowess in a sport where it’s common to retire while still very young, especially at the elite level.

Olaru’s book begins in November 1989, when Nadia undertook her daring escape to Hungary with a group of more average citizens. The group fled across fields during a frigid night. The Romanian border guards missed them, but they were picked up by the Hungarians, who were shocked to find the famous gymnast among those who were fleeing. The Hungarians were going to let Nadia go, and send the rest of the party back to Romania. Nadia, being a team player, spoke up and said that she wouldn’t be going without the rest of the group.

Nadia in 1990, just after she left Romania. If she’d waited a month, she wouldn’t have had to defect.

Very soon after her illegal border crossing, Nadia was on her way to New York City. She lost a lot when she defected; the man she left with was a married man who abused her. A lot of Americans had a negative impression of her in the weeks after she defected. I remember reading a 1990 era Life Magazine article that really made Nadia out to be kind of lowbrow, implying that she was bulimic and a bit of a skank. The reality was, the man was basically holding her prisoner, beating her, and exploiting her for money.

Upon arrival in the United States, Nadia Comaneci requested and was granted political asylum. I remember watching Nadia in the news, as this was going on during my senior year of high school. I barely knew who she was, because I was only four years old when she won gold in Montreal, and lived in England at the time. I didn’t follow gymnastics until I was about 15 or 16 years old. Still, I remember very clearly the story in the news, and was fascinated by it, because although I wasn’t a gymnastics fan in Nadia’s day, I did grow up during the height of the Cold War.

I never dreamed, when I was a kid, that one day, that whole system would disintegrate within a couple of years. If there’s anything to learn from that era in history, it’s that things can change very quickly, forever altering or even ending people’s lives. That’s one reason why I get so worried about Trump and his admirers. History has shown us that things can change in a “New York Minute”, as Don Henley sang back in 1989.

Olaru’s book also offers a very negative and damning look at Bela and Marta Karolyi’s years as Romanian team coaches. As bad as some of the revelations have been from American gymnasts who have trained with them, they are even worse in this book, as Olaru writes about how the gymnasts were literally starved and sometimes physically beaten when they didn’t perform well. Securitate notes provided by alleged informants, such as Geza Pozsar, the choreographer who worked with the Karolyis, indicate that the gymnasts often wept because they were so hungry. As Nadia grew older, she and Bela had difficulties, because she was no longer as compliant as she had been. He could no longer “spank her bottom” when he wanted to, especially after she became famous.

I’ve watched Bela Karolyi for years when I’ve viewed women’s gymnastics on television. His public persona is that of a big bear, with lots of energy and enthusiasm. But, based on this book, and several others I’ve read by people who have trained with him and his wife, Marta, he is clearly an abusive coach on many levels. So far, I have not seen evidence that he sexually abused his gymnasts– thank God– but I have seen ample evidence that he was verbally, mentally, emotionally, and physically abusive to them. However, even the best gymnasts, like Nadia, got that treatment. At least he was somewhat “fair”, I guess.

When Bela and Marta Karolyi defected from Romania in 1981, the Securitate became even more intensive in their efforts to control Nadia Comaneci and protect their national treasure. Although she lived a relatively upscale life by Cold War Romanian standards, the reality was, she was more in a cage than her fellow Romanian citizens were. And the “lavish” privileges she enjoyed weren’t all that great. She did have a car and a seven room villa, for instance, but the villa was poorly insulated. Consequently, she slept in the kitchen so she could stay warm. And she didn’t necessarily have to stand in line to get food, like rank and file Romanians did, but the fact that she didn’t have to do that doesn’t exactly make for a luxurious lifestyle, as Romanian officials tried to indicate.

In many weird ways, reading about how Nadia and her family members were policed reminded me of reading about people trapped in cults or abusive relationships. The Securitate didn’t want Nadia to abandon Romania, so they were constantly looking and listening for indications of potential plans to leave. And they did things like tell her she couldn’t survive outside of Romania. They didn’t seem to realize that Nadia had already proven her incredible strength and resilience, not just in 1976, but in the years following that triumph, after she grew several inches and gained twenty pounds. For awhile, she was looking as washed up as John Travolta did throughout the late 80s. But, just like Travolta, Nadia Comaneci made a great comeback for the 1980 Moscow Games and came home with more medals. I don’t know why the Securitate didn’t see that she was capable of doing that again in 1989; she was only 28 years old when she left.

As I read this book and got some insight into Nadia Comaneci’s plight after her 1976 Olympic glory, it occurred to me why Nadia was known for never smiling. Based on Olaru’s accounts, backed up with actual notes from the Securitate, phone taps, interviews, and interrogations, it sounds to me like Nadia Comaneci’s life was a living hell. When she was being trained by Bela Karolyi, who has his own version of this story famously depicted in a movie about Nadia, she was evidently enduring a nightmare that we could never fathom. No wonder Nadia was willing to risk it all and leave for the West, once she retired from gymnastics.

Today, Nadia Comaneci is married to fellow Olympic gold medalist, Bart Conner, who won his medals in Los Angeles, back in 1984. They run their own gym in Oklahoma, and share a son named Dylan Paul Conner, who was born when Nadia was 44 years old. She still physically looks amazing, but I notice she smiles a lot more these days.

Overall, I think Nadia and the Secret Police is an excellent read for students of Cold War history, especially if they are interested in the Ceaușescu era and/or Romania. I will warn that this book is translated, and sometimes the translation gets a little mucked up. There were times, for instance, that the translator wrote names as they would be written in the Eastern Bloc or Soviet Union, with the last name first. Other times, he writes them as if they were in a western country. At times, the writing is also a little dry and formal, and there are some typos. I was surprised by the abrupt ending of this book, although I appreciated the many footnotes, notations, and photos.

Again, I cannot reiterate this enough. This book isn’t really for people who idolize Nadia or gymnastics and are looking for a life story. This is a book about history and politics. Nadia Comaneci just happens to be the subject, because she’s probably still the most famous Romanian in modern times. The focus is less on gymnastics, and more on world politics and intrigue. Yes, it’s useful for diehard Comaneci fans to read, but the focus is more on the oppressive government regime and less on Nadia Comaneci’s gymnastics prowess. I’m glad I read it. And I’m glad I’ve finished it, so I can move on to the next book.

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book reviews, healthcare, history, mental health, politicians

A review of Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter, by Kate Clifford Larson…

Amazon.com tells me that I purchased Kate Clifford Larson’s book, Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter on October 25, 2015. It was originally published on October 6th of that year, and I believe I bought it based on recommendations from Alexis, who was my #1 reader and commenter for years. I’m sorry it’s taken me almost eight years to finally get around to reading Kate Clifford Larson’s fascinating book about Rosemary Kennedy, and the very dysfunctional Kennedy family. I’m glad I finally sat down and read the book, because it was surprisingly compelling in many “soap opera-ish” ways.

I’ll admit that before I read Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter, I knew almost nothing about the Kennedy clan, other than the fact that they were a very rich and politically powerful Irish Catholic family from Massachusetts, and they seemed to be cursed by many tragedies. I never knew just how many tragedies there were until I finally read this book that’s been sitting in my Kindle queue for so long. My mind is blown on many levels.

Who was Rosemary Kennedy?

Rose Marie “Rosemary” Kennedy was born in her parents’ home on September 13, 1918 in Brookline, Massachusetts. She was the third child and eldest daughter of Joseph P. and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy. Her older brothers, Joe and Jack, were perfectly normal boys, born to wealthy and prestigious parents. Joe and Rose Kennedy would go on to have a total of nine children, eight of whom were healthy, strong, intelligent, and high achieving. Rosemary might have been completely normal, too, except for a terrible decision that was made as she was being born.

On the day of Rosemary’s birth, Rose’s doctor was not immediately available to deliver her, on account of a severe breakout of Spanish flu. The doctor had to be in attendance when the baby was born in order to collect his fee. Consequently, the nurse who was tending to Mrs. Kennedy told her to keep her legs closed and actually pushed Rosemary back into the birth canal. Because of those unfortunate decisions, Rosemary was kept in the birth canal for two hours without adequate oxygen. When the baby was born, she appeared to be healthy and normal, but as she grew, her parents realized that she was not developing as her brothers, and later, her younger siblings, did.

Soon, it became clear to her family that Rosemary had significant intellectual and mental delays. However, because the Kennedys were so rich, powerful, and ambitious, they kept Rosemary’s condition carefully hidden from most people. She was apparently beloved by her family, yet she was also an object of shame for them. Her parents– especially her father, Joe– took great pains to keep Rosemary’s difficulties out of the public eye.

When she was still a child, it wasn’t impossible to hide Rosemary’s condition from the public; but as she grew older, stronger, and wanting more independence, figuring out what to do with Rosemary, and hiding her disabilities from the public, became much harder for her parents. Complicating matters was the fact that physically, Rosemary was very attractive and flirtatious. She enjoyed the company of men, and they liked her, too. The Kennedys were concerned that Rosemary would end up falling into a disreputable lifestyle that would put her in danger or, seemingly worse to them, somehow embarrass the family.

Power parents…

Rose Fitzgerald was a favorite daughter of John “Honey Fitz” Fitzgerald, a very politically powerful Irish Catholic man from Boston, Massachusetts who had served as a Massachusetts State Senator, a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, and the Mayor of Boston. Rose met her future husband, Joseph Kennedy, when she was a teenager vacationing in Maine. John Fitzgerald hadn’t really liked Joseph Kennedy and discouraged Rose from being involved with him. But Rose didn’t listen to her father; the couple were wed October 7, 1914, when Rose was 24 years old.

Joseph Kennedy was quite wealthy, and his wife and children wanted for nothing materially. However, he was very unfaithful and had many affairs, to which Rose turned a blind eye. As I read this book, I learned that Joseph was also very image conscious and ambitious, and he expected his family to present the proper look. Rose Kennedy was also very image conscious and obsessed over her children’s bodies. She weighed them every week, and according to Larson’s book, both parents relentlessly fat shamed poor Rosemary, who had a tendency to gain weight.

Rosemary’s schooling…

Because of her intellectual disabilities, Rosemary Kennedy did very poorly in school. Her reading ability never rose past a fourth grade level. She had terrible penmanship and spelling, even though she apparently enjoyed writing letters. She also had trouble counting.

Although Rosemary was basically sweet and loving, she often had what today we might call “meltdowns”. Because she had trouble regulating her emotions and could not seem to grasp basic educational concepts, she went through a whole lot of different schools. Her younger siblings’ scholastic achievements soon surpassed Rosemary’s, as Rose Kennedy was constantly searching for the right boarding schools for her children. Though the other children were bright, competitive, habitual winners, Rosemary was constantly the subject of anguished letters from harried teachers and headmasters who didn’t know what to do with her.

The family experienced a brief hiatus in their scholastic drama when they moved to England in 1938. Joseph Kennedy was then serving as the U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain, so the family was temporarily based in London. Rosemary was placed at a Catholic boarding school called Belmont House, where she thrived. Unfortunately, the Kennedys had to move back to the United States due to Nazi Germany’s attack on Europe. Although Joseph and Rose kept Rosemary in England for as long as they could, it was too unsafe to allow her to stay there permanently. She moved back to the United States and then seemed to enter a negative spiral. All of the gains she had made at Belmont House quickly vanished as Rosemary became even less manageable.

Another tragic decision– Lobotomy…

Rose and Joseph Kennedy kept trying to find a suitable place for Rosemary. They failed repeatedly. Rosemary’s behavior grew more erratic and unpredictable. While her parents were apparently genuinely worried about her well-being, they also worried about how public knowledge of Rosemary’s condition might affect their political status and business standing.

Joseph Kennedy had heard about a new psychosurgical procedure being offered at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, DC. Psychiatrist Dr. Walter Freeman, and his associate, surgeon Dr. James W. Watts, were developing a technique that supposedly made “difficult” people like Rosemary more compliant and calm. The procedure was called “lobotomy”, and it involved numbing, and then boring small holes at the top and on either side of the patient’s head while they were awake and restrained. Although the vast majority of patients who had lobotomies did not experience good outcomes, Joseph Kennedy was apparently so eager to solve his issues with Rosemary that he eagerly signed her up for the operation. He did not tell Rose or his other children that Rosemary had the surgery until after it was completed in November 1941.

Like most of the other patients who had served as human guinea pigs for Freeman’s and Watts’ research, Rosemary Kennedy had devastating results after the lobotomy. She temporarily lost the ability to walk and talk, and became even more significantly intellectually delayed. Rosemary eventually learned how to walk again, but did so with a limp. She never regained her ability to speak clearly, and her arm was left palsied.

Heartbreakingly, after the lobotomy, Rosemary’s family basically abandoned her to the care of psychiatric facilities and, later, nuns. She very rarely saw her family for over twenty years, until Joseph Kennedy’s death in 1969. At that time, her family began bringing her back into the family circle. In spite of her intellectual and mental health issues, Rosemary Kennedy was very physically strong and healthy. She died of natural causes on January 7, 2005, in Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin. She was 86 years old.

My thoughts on the book…

It may seem like I’ve given away a lot of Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter in this review, but actually, I’ve just scratched the surface of this incredible story. Kate Clifford Larson did an excellent job researching this book, and writing a compelling explanation of the Kennedy family. I’ve barely mentioned Rosemary’s siblings, three of whom died tragically young, nor have I shared some of the more shocking and outrageous aspects of this story. I definitely came away with an opinion of Rose and Joseph Kennedy, who gave birth to remarkable children who would shape and influence America, yet showed such crass and callous disregard for Rosemary. Yes, it’s true that some of their actions had a lot to do with the mores of the time period, but a lot of it was also just very cold-hearted and cruel, not just to Rosemary, but also to the people who were tasked with helping her.

I do think that this book is profoundly sad, and parts of it are pretty infuriating on many levels. However, it’s also fascinating, given the historical importance of the Kennedy family and the events that were going on at the time. If you’re interested in American and world history, this book may be a page turner for that alone, as it offers glimpses of the current events of the time, and touches on business, politics, health, and mental health care.

While I definitely think the way Rosemary was treated was cruel, I also realize that there were very limited options for people like her when she was coming of age. That was a time when “defectives” (as they were sometimes called then) were forcibly hospitalized or otherwise locked up, sterilized, and/or kept out of society, and away from their families. Rosemary Kennedy was both blessed and cursed by having such a wealthy family. They could afford to send her to different camps, schools, and hospitals, but they were also ashamed of her, and didn’t want her to “ruin” their financial and political successes.

The Kennedy family was also very deeply entrenched in religion. Larson touches on how Rose Kennedy’s deep devotion to Catholicism caused huge rifts with her children, as she insisted that they adhere to her strict beliefs. If you’re a regular reader of my blog, you might already know how I feel about religion, and parents insisting that their children adhere to their religious beliefs. Rose Kennedy’s use of Catholicism in her attempt to try to control her adult children is bad enough, but Joseph Kennedy’s disastrous decisions made solely to protect his image and career were especially reprehensible. Moreover, both Rose and Joseph Kennedy treated some of the people who helped Rosemary with contempt and a true lack of consideration.

Kate Clifford Larson includes extensive footnotes, photographs, and a detailed bibliography. Some reviewers complained that there were too many resources included, and too little text. Personally, I didn’t have that complaint, but then to me, this book included information I didn’t know. People who already know a lot about the Kennedys may find this book to be repetitive. Some even stated that they felt it was a waste of time to read it. Again– this is my review, and it wasn’t a waste of time for me. It does make me think I might want to read more about the Kennedys, however.

Overall

I’m glad I read Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter, by Kate Clifford Larson. I would recommend it to history and political science buffs, but also to anyone who enjoys true stories. However, I would caution readers that this story is pretty sad and infuriating in some parts. Also, I would caution that this book is not strictly about Rosemary Kennedy, but is more from the perspective of her family. You won’t be reading much about what life was like from Rosemary’s perspective, as Larson doesn’t seem to do a lot of original research.

If I had known more about the Kennedys before I read this book, I might have had a more negative opinion of it. But, since I learned new things by reading it, I honestly don’t think of it as a poor effort. Some Amazon reviewers who obviously know more about the Kennedys than I do did take issue with the fact that the book is more about the Kennedy parents and, to a lesser extent, their children, than Rosemary herself.

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