Harriet Brown - Shadow Daughter: A Memoir of Estrangement

PRAISE FOR HARRIET BROWNS PREVIOUS BOOKS A well-researched and cogent argument for more rational scientific approaches and humane cultural attitudes toward health, eating, and the concept of being overweight. Written in an approachable style and peppered with short first-person interview narratives.... A solid general overview of the scientific and cultural issues surround-ing fatness and weight loss with an excellent starter bibliography. Library Journal Browns conclusions... will likely shock most readers and make them rethink much of what they assume, what they think they know about weight and fat.... This book may be just what most of us need, so we can be kinder to ourselves and others and truly take care of the bodies we have.

Its a revelation. San Francisco Book Review A must-read for anyone ready to start shaking this fat = bad, thin = good obsession.... Browns book can help you love your body now. Bustle More than a health guide: its an important consideration for any social issues shelf and blends science, history and health in an ex-amination of changing precedents for body image. Midwest Book Review 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 1 5/7/18 9:30 AM At turns harrowing and heartbreaking, Body of Truth is ultimately life-affirming and always, always brave and honest. Ann Hood, author of The Obituary Writer and An Italian Wife An inspired and inspiring book about our cultural obsession with weight, our fetishization of thinness, and our demonization of fat. Body of Truth is a compelling read, one that will make you rethink your attitudes towards your body and your healthand, in the process, enable you to enjoy your life a bit more and count calories a bit less. Daphne Merkin, novelist, cultural critic,and author of The Fame Lunches One of the most up to date, relevant, and honest accounts of one familys battle with the life threatening challenges of anorexia. Daphne Merkin, novelist, cultural critic,and author of The Fame Lunches One of the most up to date, relevant, and honest accounts of one familys battle with the life threatening challenges of anorexia.

Brown has masterfully woven science, history, and heart throughout this compelling and tender story. Lynn S. Grefe, former Chief Executive Officer,National Eating Disorders Association As a woman who once knew the grip of a life-controlling eating disorder, I held my breath reading Harriet Browns story. As a mother of daughters, I wept for her. Then cheered. Audrey Niffenegger 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 2 5/7/18 9:30 AM SHADOW DAUGHTER 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 3 5/7/18 9:30 AM Also by Harriet Brown Body of TruthBrave Girl Eating 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 4 5/7/18 9:30 AM SHADOW DAUGHTER A Memoir of Estrangement By Harriet Brown 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 5 5/7/18 9:30 AM Copyright 2018 by Harriet Brown Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. Audrey Niffenegger 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 2 5/7/18 9:30 AM SHADOW DAUGHTER 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 3 5/7/18 9:30 AM Also by Harriet Brown Body of TruthBrave Girl Eating 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 4 5/7/18 9:30 AM SHADOW DAUGHTER A Memoir of Estrangement By Harriet Brown 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 5 5/7/18 9:30 AM Copyright 2018 by Harriet Brown Hachette Book Group supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright.

The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture. The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the authors intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the authors rights. Da Capo Press Hachette Book Group 1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104 www.dacapopress.com @DaCapoPress Printed in the United States of America First Edition: November 2018 Published by Da Capo Press, an imprint of Perseus Books, LLC, a sub-sidiary of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Da Capo Press name and logo is a trademark of Hachette Book Group.

The Hachette Speakers Bureau provides a wide range of authors for speaking events. To find out more, go to www.hachettespeakersbureau. com or call (866) 376-6591. The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher. Print book interior design by Jeff Williams Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for. ISBNs: 978-0-7382-3453-3 (hardcover); 978-0-7382-3454-0 (e-book) LSC-C 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 6 5/7/18 9:30 AM For my other mothersEsther, Vivian,Ellyn, and Lois 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 7 5/7/18 9:30 AM 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 8 5/7/18 9:30 AM CONTENTS A Note to Readers00Prologue: First and Last00 ONE Thicker Than Water TWO The Roots of Estrangement THREE Mean Mothers (and Fathers) FOUR The Myth of the Worst-Case Scenario FIVE The Last Straw SIX Love: The Unresolvable Dilemma SEVEN The Half-Life of Grief EIGHT On Forgiveness NINE Out of the Shadow Acknowledgments00Notes00Index00ix 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 9 5/7/18 9:30 AM 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 10 5/7/18 9:30 AM A NOTE TO READERS Ive always wondered how memoirists manage to reproduce conversations from ten or twenty or thirty years earlier with such precision.

How can they remember whole paragraphs of dialogue, not to mention those perfectly telling details? So if youre wondering how I have accurately reproduced conversations from ten, twenty, thirty years ago with such perfect recall, the answer is that I have kept a detailed journal since I was a teenager. Any scene Ive reproduced here is accurate to the best of my knowledge and according to my journals. The other people involved in those interactions might have different memories and perspectives, of course. My mothers perspective would certainly differ from mine. This narrative, though, reflects my memories and perspectives and interpretations. Ive been as fair as possible, and any factual errors are mine alone.

As a journalist Im used to using peoples full names and biographical details in an article or book. Given the intensely personal and sometimes excruciatingly sensitive nature of this xi 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 11 5/7/18 9:30 AM xii A NOTE TO READERS subject, though, Ive chosen to use first names only, and in some cases Ive used pseudonyms and/or altered specifics to protect peoples anonymity. Every quote is verbatim (I taped all inter views), and even when identifying details were changed I pre sented the emotional content of these narratives as accurately as I could. 9780738234533_BookInterior.indd 12 5/7/18 9:30 AM PROLOGUE: FIRST AND LAST I did not attend my mothers funeral. I went instead to the island of Maui, five thousand miles away. On the day her mor tal remains slid into a drawer in a mausoleum in southern Florida, I was hiking the Lahaina Pali Trail with my husband and daughters, following the five-mile-long path that hugs the cliffs over the Honoapiilani Highway, with views of the Pacific below and fields of lava and igneous rocks above.

Over the years Id imagined her death a thousand times imagined killing her myself, in factand in every one of those scenarios I saw myself weeping and devastated at her funeral. Even after years of estrangement I believed her death might mi raculously heal something inside me. And I thought I still wanted to be healed, though it had been years since Id cut off contact with her or thought about her daily, years since shed appeared in my dreams. Id often joked that my mother would outlive me out of sheer spite. I made my husband promise hed keep her away from my