Early Writings and Happy Times.............

Dad doesn't look too happy in this pic..huh? You and Chel sure do tho!

Memories....our memories...the happy times.....we were so lucky and blessed to have a happy marriage and also to have you and Chel. We were your average family...I think, to others, we appeared to have it all. We were without serious issues or problems for so many years and I never took that fact for granted. I also thought to myself , "I wonder when something terrible might strike, things are going too well and everyone has something". I enjoyed my life and family each day, but felt very lucky that everyone was happy and normal....what is normal?......today I feel that dysfunction is the norm...today after almost 33 years later, and seeing so many of my friends, family, people on Dr. Phil etc...and their problems.

I guess most families go through something or another, that just the way life is and sometimes life throws bad things in our direction. I always wondered what it would throw at me one day...it was inevitable that things couldn't stay as good as they were.. forever.

Looking back, as a young family, we had the opportunity to experience so many things. We went on trips to visit Aunt Sue and Uncle Jim in Maryland.....you and Chel would hang out in their outdoor pool all day long and take side trips to Ocean City.

 Several years we rented one of those enormous motor homes and even brought the dogs, Romeo and Bianca with us. I remember one time you both went with dad to pick it up the night before we were to leave. You and Chel were in the rear bedroom each one of you laying on one of the 2 beds. Dad went over a bump in the road and you actually hit the ceiling......obviously before the strict seat belt laws were in place.

 I don't like to think about the time Bianca ran away up in the mountains of Frederick Maryland. We almost had to give up and leave without finding her after hours of searching and calling her name through the woods...we were so happy to see her little face come around the corner of a huge tree all dirty and full of burrs, she was so traumatized.

You both took dance classes at Jane Perry Studio in Skokie for years, I would sit and watch you dance on the side of the studio. You guys would look so forward to the end of year shows where all the students would show off their dances they had been practicing all year. Grandma, Grandpa and the whole family would come and painstakingly watch all of the other kids for hours waiting for you to be on stage for your 4 minutes of fame.

I wanted to share some of your early writings that are so cute...they show how adorable and sweet...you were......always so thoughtful and helpful with your baby sis. Looking back I guess the only wish I would have for you is for you to have had a better self image of yourself....loving yourself is so important. I wish you could have loved yourself half as much as dad and I loved you.

I'm sorry I didn't give you the attention you needed, (according to your note)... if I had it all to do over again...I would give you nothing but attention...I was so happy to be able to stay at home and be there for you and Chel. I loved being your mom.

I know where you got your ability to save every single thing that you ever received, wrote, had written to you etc....you saved absolutely everything from each and every note you sent your friends in middle school, folded in that way where they end up in a thick triangle. (I wonder if kids still do that these days).

You definitely got your "'save everything" gene from me......I still have your little postcard they give you in the hospital with all your information on it from the nursery, if you can believe it! So I am the person you took after and I'm actually happy about it...i have lots of items of yours to share and add to the book. :)

I miss you so much.....m

At The Very Beginning of the Nightmare....(some ramblings)

I love this image of the last pencil drawing you were working on. It is so sweet, I
wish you could have finished it.....you were such an amazing artist.............a perfectionist!














One of the earliest memories I have of realizing that there was something very wrong in your life, is one evening while laying in bed, reading. You came into my room wearing a bright blue, tight fitting very pretty dress, borrowed from a friend. Dad and I had a bed with a bridge on top and attached was a gigantic mirror which was right behind me. You were looking at yourself in the mirror while I lay there, I looked at you with a feeling of astonishment. You looked abnormally thin in this dress. I think you were deciding whether to wear it to either homecoming or a wedding, I don't quite remember. I looked at you and said," Monica, you look VERY thin in that dress, how much did you lose"? I know you had started a diet several weeks earlier due to the fact that you were going to be entering a riding clinic of a very well known and respected professional in the Hunter Jumper world. He also had a reputation for making some of the young girls in his clinic, who may have had a few extra pounds on them, feel inadequate. He would make comments in front of bleachers full of paying customers watching his popular clinics and completely embarrass them. I remember you being so afraid that he would say something to you about your weight, that you actually started dieting weeks before the clinic. You managed to lose a few pounds with ease. The clinic went well and you were a star, he happened to be impressed with your riding.......however, you continued to lose more weight. You never needed to lose any weight to begin with since you were always slender and looked magnificent on Malmo........if I may say so myself. You appeared so proud of yourself for losing the weight and I do remember you received lots of attention from others who commented, " Oh you look so good" or " Did you lose weight, you look so much better"...etc. it definitely gave you a high and the desire to continue to lose.....until it just plain got "out of control". It was accompanied with the obsessive desire to weigh yourself. I'm not sure how many times a day you would weigh yourself, but I'm pretty confident that it was too many times! Another memory I have is being in the kitchen and looking down into the family room as you lay on the couch. It was morning and you had slept on the couch all night long. You told me that you were feeling so faint and weak that you were afraid to go to bed and fall asleep because you were fearful that you would not wake up.

I didn't know it at the time, but this weighing yourself behavior was accompanied by the compulsion to exercise. And so began the nightmare.........
I couldn't believe how everything changed about you at that time, it was incredibly scary for us.....I didn't know what to do...it was like you had gone away and we had this new person living with us who we didn't know anymore.

We took you back to the original doctor who first diagnosed you with anorexia, I would bring you there weekly, but I remember you were so angry, I didn't know then that anorexia was already taking over, taking hold of you. I always thought that anything can be fixed, we can work it out, we can do whatever is necessary to fix it. We were willing to go to whatever length we needed to for help and to understand what was happening to you.........
We did whatever the doctors said to do....the first major thing that was asked of us was to remove the scale from our home...what?? but you would be so upset, it was difficult for me to do that and listen to how it affected you emotionally. Me? the mom who found it nearly impossible to implement consequences during your early teens, the one who didn't want to upset you guys in any way. We were always so close, we were friends, I was the mom all your friends said they liked to be around.....

In the long run I ended up doing what was necessary at the time, I completely put my confidence in the doctors and specialists.

I used to have so much respect for doctors.......

I realized this wasn't going to be an easy fix.... it would be the battle your life!!


I miss you like crazy......m

A Few Sports/Activities in the Early Years.........

I just came out of my craft room with lots of memories....I spent about two hours going through photos of the early years when you and Chel were so young. It just seems like another lifetime ago, if that makes sense. I really had to stop myself from posting too many pics... they are all so good..... as i have said before, i want to share everything about you on this blog....even if it takes lots of years. I just want everyone to know how wonderful you were.....and still are in our hearts. I want to be realistic too, so I guess it's true when someone leaves this world all of the negative seems to disappear and people only remember the good of that person. In my eyes you were all good....but i am of course your mom.......

So i asked dad if he had any ideas for me to write about on our blog and he suggested that i write a little about when you and your baby sis played sports as kids. I found a few pictures of the teams you guys were on. I'm not sure I remember the chronological order of which team was first, but they were all in the late 80's early 90's.

Dad always wanted you both to be golfers, since that was his passion and still is to this day....he encouraged you to go to the driving range and really had to push you to go with him. I wonder if he kind of gave up and accepted the fact that golf was not going to be the same for you guys and accepted one of the next best competitive activities......girls softball. He decided to get involved with what interested you at the time and work on golf maybe in the future. What better way than to coach you and your friends. All of chel and your friends looked upon dad as pretty scary, I think, he stood so tall, almost 6"4 and was really loud. His normal voice wasn't just a regular tone...and when he sneezed...look out....it was piercing to the ears! I remember when you both were babies and you would be asleep on dad's chest and he would sneeze you would jump out of your skin and then quietly fall back asleep. The first impression of dad was different than when you got to know him. It didn't take long to realize that he was like a puppy dog in a hard exterior....the girls on the team really liked him and also looked up to him. He took his job very seriously and treated you guys just like the rest of the girls, no favoritism. He knew you were one of the better players and was as proud as a dad could be. Chel on the other hand wasn't quite as focused as you were and I think she was playing because.......well I'm not sure why she was playing or should I say she really liked playing in the sand in the outfield. Ill never forget the time that the ball was hit far out in left field and there was Chel doing snow angels in the dirt. I think she missed the ball, but we laughed for years about that play. okay time for another pic...



The three teams you all played on were called the "Hurricane's, Gems, Diamond Dolls, and the Flames" Just a stepping stone to the true love you both

shared...horses!

I really wanted to put a picture of you on Dusty right here, but I am having a rough time at putting pictures on this blog...gggrrrrrr they always go to the top of the page when I want them to be at the bottom where I am writing. Oh well, it's a cute pic even though it's up top randomly. I will get it eventually, this blog stuff is all new to me......I think I may have to take a class soon!

miss you tremendously....m