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First published August 2, 1996
Here is an absolutely extraordinary memoir from author Michael Krasnow. Krasnow had anorexia nervosa, major depression, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. He was born in New York in 1969 and grew up in Massachusetts. He was first hospitalized with anorexia at the age of 15 and was still anorexic at 27 when this memoir was published in 1996 shortly before his death. (He died from the disease a year after publication. At the time of his death, he weighed 68 pounds. Standing 5’11” tall, he thus had a Body Mass Index of 11.1 when he passed away.)
Krasnow maintained an adult weight of 75 pounds for several years. (According to Krasnow, if his weight rose above 75 pounds he “felt fat.”) His parents first became concerned when they realized that he had begun studying his daily high school lessons from 2:30 every afternoon until 2:00 in the morning. When he subsequently began brushing his teeth for twelve hours every day, his parents had him hospitalized.
The author notes that he developed five unusual habits which he faithfully practiced on a daily basis: (1) the refusal to eat any low calorie or diet foods; (2) the refusal to let anyone see him eat; (3) the constant wearing of a jacket or bathrobes; (4) the refusal to drink water; and (5) the refusal to swallow his saliva (he carried a spit cup to bed each night). (p.19-21)
He was one manipulative individual. Though he was often hospitalized, his parents visited daily. He ran away from a number of hospitalizations and on two occasions bought bus tickets and rode to distant states where he’d check into a motel. In a few days he would telephone his parents to come rescue him. He would tell them how and where to find him, and they came to collect him each time without fail. (On one occasion, he told his mother that he was at a bus station and was about to board a coach, yet he stuck around the station until she showed up to rescue him.)
One of the doctors Krasnow liked wrote in one of Krasnow’s numerous hospital discharge summaries (reprinted as appendices to the book) as follows: “The patient…focuses on the issues of his inability and unwillingness to consistently eat. I have discussed with him that there is a major difference between his inability to eat and his unwillingness to eat.” (Stephen Wiener, MD, p. 108).
The next year, Dr. Stephen Weiner wrote this in a subsequent discharge summary following another of Krasnow’s hospital stays: “The patient remained angry at us for our unwillingness to allow him to starve to death. He became more negative toward the staff as it became clearer that we would not allow him to starve himself to death…He continued to insist that he would not eat and would die of starvation.” (Stephen Wiener, MD, p. 118).
Krasnow was good to his word. His memoir ended in March of 1996. Michael Krasnow died seventeen months later. He weighed 68 pounds.
Krasnow’s stated purpose in writing this memoir was to provide a written record of his experience in hopes of benefitting both anorexics and therapists.
One can only hope that his wish was granted.
My rating: 7.25/10, finished 8/31/23 (3861).