ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Daniel Becker was born in San Francisco. He attended Dartmouth College and received a Masters in Public Administration from Columbia University. Career highlights include working as a Legislative Assistant to Representative Barbara Boxer in Washington D.C., working with the California Legislative Analyst's Office in Sacramento and working in several different policy positions with the City of Seattle. In 1998, Daniel spent four months living and working in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.
Daniel's writing experience includes earning two certificates in non-fiction writing from the University of Washington. He has also taught writing courses for the University of Phoenix. His work has been published in Salon.com and Backpacker Magazine. The first two chapters of This Mean Disease earned a finalist spot in the Pacific Northwest Writer's Association's annual literary contest.
Recently married to Annette Elinger, Daniel is currently a Master's Candidate in Stanford University's Teacher's Education Program. His father, stepmother and two brothers continue to live in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Buy Now:
Paperback, 192 pg, '05
Product Code: TMD
ISBN: 978-0-936077-50-5
MSRP: $14.95
eBook - epub format
Product Code: EBPTMD
ISBN: 978-0-936077-75-8
MSRP: $9.99
This Mean Disease
Growing Up in the Shadow of My Mother's Anorexia
Author: Daniel Becker
Foreword: Joel Yager, M.D.
DESCRIPTION:
In this beautifully-written memoir, Daniel Becker shares the inner world of his mother's anorexia nervosa and its devastating effects on his family. Through the eyes of a child, we witness both the heartbreaking details of his mother's obsession with food and her inability to nourish herself.
The secrecy surrounding the illness—which has the highest mortality rate of any psychiatric disorder—creates a shadow over the family that grows bigger over time. As Daniel, his father, and brothers struggle to maintain their loyalty to Mom, they become aware of its impossible grip and their inability to help her. In the end, Daniel must face his own guilt and longing to find his way out of the darkness.
REVIEWS:
"Daniel Becker's haunting memoir gripped me from the first pages. It is a book of emotional honesty and courage, unique in the literature."
— Judith Ruskay Rabinor, PhD, author of A Starving Madness
"This fascinating and deeply troubling account of a child's suffering is the only book of its kind-a rare story told by the son of a mother with anorexia nervosa. There is a kind of silence that resonates from her absences and the lack of discussion about her illness that is chilling."
— Richard Gordon, author of Eating Disorders: Anatomy of a Social Epidemic