Bitter Ice: A Memoir of Love, Food, and Obsession

by Barbara Kent Lawrence

The author chronicles her twenty-seven year marriage and her husband's battle with anorexia, mental illness, and alcoholism

Genres: Memoir, Psychology, Nonfiction, Biography Memoir

352 pages, Hardcover

First published November 1, 1999

About the author

My 9th book "Both Sides of the Pond, My Family's War: 1933-1946" was released on September 15, 2025. I hope you will visit www.barbaralawrence.com to learn more about it.

I've written two books about eating disorders in men for which I drew from my experience being married to a man who was anorexic and bulimic, and from training as a researcher. I've also written four books and many articles in education and two novels set in Maine: 'Islands of Time' and "The Other Island: Ben's Story."

I received a B.A. from Bennington College in 1965, an M.A. from New York University in 1969, and an Ed.D. from the Boston University School of Education in 1998. I taught anthropology, sociology, and history at schools in Washington, D.C., Connecticut, and Maine; co-founded and run a real estate and construction firm; and worked as a real estate agent in Boston, as an Adjunct Professor at Lesley and Northeastern Universities, and as a policy analyst in education.

Reviews

[Joni · Rating 2 out of 5]

Woman, really?!? The author needs a good editor. The overly detailed storytelling takes it from gripping memoir to tedious academia. I'm a third in and not sure I'll be able to finish.

[Vee · Rating 1 out of 5]

If it was possible to give a book zero stars and still have it count I would. Never have I wanted to throw a book against a wall so badly. This book was horrible. There was very little about her husband's illness and way too much of the author switching back and forth between complaining about how poor they were and how much her husband ruined her life and giving vast descriptions of their summers in the mountains or their vast houses. She was so completely unaware of how well off she was and I gave up two thirds in of any of her ever talking about her husband and trying to help him in his recovery. Do not waste your time on this bougie trash.

[Travis W · Rating 1 out of 5]

I started and stopped reading this book multiple times throughout the year before I began again and read it in a span of a few days. It had been recommended to me as a book about a woman who's husband had an eating disorder and her dealings with this. Sounded interesting. I understand it is her memoir and memories are something that each individual experiences in their own way. Truth lies somewhere in the middle. My review of the book is that Barbara (the author) made herself one of the most unlikable people I've ever read about. I understand its a book about her struggles with her own growing up and her own mental health, even with her ex-husband. But her constant judgement against other people who happen to be poor, or uneducated come across as paternalistic and condescending and her whining about having to live like common proles was grating.

She complains about how poor they are and how she must stay, enable her husband's illness and continue to be the good wife while jetting back and forth between her home here, trips to Europe, college degrees and fancy boarding schools and colleges for her kids. It read like the memoirs of a woman who was born into money and was cut off and spent the rest of her life kicking herself for not marrying a wealthy man. She even mentions multiple times about how it was her choice to NOT do what her family expected of her (marry wealthy) and how she was proud of that, yet she devotes so much time to talking about her embarassment that her husband couldn't provide for her properly or how embarrasing it was when friends and family who knew her high status days would look at her life now. Her time in the apartment in New York is one of the worst. She seems to forget people live like that regularly because they have to, not because they need a place to stay between trips to Europe and cabins in the woods.

By the end of the book the only sympathy I felt was for her children, who I hope have had better lives now that the author divorced and moved on. Books about men with eating disorders are rare. That really isn't what this book is. It is a book about obsession. Her obsessions. It felt like a Lifetime Movie of the Week, complete with melodramatic acting and bad subtitles. I can't recommend this book to anyone. It's going to Goodwill.

[Monica · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a sad story about how eating disorders affect the people who live around the victim, and how everyone suffers from the disease, not just the person whose body is affected. It was also interesting to read about eating disorders affecting men because that is just not something that explored enough

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

Normally I love books like this... who doesn't love a good addiction story!!>> But this book didn't cut it for me, I found myself irritated with the wife (who wrote it). There was nothing really to relate to... Maybe I want to give it one star!

[Julie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book, but couldn't. You don't read about men who are anorexic so I had high hopes. However the wife/author was just so difficult to put up with. I should have felt sorry for her but I didn't. I finished it, but had to skim a lot.

[Jessica Haider · Rating 1 out of 5]

I couldn't even make it a third of the way through Bitter Ice. The author seemed to focus more on herself than on her husband's eating disorder.

[David Schumann · Rating 4 out of 5]

She was a client of mine. I have a galley copy. It is a wild true story of her life

[Lisa · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though a bit slow at first, once Lawrence shared more of her story, I could not put this down. A haunting tale.

[Tracy Schillemore · Rating 4 out of 5]

a good memoir of survival

[Selkie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bitter Ice is the biography of a woman struggling to cope with her husband's bizarre behaviour brought on by his alcoholism & anorexia, & her determination to come out of the experience sane.

[Teresa · Rating 1 out of 5]

Is there a way to rate this -5 stars? I didn't even finish it. Painfully boring.