Homesick: A Memoir of Family, Food, and Finding Hope

by Jenny Lauren

With captivating blue eyes and dark hair, Jenny Lauren looked as though she'd stepped out of one of the ads for which her uncle, Ralph Lauren, is famous. It was not long, however, before she found herself in a world where it was easy to see herself as less than perfect. She was ten years old when she first starved herself. After many years of bingeing, purging, and compulsively exercising, her body fell apart. Her colon herniated and she was forced to undergo surgery. At twenty-four, living in chronic pain, she wrote Homesick as a cautionary tale that she hoped would touch many.

This unflinching account details her struggle with anorexia and bulimia, yet is also a much larger story that focuses on universal the intricacies of family ties, the pressures of society, the search for selfhood, and ultimately the power of hope. With flashes of wit and a knowing beyond its young writer's years, Homesick is a riveting and emotionally complex story of pain and hard-won recovery that no reader will forget.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Mental Illness, Mental Health, Womens

304 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

The first half of the book perfectly summed up in this quote "My butt…my butt..this is so sad. Mom…Dad..help! I lost my ass. Will you find it? Or at least could ya buy me another one?”
-pgs. 117-118

[Denise · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had hope in the beginning of the book, but after another 100 pages of the same thing, my interest dwindled. I felt sympathy for the pain that she no doubt has/is struggling with. She’s lucky in some ways to have that lifestyle to be able to go to all these healers and to just up and move away or visit another country. The front cover says “should be required reading for every teenage girl in America”, I disagree. Most people can’t relate to this, the eating disorder was not the main focus if that’s the point the reviewer was trying to maintain.

[Nora · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book a lot, although it was sad and poignant, and it has stuck with me. I thought the author's story was very relatable. It is not "inspirational," unless you are inspired by the realization that an eating disorder can literally make your kischkes stop functioning. There was something hovering around the story, like a ghost of intergenerational trauma.

[Avery Rose · Rating 2 out of 5]

All critiques aside, I really couldn’t get over the fact that she had no real job or responsibilities and endless amounts of money and resources to see all these specialists lol

[Imen Stitches · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't have an eating disorder, or any mental issues ( that I know about!! ) so I appreciated the insight of what someone's life was like.

I enjoyed the style very much. It seemed as if it was a long, long conversation between the author and myself. I liked the honesty about it.

I didn't like that we are left "uncured" and still in some kind of pain. I would guess having an eating disease, would affect all parts of your body and mind. Would you ever truly get over this constant food issue? Or be cured?

I would of liked her to say that some kind of help she received along her journey was helpful, or find some reason why things were happening. She's lucky to have people "pay" her way. You're left with a big question mark and no real conclusion on what triggered her sickness, or how she could possibly help stop it, or if she even realized that she still needed help.

Overall this was an admirable book.

[Liralen · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was kind of a struggle to get through this. It sounds like she had a pretty awful time of it, and with that I sympathise. The focus is heavily on her struggle to find a place for herself, though, and while that's understandable, in places it is rather self-consciously poor-little-rich-girl -- not to dismiss her troubles because of that, but it felt like that was something she was still struggling with at the time of writing.

It takes a somewhat unexpected turn towards fringe spirituality in the later part of the book, which...still not sure what to make of that, actually. I suppose by the end of the book I felt that the crux of the message had been lost in the endless search for a new spiritual healer to cure her, in the semi-random italics, and in the sense that she was writing about finding herself without having gotten there yet.

[Lizzie · Rating 1 out of 5]

A memoir of a woman whose eating disorders led to such severe bowel problems that she had to have surgery, and the problems that led to. This looked good because I like both eating disorder and surgery memoirs, but really it wasn't that interesting.

Her uncle is Ralph Lauren and her father runs the men's line. Being around fashion may have exacerbated her eating disorder, but the real problem was how her parents were smothering and controlling. As she went from doctor to doctor and explored new age healing, it reminded me that rich people can be badly served by the medical system, too. If you have a lot of money it's easy to spend it on long term rehab, chakra adjusters, and psychic healers in the Phillipines. I guess at the end the psychic healer cured her, but I didn't really care.

[Emily · Rating 1 out of 5]

I never knew it was possible to write about one's ass - and the same damn thing about it, at that - for an entire book. Yes, I know there was a far deeper storyline going on which factored INTO that, but it would have been nice to focus more on the other issues at hand. I found this book very monotonous and aimless. It ended very abruptly with no real conclusion. And I still can't, for the life of me, figure out how the title of the book is relevant at all. That said, I DO think Jenny Lauren has a story worth being told and she deserves to tell it. It could have been very interesting - there were many questions I was left with unanswered that I would still be interested in her addressing. I am just not a fan of the way the book was written.

[Gretchen Aerni · Rating 3 out of 5]

So sad reading what she had to endure but I struggled with the reality of it. Like who has the endless resources and time to go the to extremes for healing that she did? But maybe that is the reality of eating disorders..and hers was even further complicated. It was an intriguing read nonetheless and I was motivated to finish it.

[Elisa H · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a hard book for me to get through. It's basically a memoir about her battle with eating disorders and her body image. I've read books with similar themes before but the story telling is very bland, I ended up skimming the last half of the book. It was very hard to rate this book I felt a 2 was too low and a 3 too high, so 2.5

[Keiki · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ugh. This was terrible! If there is a more self-absorbed, clueless person in the world than Jenny Lauren, well - you know, there isn't! Talk about "poor little rich girl" syndrome. Lots of graphic details about health issues and medical procedures didn't add to its charm.

[Heather Colacurcio · Rating 2 out of 5]

An important story about eating disorders that could have been told in a much less bland way.

[Charity · Rating 3 out of 5]

It is very good. Some parts are hard to read through, but it is worth it.

[Erica · Rating 2 out of 5]

I understand that memoirs are supposed to be self-centered but Jenny Lauren is ridiculous. I can't believe how apologetically selfish and whiny she is!

[SW! · Rating 1 out of 5]

Just plain boring.. Gosh