Kid Rex

The Inspiring True Account of a Life Salvaged from Despair, Anorexia and Dark Days in New York City

De: Laura Moisin

Narrado por: Arielle DeLisle

After knowing friends with anorexia and being baffled by their behavior, Laura Moisin suddenly found herself prone to the same disease - not eating at all and going weeks at a time consuming nothing but water and the occasional black coffee. Deceiving therapists by misleading them with symptoms of depression, her anorexia is prolonged, and her health deteriorates rapidly.

Recognizing that she has a serious disorder, she quickly finds a therapist working at her university and openly confesses that she’s an anorexic seeking treatment. Her therapist looks at her doubtfully and says, shockingly, "No, I don’t think you’re an anorexic.”

Already swirling in a state of confusion, the attacks on New York’s World Trade Center - an event the author witnessed first-hand from her apartment - only accelerate her path to further self-destruction.

Without preaching, this memoir offers a reassuring first-hand voice for the many who suffer silently, and provides strength for family and friends to help heal destructive behaviors.

©2008 Laura Moisin (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Poor little rich girl

While she uses plenty of big words, Laura Moisin writes like a little girl. She claims to have gained insight into herself, but this book doesn't prove that. Instead, she casts blame for her anorexia and mistreatment on anyone but herself. Renfrew, her therapists, even her childhood nursery school are painted as her antagonists, with one sided portrayals. I found her descriptions long winded and whining, revealing what a spoiled child she must be. This book falls into the greatest trap of memoir- staying inside the authors own head for so long the read/listener goes mad. She recounts with far too much detail the events of her childhood and lavish family vacations, and never incorporates a scrap of research or a narrative of anyone outside her family. Boring, predictable, annoying.

If you are an elitist...get this book

I tried to give this story a chance and listened to the very end.

I sadly could not relate. The narrator sounded self-involved and out of touch with the illness.

I also learned that unless you have money and support, you will not recover.

Had a hard time finishing this book

As a recovering anorexic I had a hard time with the validity of this book. I was also at Renfrew several times between 1999 and 2001 and I find her account of her time there really hard to believe. Just dumb little details like when she described the phones she said they were downstairs, but the phones were upstairs. She talked about the patients doing art therapy on the floor of the residence, but art therapy was done in a separate building in the art room. We were allowed to choose our own food in weekly menu planning. You weren’t given meds until after your appointment with the psychiatrist which happens within your first 3 days. Your entire day is planned out with group after group from breakfast to dinner with only small free time breaks. 99% of the staff were amazing and sooooo supportive (with a few bad eggs, but nothing like she described). She mentioned her roommates husband was lying with her in her bed the day Laura left, but visitors were not allowed in the rooms ever. There were definitely NOT vomit buckets in the bathroom, and if they suspected someone was purging, the bathroom door would be locked. I just have a hard time believing most of her account of her stay there, and because of that I had a hard time believing the rest of her story.

Whine-fest

Would you try another book from Laura Moisin and/or Arielle DeLisle?

No

Has Kid Rex turned you off from other books in this genre?

No, I have read many books relating to eating disorders. This was just a bad one.

How could the performance have been better?

Maybe the book would have been better if read. The narrator had a young whiny voice that made the litany of complaints the author was spewing all the more irritating.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Kid Rex?

Oh god, she MUST have known someone to have gotten this pushed through.

Any additional comments?

I am angry with this "author". Not for being anorexic, but for her attitude toward every single person that has tried to help her. She is very fortunate to have the opportunity to attend a wonderful college and have her own apartment. To see doctor after doctor (though she lied to them all and then got mad at them for their incompetence). She had her choice between Renfrew and Remuda Ranch but had nothing but petty, childish complaints to report. If you want to listen to a privilaged whiny girl complain about just about everything, this is the book for you. I also have a feeling that she grossly exagerated her condition. Ex. She stated that for years, she had nothing but one glass of water per day. This is not possible. She would have collapsed from dehydration at the very least. She desperately tries to show how smart she is by using unnecessarily large words and pretentious phrases. I know authors have the right to embelish but it has to be believeable. Don't waste your time.

Save yourself the time and money!

I have never heard an autobiography about such an obnoxious, spoiled brat. She is constantly complaining about everyone else around her, especially all the people who are trying to help her. Everything is just me, me, ME, how can they do this to MEEE! She spend 4 days at an eating disorder facility before she gives up and leaves, and then complains for the rest of the book about how they weren’t able to help her. She exaggerates so much about how sick she was and how little she ate (had it been true she’d be dead), it just doesn’t evoke any compassion, just frustration. But mostly because she loves her self-diagnosed illness so much, she uses the phrase «MY anorexia» five times on every page of the book. It becomes super annoying.