Judy L. Mandel

Replacement Child: A Memoir by Judy L. Mandel opens with a newspaper story:
"ELIZABETH, N.J. —Elizabeth’s second aviation holocaust in thirty-seven days today had claimed at least twenty-eight lives . . . The ship plunged into the two houses near the southeast corner of South and Williamson streets at approximately 3:45 pm. Before firemen could subdue the roaring, orange flames that leaped nearly 100 feet into the rainy sky, three dwellings and a garage had been destroyed and a fourth house was damaged severely. Nearly a score of persons were homeless. Killed on the plane were Captain (Thomas J.) Reid and all twenty-two others aboard. Police . . . announced the following list of Elizabeth persons missing and feared dead: DONNA MANDEL, 7 years old, 310 Williamson Street . . . "

Judy was a replacement child, a child who is conceived to replace a deceased child. In her family's case, Donna, her deceased older sister, died in a horrific accident. A plane crashed into her family's apartment building. The building caught fire and her mother was able to save one of her daughters, 2 year old Linda, but had to leave the oldest daughter, 7 year old Donna, to die in the fire. Linda, the daughter who was saved from the fire, was seriously injured from major burns over her whole body. She was so scarred and disfigured from the fire that she had to suffer though many reconstructive surgeries throughout her life.

Judy was born into this family that was very much focused on Linda's care and ongoing surgeries while the memory of Donna, the deceased daughter, perpetually hangs over the whole family. Judy longed to be loved and accepted, but both of her parents seemed to keep her at a distance, especially her father, as if loving her or displaying any affection would tarnish the memory of her sister or take care away from Linda. This occurred even to the point that her parents stop introducing her or referring to her as their "beautiful daughter, Judy," something any proud parent might say, because they thought it might be insulting to Linda.

As an adult, Judy decided to research the accident, the plane crash that no one in her family ever discussed openly and honestly with her, to try to understand the dysfunctional dynamics in her family. It always seemed to her that there were untold secrets, parts of the story that no one told her. Judy writes:

"I tell her I want to go back and see the scene of the crime—the crash site.
'Why would you want to do that?' she is incredulous.
I try to explain that since our parents died I’ve had a nagging feeling that there is something left undone in my own life. It may have something to do with the accident, I say, and going there in the flesh feels suddenly important to me. There have always been missing pieces, for me, in the story. Up until now, I’ve dismissed the gaps as irrelevant to my life—but now I suspect it is those missing pieces that may hold the seeds of my own truth about my ambivalence toward my father, my troubles with men, and my schizophrenic attitude toward risk and safety. I’m hoping the trip back will help me understand more about their lives, and my own. (pg.15)."

Judy tells her story in chapters that follow several timelines, her childhood, her family before she was born leading up to the accident, and her current life. In this way she composes complete pictures of her family and how they were dealing with their lives and the aftermath of the tragic accident. Although Judy didn't learn the term "replacement child" until later in her life, it seems she always understood that she was there to replace Donna and yet she could never live up to the memory of her deceased sister.

Her parents inability to openly show Judy love and affection clearly resulted in damage to her self esteem and made her become a risk taker. She says, "By the time I was an adolescent, I saw it as my sacred duty to prove the world was a safer place than my parents believed, that I could take risks and survive." But her parents solicitous manner toward Linda and her health also changed Linda. Judy writes: "My sister Linda couldn’t break away from thinking of my father as her knight, the one who made her feel like she could do anything she set her mind to. I had experienced a different side of my father growing up. His code with me was that I was the daughter who was blessed, who didn’t need his praise."

This is a re-written re-release of this memoir that was apparently first published in 2009. It is a powerful story about how unspoken family dynamics and secrets can influence people their whole lives. Certainly there are still examples of people losing a child and having a replacement child, whether they admit to that concept or not. It would be extremely hard for any child to be born into a family under that moniker and then not receive the love, acceptance and affection any child needs. Judy's struggles with relationships as an adult prove this.
Highly Recommended

Disclosure: My Kindle edition was courtesy of Netgalley for review purposes.
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… (altro)

Imagine if you spent all of your life knowing that the only reason you were born is because your parents had lost a child, suddenly and tragically, long before you were even thought of. In fact, imagine that if your oldest sister hadn't died and your surviving sister hadn't been terribly injured, your parents would never have considered having a third child. Imagine that you've always been the replacement child, living in the shadow of a much loved and missed perfect older sister. Judy Mandel was that replacement child, conceived only in the wake of a plane crashing into her family's apartment which killed 7 year old Donna Mandel and badly burned 2 year old Linda Mandel and she tells her story in the memoir Replacement Child.

Three different narratives thread throughout this memoir. There is an account of the day leading up to and culminating in the crash that killed little Donna Mandel; there is the story of Judy Mandel's childhood in a family so marked by tragedy; and there's the present day (2005) account of Judy as an adult, mother, and writer tackling this very memoir. Each of the narratives are designed to show the devastating and lasting effects of the tragedy on the Mandel family and to help Judy understand how the death of one sister and the disfigurement of another years before her own birth shaped her experience and made her the person she is today.

The tale of Judy's childhood is a heartbreaking one of understandable but dysfunctional family dynamics. She was always unable to live up to Donna's memory, especially in her father's eyes and heart, and she was forever cognizant of her parents' very guarded love for her and their inability, due to fear, to let her experience everything in life she wanted to experience. She lived with and understood the family's focus on Linda and her frequent hospitalizations to try to ease pain and to make small repairs to the massive damage done to her by the fireball but Judy Mandel herself suffered the emotional hurts of being shunted to the side and never being talked about positively in a way that might have drawn attention to Linda's disfigurements, an unacknowledged victim of the crash as well.

Mandel weaves her need to write this story because of the looming impact of Donna's absence she always felt in her own life with the events of that terrible life-changing, family-destroying day. And this weaving together is interesting in the beginning and in her dawning understanding of its impact on her personality and relationships but towards the end of the memoir, Mandel seems to lose the thread and start repeating herself, which made the later portions tedious. Somehow, despite the telling of such a horrible story, there's also an emotional distance maintained, perhaps intentionally, but one which makes it a little difficult for the reader to connect with Judy and with the sadness and suffering that must have pervaded the family always and forever. She tells the reader of her conclusions with regards to her family and marital relationships but doesn't always convincingly show how she reached them. So although the premise of the memoir was interesting and compelling, the reading itself was, unfortunately, not nearly so.… (altro)

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

Replacement Child by Judy Mandel discusses an interesting concept that I wasn’t previously aware of: replacing a dead child with a newly birthed or adopted one.

That’s right. Judy Mandel’s family, before she was born, suffered from a tragedy. An airplane crashed into their home, killing Judy’s older sister while severely burning her other sister Linda.

Judy was birthed as a replacement child for Linda.

The story sounds compelling, and in actuality, it is a compelling tale. However, there were three story lines to follow:

1. The day of the crash (compelling)

2. Judy’s life growing up (interesting)

3. Judy’s day as she is writing this memoir (not sure why that’s included, it took away from the story)

The story itself is intriguing, sad, and amazing. Yet, I don’t think it was told that way.

I spoke to my mom about the story, and she said she grew up with someone who was the replacement child. It was totally new to me.

Do you know of this occurring?

Thanks for reading,

Rebecca @ Love at First Book… (altro)