On My Own Terms

About the Book

On My Own Terms: A Memoir

TWENTY-FOUR-YEAR-OLD DARLENE BARRIERE is borderline anorexic when she enters psychotherapy. She's there to prove she doesn't need professional help, even though she hates everything about herself. She's afraid of being labeled neurotic or psychotic, but mostly, Darlene is afraid that she might be as crazy as her mother.

And so begins ten months of grueling sessions with Dr. Stein . . . . Darlene shares and faces the memories that led to a suicide attempt, a planned teenage pregnancy and subsequent abortion, promiscuity, a stint in detention, morbid obesity, eating disorders, and a voluntary tubal-ligation when she was twenty-one years old. But she doesn't share the fact that in her purse are three boxes of Ex-Lax. Darlene must face the reality that her mother hated her. She must come to terms with her love/hate feelings for her violent, lord-and-master father.

Twelve years later, Darlene learns her estranged mother has terminal bone cancer. As the family congregates to prepare for their mother's death, Darlene attempts to re-establish the emotional connection she once had with her brothers and sisters. But religious feuds, unresolved childhood squabbles, and Darlene's 'public-trustee-relationship' with her mother take their toll. Now she must deal with what happens when the past collides with the present.

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About the Author

Darlene Barriere is a native of Winnipeg, Manitoba. When she isn't working on her novel, or faux painting walls, or installing crown and chair rail, or at the gym for her daily workout, she can be found in the kitchen preparing gourmet dinners or decorating specialty cakes for neighbors and other friends. Darlene and her husband, John, now live in Kamloops, British Columbia.