Julie Myerson - why am I not surprised that a book has materialised concerning her own son's drug issues?

[glasjam]

Read this is in today's Observer www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/mar/01/julie-myerson-novel-drug-addiction

Does anyone else have the uncomfortable feeling that I have on learning that she is writing about her son's drug problems? I know that writers often mine their own personal experiences for material but I think she's putting her literary endeavours ahead of her son here. From what I can gather, he is still young, his drug issues are ongoing, and although he is out of the family home, surely this is risking any possible future reconcilliation? I also baulk at the way she "weaves historical research about Yelloly with her disturbing account of her son's ejection from the family home" It just smacks of middle-class-writer angst.

My cynicism is further fuelled by my very strong suspicion that Julie Myerson is the author of Living with Teenagers - but that's another story...

don't think the cameras were allowed in the reggie office, were they?

but you are forever going around uncovering snobbery etc dittany. and it doesn't really matter what's actually been said on the thread, you just make it all up to fit.

but what's so obnoxious is that JM acts like she's only done it out of altruism. She's just utterly deluded.

Missed all the Jade stuff, and probably glad I did. And not a lot more to say about JM. But it is interesting our consumption, willing or unwilling, of the daily invasions of others privacy without their consent.

it just feels like every time there's a half-way interesting discussion on here, up you pop yelling 'but you are all HYPOCRITES!!!'

meh.

hhhmm, yes. it's just that you are so LOUD. but yes, you're right. i should.

i bet you anything she gets a column in the Telegraph or somesuch. no such thing as bad publicity.

if you could try not to hijack every thread with the great big BUT YOU ARE ALL HYPOCRITES line, that would be great too.

as i say. not radioactive. back to the discussion.

Yes, I think salome is right. But I also think that the hunger is so intense and has so many outlets that everyone may rapidly become bored and the whole thing will just burn itself out. Leaving JM's crapped up family relationships and young Jake mowing mp's lawn in that dubious nether garment...

And meh, meh, mehetty meh to everyone.
[meh]

poor old jake. i think he'll do well. i'd give him a job if i had one to give. he deserves a good chance.

like the gladiators analogy.

I think we can all be certain that old Julie will be wheeled out whenever a broadsheet needs a "parents view" of middle class drug taking.

I don't think Jake needs any chances given. Something tells me he'll be fine

have you seen what he's wearing today, lol?

true, he'll be fine. he'll probably become an author. it says in the mail that the final LWT column was written by her son who was being teased about his lack of pubic hair. nice.

the father seems like a right stuffed shirt as well.

aw the Mail photos looked staged though didn't they

"So... let's do a take on the 'arriving to sunday lunch in boxers' thing... you wear your boxers and a flasher's mac and we'll make it look like we're doorstepping you on the way to buying your morning milk. FGS put the copy of the Telegraph back. Buy some B&H's. Look really tired....."

his father eh... I just think, if my DH punched our teenage child, would you want him to write about it in the Guardian? Or see a therapist? I dunno...

D'you know, I had never ever heard of JM until all this blew up. Is she actually any good? As a writer, that is - I've done all me own judgin' on her as a parent!

What is very ironic about the whole affair is that it is the Grauniad readers who are deriding her and the DM ones who are applauding her for exposing the horrors of drug abuse. I would put money on her being offered a regular column for the DM.

Have not the whole thread. Am I the only one that is bored to death with all the publicity this is generating for her book and her pathetic family?

i just felt so sorry for the lad...'never done a day's work in his life and he's 20' etc etc. he was in their HOUSE, if they wanted him to get a job, they should've insisted.