Part 2 (1/2)

All through grammar school, Carrie excelled in her cla.s.ses, never bringing home any grades lower than a B-plus, but more often As. She won the school's coveted Silver Bowl when she was graduating from the sixth grade for not only having the best grades, but also for being the most popular student. I almost exploded with pride when her name was announced.

By the time Carrie entered the seventh grade in junior high, she had sprouted up and become noticeably taller than her cla.s.smates. She was reed thin (best described as gangly), and I knew she worried about her big feet, the railroad-track braces on her teeth, and her stringy ash-blond hair. Still the question caught me by surprise.

”Mama, am I ugly?”

”Why would you think that, sweetheart?”

”Because I am. I'm ugly.”

”Well, you're not. You're just going through that awkward age, that's all. Before you know it, you'll turn into a b.u.t.terfly!”

”I'll never be a b.u.t.terfly.”

”Of course you will.”

”No I won't!”

That should have been a red flag for me, but I truly believed what I said to myself: ”It's simply a stage she's going through, that's all.”

In 1978, I had decided that we should end our eleven-year run of The Carol Burnett Show. Even though CBS wanted us back for a twelfth season, I felt it was time to move on. I wanted to be able to pick and choose projects that would give me even more time to spend at home. Also, I believed it was better to leave before someone from the network would eventually knock on our door and say, ”Stop doing this!” Our final taping was in March of that year. It was a bittersweet ending, but I felt it was the right thing to do.

Even though I was home much more, Carrie was becoming more and more agitated. As much as I tried to get her off her pity-pot, she kept digging in her heels, and over the next year, in spite of the fact that her braces had come off and many of her friends were now as tall as she was, Carrie seemed to be losing all the self-esteem she had enjoyed in grammar school.

Diary entry:

I wish I could get through to her, but d.a.m.n it, she cuts me off at the pa.s.s every single time. Whenever I want to have a talk with her, to communicate, she either ignores me or says she's tired and retires to her room. Also, she seems to be losing her appet.i.te. Is this all about p.u.b.erty? I know being a teenager is a pain in the a.s.s, but her att.i.tude is becoming a pain in my a.s.s, too!

TEENAGERS!

Quite frankly, there are times I'd like to sedate her and wake her up when she's twenty.

In my navete I continued to ”know” that she would grow out of it. But Carrie didn't know it, or believe it, and I later learned that she began to ”experiment” to make her feel better about herself. She had always aimed to be the best at anything she tried, and it didn't take long for Carrie to become the best drug addict in her group at high school. However, Joe and I were still in the dark about what she was doing. She was fourteen.

Diary entry:

Now I'm really getting worried. Carrie brought home her report card and it was filled with Ds and a couple of Cs. It's not like her. She doesn't talk much at home anymore, either. She and Jody and Erin used to chatter like magpies at the dinner table. Now it's just Erin and Jody. Joe asked her what was wrong tonight, and she said, ”I have a headache.” He shot back, ”Seems like you've had a headache an awful lot lately.” She excused herself, took her half empty plate into the kitchen, and went up to her room without so much as a goodnight.

As parents, Joe and I were unbelievably nave about the whole situation, in spite of the fact that Joe had been in recovery for several years, and both my parents had died of alcoholism. I was in a state of denial, convinced that all the ”bad stuff” I'd gone through in my younger years was a thing of the past. It wasn't until Carrie's grades went from As to Fs that we started to suspect it was due to more than mere growing pains.

Diary entry:

Joe and I had a long talk with Carrie after she got home from school today. There were big circles under her eyes. We asked her if she was on any drugs. She said no and started to cry. We talked to her at length about the dangers of using drugs. She calmed down and nodded at everything we were saying. I want to believe her. Dear G.o.d, I want to believe her!

Over the next few weekends we encouraged Carrie to have some of her girlfriends come over and spend time at our house. They did, but they would just hole up in her room for the afternoon. Things didn't improve. Carrie was still hidden and distant. I was afraid of who she was becoming. One morning I made the tough decision to search her room. At first I felt guilty, but my fear overrode my conscience and, after she left for school, I went into her bedroom and started to poke around... .

Diary entry: