{"id":25,"date":"2013-11-23T23:24:52","date_gmt":"2013-11-23T23:24:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/?page_id=25"},"modified":"2014-11-24T06:08:32","modified_gmt":"2014-11-24T06:08:32","slug":"about-mermaid-a-memoir-of-resilience","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/?page_id=25","title":{"rendered":"About Mermaid &#8211; A Memoir of Resilience"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/Mermaid_bookcover2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-20 alignright\" alt=\"Mermaid - A Memoir of Resilience\" src=\"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/Mermaid_bookcover2-199x300.jpg\" width=\"199\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/Mermaid_bookcover2-199x300.jpg 199w, http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/11\/Mermaid_bookcover2.jpg 307w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 199px) 100vw, 199px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>At the age of three,<\/strong> Eileen Cronin first realized that only\u00a0<em>she<\/em>\u00a0did not have legs. Her boisterous Catholic family accepted her situation as \u201cGod\u2019s will,\u201d treating her no differently than her ten siblings, as she \u201csquiddled\u201d through their 1960s Cincinnati home. But starting school, even wearing prosthetics, Cronin had to brave bullying and embarrassing questions. Thanks to her older brother\u2019s coaching, she handled a classmate\u2019s playground taunts with a smack from her lunchbox. As a teen, thrilled when boys asked her out, she was confused about what sexuality meant for her. She felt most comfortable and happiest relaxing and skinny dipping with her girlfriends, imagining herself \u201can elusive mermaid.\u201d The cause of her disability remained taboo, however, even as she looked toward the future and the possibility of her own family.<\/p>\n<p>In later years, as her mother battled mental illness and denied having taken the drug thalidomide\u2014known to cause birth defects\u2014Cronin felt apart from her family. After the death of a close brother, she turned to alcohol. Eventually, however, she found the strength to set out on her own, volunteering at hospitals and earning a PhD in clinical psychology.<\/p>\n<p>Reflecting with humor and grace on her youth, search for love, and quest for answers, Cronin spins a shimmering story of self-discovery and transformation.<\/p>\n<p>Watch the Mermaid\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=2ZWwKpKQBEQ&amp;feature=youtu.be\" target=\"_blank\">book trailer<\/a>\u00a0of Eileen Cronin reading an excerpt at Vroman&#8217;s in Pasadena, California.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At the age of three, Eileen Cronin first realized that only\u00a0she\u00a0did not have legs. Her boisterous Catholic family accepted her situation as \u201cGod\u2019s will,\u201d treating her no differently than her ten siblings, as she \u201csquiddled\u201d through their 1960s Cincinnati home. But starting school, even wearing prosthetics, Cronin had to brave bullying and embarrassing questions. Thanks [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":111,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"custom-page.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-25","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/25","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/25\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":371,"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/25\/revisions\/371"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.eileencronin.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}