Claude Chirac confides in the anorexia of his sister Laurence: “I was ashamed”

The family of Jacques and Bernadette Chirac has lived through difficult times. In 2016, their daughter Laurence went to Necker Hospital in Paris at the age of 58, after suffering from chronic anorexia nervosa. A painful episode that Claude Chirac agreed to mention in the book “The strength of the different”, written by the Secretary of State for Handicap, Sophie Cluzel. “I did not always assume. I was ashamed, yes, sometimes. A few times, I did incredible gymnastics to prevent a group of friends from seeing my sister, that yes, that is true, it is perhaps the only dark part of that time“, she confides in this book.”When you see a being who weighs 25 kilos waking up from a coma, with immense distress in his eyes when he realizes that he is still alive. Blame him for what? There is absolute determination there, that of someone who jumped from the 4th floor of a building. Who can judge?“

Comments on which she returned in the program of Léa Salamé broadcast on France Inter. “JI can’t deny it. These are feelings that I had, I’m not proud of them but it’s a reality“, she declared before ensuring to have lacked maturity.

Reassure people

The author of the book, Sophie Cluzel, explained to Léa Salamé the importance of talking about this feeling of shame which is more recurrent than one thinks: “Claude Chirac’s feeling will reassure individuals, families and caregivers. At one point we all get fed up, sometimes ashamed, sometimes wanting to have a much more natural and normal life, because that disrupts life.“Jacques Chirac’s daughter was also a caregiver for her father, until his death in 2019.