Mothers and Babies

Mutti gave birth to seven children. The first, a girl, was premature and died shortly after being born. This baby came into the world in the middle of the war, at a time when the Nazis had instituted the Final Solution, and Mutti's life was in constant danger. Too afraid to go to a hospital, my mother gave birth to my oldest sister in the circus caravan, with only my father's sister, a circus dancer, in attendance. I can't imagine the grief and sadness Mutti must have felt.

She became pregnant again a few months later. The war was over when Mutti was eight months along, and she got married right before the baby was born. But Mutti, like everybody in Germany at that time, had had no food and was not in best health. Carmen, too, was premature.

I'm telling the story of Mutti's first two babies at the beginning of my memoir, Carnival Girl. This memoir will be published in June, and I'll keep all of you informed, so you can read that amazing story.

Mutti eventually had three girls, a boy, a girl, and a boy.

I gave birth to seven children. The third, a girl, died at birth, from complication after a car accident. I always felt that I was missing a child after that, and that feeling still is with me today.

Eventually I had a boy, a girl, a boy, and three girls. Such are the parallels in mine and my mother's life!