{"id":106359,"date":"2023-06-28T11:51:00","date_gmt":"2023-06-28T15:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=106359"},"modified":"2023-07-05T12:47:57","modified_gmt":"2023-07-05T16:47:57","slug":"jennette-mccurdy-childhood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/jennette-mccurdy-childhood\/","title":{"rendered":"Jennette McCurdy’s Childhood Life Before iCarly"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

What was Jennette McCurdy’s childhood like before fame? How did McCurdy deal with her mother’s mental and physical illnesses?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before she was Sam Puckett on iCarly, Jennette McCurdy was just a young girl with a mother who had big dreams\u2014and big problems. In her memoir I\u2019m Glad My Mom Died<\/em>, McCurdy details how her mother’s childhood dream manifested into her daughter’s life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Continue reading to learn more about Jennette McCurdy’s childhood chase for fame.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

McCurdy\u2019s Troubled Home Life<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

From Jennette McCurdy’s childhood, she lives with her family in Garden Grove, California, about an hour and a half from Hollywood. She notes that residents call the city \u201cgarbage grove\u201d because so many \u201cwhite trash\u201d people live there. She lives with her mom and dad, her three brothers, and her mom\u2019s parents. The family doesn\u2019t have much money and frequently pays their rent late or underpays it<\/strong>, even with McCurdy\u2019s dad and grandparents all chipping in. Her grandparents work minimum-wage jobs; her dad works two blue-collar jobs. Debra home-schools her four kids.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

McCurdy\u2019s home life is marred by Debra\u2019s mental and physical illnesses, including Debra\u2019s hoarding, her volatile mental and emotional state, and her cancer. These issues cause McCurdy to feel constantly anxious, guilty, and responsible for her mom\u2019s health and happiness<\/a>.<\/strong> However, she loves her mom deeply and, as a child, she\u2019s unaware of how much her uncomfortable feelings are a reaction to Debra\u2019s behavior.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Debra\u2019s Hoarding<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Debra is a hoarder, and their house is so filled with junk that there\u2019s no room for the four children to sleep in their bedrooms<\/strong>; they sleep on mats on the living room floor. They also use a fold-out mat on the floor as a dining room table.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The garage is so full of junk that it\u2019s impossible to walk through, and it\u2019s full of dead rats and possums, which smell bad. The family keeps an extra refrigerator at the front of the garage near the garage door so it\u2019s more accessible, but the garage door is broken, so every time McCurdy and her brother have to get food out of the refrigerator they put themselves in danger: Her brother strains to keep the heavy garage door open while McCurdy runs to get what they need before the door comes crashing down. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The family is Mormon, and McCurdy loves going to church\u2014not because she\u2019s religious, but because it means she can leave the house. She hates the house and feels anxious just being in it. Church feels like a clean, peaceful escape.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Causes and Effects of Hoarding Disorder<\/strong>

While researchers don\u2019t know what causes hoarding disorder, they do know that it often coexists with other mental health conditions<\/a>, such as obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), attention-deficit\/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and depression. A unique feature of hoarding disorder is that hoarders frequently have no awareness of or insight into their behavior. As a result, they defend their hoarding and resist attempts at intervention.

The causes of hoarding may be unknown; the effects, however, are clear. Studies show that hoarding can present a risk of psychological and physical harm to family members<\/a>, as was the case in the McCurdy family. Like McCurdy, children of hoarders report increased anxiety and family strain<\/a>. They often feel that they can\u2019t have friends over to the house and they need to keep a shameful secret about their family. In addition, hoarding can collapse appropriate boundaries by forcing family members to share\u2014and perform all their activities in\u2014the only uncluttered spaces in the house.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Debra\u2019s Volatile Mental and Emotional State<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Debra is very emotionally volatile and frequently has angry outbursts over everything from her sons spilling milk to her husband getting home late from work\u2014she often makes him sleep in the car when he gets home late.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Debra\u2019s unpredictability causes McCurdy to be very sensitive to her mom\u2019s emotions<\/strong>; this hyperawareness allows McCurdy to determine what\u2019s about to happen and behave accordingly. She feels responsible for her mom\u2019s happiness. For example, she can tell from Debra\u2019s body language<\/a> and facial expressions when she\u2019s about to get angry at McCurdy\u2019s dad, so she rushes to Debra\u2019s side and tells her she loves her in an attempt to calm Debra down and prevent another violent outburst.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Shortform note: While everyone has occasional outbursts, people who are consistently unable to control or manage their emotional responses\u2014in particular, their responses when things go wrong in their lives\u2014are known in psychological terms as emotionally dysregulated<\/em><\/a>. Like Debra, they\u2019re likely to have outsized, negative reactions to small irritants or easily solvable problems. Children aren\u2019t born with the ability to regulate their emotions, so having a parent who struggles to model healthy emotional regulation makes it more likely that a child will also have trouble managing their emotions.)  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Debra\u2019s Cancer<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Debra was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer when McCurdy was two years old, and she underwent chemotherapy, radiation, a bone marrow transplant, a mastectomy, and a breast implant. Even after the cancer is in remission, Debra\u2019s illness is a constant presence in McCurdy\u2019s childhood<\/strong>: Debra frequently tells her cancer story to anyone who will listen, and every week she makes her kids rewatch a home video she made shortly after her diagnosis. Each time, she tells McCurdy that she can\u2019t understand how she could have been singing<\/a> \u201cJingle Bells\u201d at such a somber time\u2014McCurdy was two years old.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a six-year-old, McCurdy feels incredibly guilty for her behavior as a two-year-old. She also feels uncomfortable about repeatedly having to watch a video of her mom when she was very sick with cancer. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The overall feeling in McCurdy\u2019s house that her mom\u2019s cancer could return at any minute contributes to McCurdy\u2019s desire to please her mom <\/strong>and do anything she can to keep her healthy and happy. McCurdy even believes that she can keep Debra alive by wishing for it every year when she blows out the candles on her birthday cake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When McCurdy is 18, her mom\u2019s cancer does return. The cancer spreads and Debra gets progressively worse over the next few years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Shortform note: Children whose parents have cancer are more likely to experience higher rates of anxiety and distress<\/a>, as well as other emotional and behavioral problems. These problems can be caused not only by the child\u2019s fear and sadness upon learning of the diagnosis itself, but also by related factors<\/a> such as disrupted schedules due to medical appointments, financial stress due to medical bills, the physical or psychological unavailability of the sick parent, or a role reversal in which the child takes on the role of actual or emotional caretaker to the sick parent.) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What was Jennette McCurdy’s childhood like before fame? How did McCurdy deal with her mother’s mental and physical illnesses? Before she was Sam Puckett on iCarly, Jennette McCurdy was just a young girl with a mother who had big dreams\u2014and big problems. In her memoir I\u2019m Glad My Mom Died, McCurdy details how her mother’s childhood dream manifested into her daughter’s life. Continue reading to learn more about Jennette McCurdy’s childhood chase for fame.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":107241,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[1078],"class_list":["post-106359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","tag-im-glad-my-mom-died","","tg-column-two"],"yoast_head":"\nJennette McCurdy's Childhood Life Before iCarly - Shortform Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Jennette McCurdy's childhood before iCarly wasn't a dream come true. 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