Jeanette Sliwinski: Broken Dreams

While pounding the treadmill this morning, I scrolled through my TV guide and came across the program, "Snapped". A long-time true crime and mystery buff, I figured this would be as good a means of distracting myself from the tedium of exercising as anything else. This episode featured the story of Jeanette Sliwinski, a young woman whose life came into sharp public focus on July 14, 2005, when she took the lives of three innocent people in an apparent attempt to end her own life. Driving at over 90 mph, she slammed her red Mustang into the back of a Honda Civic waiting at a red light. John Glick and Michael Dahlquist likely never knew what hit them. Doug Meis, however, lived for several hours after the dreadful event. Talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Jeanette's story is a tragedy from a number of perspectives. The families and friends of her victims will forever be deprived of their companionship, their smiles, and their unfolding life stories. The world will never know what they might have gone on to accomplish. But Jeanette's story, too, is sad beyond words. A withdrawn, socially awkward child who seemed uncomfortable in her own skin, she managed to "reinvent" herself during high school into a physically striking young woman. And her appearance became her identity and sense of self.

Jeanette worked as a stripper (perhaps as early as high school, by some accounts) and a lingerie model to help finance her college education. In 2002, she and her boyfriend moved to Los Angeles, where she dreamed of becoming a supermodel. Over time, however, she found work only as a trade show model, considered to be the lowest rung of the ladder in the world of modeling. It was also during this time that Jeanette's boyfriend broke up with her. Her hopes for career and romance dashed, she unhappily returned home to live with her parents.

By all accounts, Jeanette's mental health was tenuous during this time. She was treated for an unspecified mental illness with a variety of medications. She was also allegedly self-medicating with herbal preparations and using alcohol and club drugs. Her mental status became the central issue in her trial, with her attorneys offering an insanity defense.

While watching her story unfold, I couldn't help but wonder how things might have turned out differently if Jeanette's modeling dreams had come true and if her relationship with her boyfriend had continued. Would she have found the happiness she apparently thought that life would bring her? Would she have gone on to live a productive life instead of making headlines for killing three people? Or, what if she had anchored her ultimate life dreams to something less fleeting and superficial than physical appearance? Clearly, the world of modeling makes stringent demands in terms of diet and exercise, a willingness to tolerate being objectified, and cutthroat competition.

I contemplated the role of personal dreams in all our lives. They start early for many of us--veterinarian, lawyer, teacher, doctor, artist. They are the point on our own personal horizon that identifies us and keeps us moving forward during good times and bad. As children, these dreams remain largely that--fantasies that provide us with comfort, escape, and a sense of direction in life.

As we move into our teen years and begin to have some control over the realization of our dreams, a number of things can happen. Depending on the clarity of our dreams, opportunities for exploration, support from parents and teachers, and the overall level of psychological health of our environment, we may well make significant progress toward accomplishing our goals. We can seek out opportunities for volunteer work, take music or art lessons, join a sports team, etc. These opportunities allow us to assess how much of a match a particular activity is for our personality and our individual preferences.

During this time, many of us essentially put our dreams on hold. We don't take steps to explore them, even though we may continue to identify them as personal goals. This may be a function of our level of motivation, or we may get somewhat sidetracked by the peer scene that is so compelling during the high school years. Then there are those young people whose dreams wither due to lack of nurturance. Or perhaps their dreams are actively discouraged or even ridiculed during the adolescent years. Parents may exert a negative effect on pursuit of dreams. he social environment in school, as well, may prove overwhelming for some students.

At any rate, whether due to lack of opportunity to explore different activities, lack of parental or teacher support, or serious difficulties in psychosocial or psychosexual development, one's dreams can become derailed. The future one had envisioned turns into day after day tedium, or, worse, a nightmare, as in the case of Jeanette Sliwinski.

There is no ultimate psychological "safety net". Teachers, guidance counselors, fellow students, parents, and friends can all strive to be alert to individuals who appear to be unduly struggling with life. Jeanette Sliwinski had already received mental health services and was scheduled to be seen on the very day that she snuffed out three lives, ostensibly in an attempt to take her own life.

I can't help but wonder how things might have turned out differently for her, John Glick, Michael Dahlquist, and Doug Meis had her life dreams been different, or at least nurtured differently, and had she accepted the harsh reality that few women make it to the top in the world she had chosen for herself. Unlike the victims of her incredibly selfish act, Jeanette Sliwinski will get a second chance at life. She was paroled after serving less than half her sentence. She may even be eligible for a driver's license this fall. One can only wonder what her dreams for herself are now and how they will impact those around her.