My Turn

by Nancy Reagan

  Although Maureen has worked extremely hard to campaign for her father, they don’t agree on everything. Maureen has always been a strong supporter of the Equal Rights Amendment, which Ronnie opposes because he believes the Constitution takes care of the matter. And I doubt that they are in full agreement about abortion. But Maureen has never been bashful about expressing her opinions.

  Maureen moved back to California when Ronnie’s second term was over, and as this book goes to press, she has been filling in for Larry King on his television interview show. In my opinion, she’s a natural talk-show host. Years ago she interviewed my father when he published his autobiography, and I remember his coming back and telling me that of all the interviewers he had met, Maureen had asked the best questions.

  Unfortunately, Maureen isn’t always diplomatic. She can be volatile, and occasionally she is intimidating, coming on too strong. Over the years these traits have made her some enemies.

  One of those enemies was Donald Regan, and Maureen and I often commiserated during the period when not just the two of us but practically everybody in Washington thought he should leave—everybody except Ronnie. When Regan finally left, I was particularly upset at some of the press reports, which made it seem as if I, and I alone, were responsible. “I’m very unhappy about these articles,” I told Maureen. “I don’t want people to be afraid of me.”

  She said: “The people who know you aren’t afraid of you, and those who don’t know you should be. The best thing in the world is for people to be a little afraid of you. You can get a lot more done that way.”

  Well, perhaps. But I had never seen myself in those terms.

  When Maureen first told me she was writing a book called First Father, First Daughter, I thought, Great, just what we need—another book by one of the Reagan children about how hard it is when your father becomes president!

  Fortunately, I was wrong. Maureen’s book is frank and interesting, and in it she provides details and insights about Ronnie that even I hadn’t known.

  My earliest memories of Michael are of rubbing his back during those car rides to and from the ranch. How he loved those back rubs! I felt sorry for that little boy. He was only three when his parents separated, and he didn’t really understand what it all meant. He reminded me of a lost puppy who needed a lot of love and affection.

  Mike was four when he learned that he was adopted. When he was old enough to understand what that really meant, he found it enormously upsetting. Although he never talked about it, we now know that he was constantly worried that he might have been born out of wedlock and was therefore illegitimate—and in his own mind, somehow worthless.

  For this reason and others, Mike had a difficult time growing up and finding his own identity. No matter what he accomplished—and he eventually became a world-champion boat racer—he always carried the burden of being called “the adopted son of Ronald Reagan.” I can understand how that must have felt, because I have always hated being referred to as the “stepdaughter” of Loyal Davis. To this day, I can’t stand that word “step.”

  After Chadwick, Michael’s mother sent him to St. John’s Military Academy, a Catholic boys’ boarding school in downtown Los Angeles. He hated it and used to refer to it as St. John’s Miniature Alcatraz. He often spent weekends with us, and on Sunday afternoons we’d drive him back to school. He would cry when it was time to go back, and my heart broke for him.

  Michael went through a turbulent adolescence, and when he was fourteen his relationship with his mother had deteriorated to such an extent that a psychiatrist recommended that he would be better off moving in with us. Suddenly I had a third child in the house, a teenager whom I barely knew. It soon became obvious that he needed a lot of attention—including a trip to the dentist, who discovered about ten cavities. He also needed clothes, and lots of care.

  But I was flying blind with Michael, and I had no idea what was really going on with him. We tried to have a successful blended family, but it’s hard when you haven’t known each other all along, and when you haven’t been in charge during the formative years.

  Michael and I had such rough times during that period that there were days when I could have killed him. Teenagers can be difficult in any case, but Mike was especially troubled and rebellious. I was convinced he didn’t like me, and I didn’t know how to bridge the gap between us. I also had my hands full with Patti, who was seven, and Ron, who was just a baby. Michael later admitted that he was jealous of the attention I gave to little Ron.

  Once, when Ronnie was away on a speaking trip, Mike asked if I could find out the name of his birth mother. He was sixteen at the time, and I thought his request was a fair one which deserved an answer. In those days, Ronnie and I had the same business manager as Jane Wyman, so I called and asked him to find out.

  When I heard from him, I told Mike that the name of his biological mother was Irene Flaugher, and that he had been named John L. Flaugher at birth. His father had been a military man who went overseas, leaving his mother pregnant—and unmarried.

  I was told that Jane was not pleased that I had answered Michael’s question. But he was obviously troubled by having been adopted, and I thought he had the right to know the truth about his own background. It seemed like a natural thing to want to know, and I hoped this would give him some peace of mind.

  But the fact that Michael’s biological parents hadn’t been married only confirmed his worst fear—that he was illegitimate. Moreover, he was convinced that his birth mother had given him away because she didn’t love him. But Michael never talked about these things, and I learned them only much later, when I read his book.

  By this time my own parents were living in Phoenix, and my father helped us get Michael enrolled in a boarding school in Arizona, where he flourished. Mother looked out for him, and when Michael graduated, she presented him with a gold signet ring. When Mother died in 1987, Michael wore that ring to her funeral. It was, he said later, the first time in his life that he had cried for a family member other than himself.

  A year or two after the “estrangement” incident, I read a report in Newsweek that Michael was writing a book about his father—a kind of Daddy Dearest. I couldn’t imagine what he could possibly say against Ronnie, but Patti’s book had just come out—an unpleasant, critical “novel” about a girl whose father becomes president—and now, apparently, Michael was writing a book of his own.

  When I called Mike to ask him about it, he said, “I’ve been asked to do a book about Dad for lots of money.”

  “Of course,” I replied. “I could get lots of money for walking naked up and down Pennsylvania Avenue. It’s a question of taste.”

  This was the last I heard about Michael’s book until April 12, 1987, when Michael, Colleen, and their children, Cameron and Ashley, drove up to the ranch to celebrate Ashley’s fourth birthday. Michael seemed anxious and upset, and although he didn’t say anything, I could sense that he wanted some time alone with Ronnie and me. After lunch, I suggested that Colleen take the children for a walk around the pond. As soon as Mike was alone with us, he burst into tears.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  But Mike couldn’t speak. He was trembling and gasping for breath and was obviously in great pain. I hugged him and started rubbing his back, the way I used to when he was little.

  Then Mike poured out the terrible secret he had been keeping inside all these years. At the age of eight, he had been sexually molested by a camp counselor, who had also taken nude pictures of him. Poor Mike had spent his whole life racked with guilt and in constant fear that these pictures would someday surface in a way that might embarrass him and, especially, his father. Except for Colleen, he had never told anyone. And he had told her only a few weeks earlier.

  Ronnie and I had absolutely no idea that anything like this had ever happened. I don’t know if we would have picked it up if Michael had been living with us—I’d like to think so—but I can’t be sure. I knew Michael had problems, but this?
I never dreamed of it.

  When he finally calmed down, Mike explained that he had given up the idea of writing a negative book about his father. He had been seeing a therapist, and he now understood that the problems in his life were not Ronnie’s fault. He was still going ahead with the book, but it was now a different book—one that might be helpful to other victims of sexual abuse.

  Michael now refers to that visit to the ranch as the first day of the rest of his life. I can understand why, and I can imagine how hard it must have been for him to share this terrible secret.

  The following month, I wrote in my diary: “Mike and Cameron called to thank us for Cameron’s birthday present. Mike told me more about the book. I hope it’s the right thing for him. He ended by saying ‘I love you,’ which he had never said before. I’m urging him to call Mermie to re-establish that relationship. I’m so happy that hers and mine became strong a couple of years ago, and I hope that ours with Mike will, too.”

  I rarely lose an opportunity to worry, and even after Michael’s visit to the ranch I was nervous about the book he was writing. When he sent us an advance copy in March 1988, I stayed up half the night reading it. I hadn’t known what to expect, but I was tremendously relieved when I saw that it was a candid and soul-searching account of his life, in which Mike was at least as hard on himself as he was on the rest of the family.

  I was pleased to see that Michael remembered those back rubs in the car when he was five, and I was touched to learn that he had been hoping that Ronnie and I would get married because he thought he could move in with us instead of living at school. He explained how unhappy he felt as a child, caught between Jane and me, neither of whom was his “real” mom. And he described his constant fear that those nude pictures would somehow surface during one of Ronnie’s political campaigns and bring shame upon his father and the entire family.

  It was wonderful to see how Mike had grown and changed, and how he was now able to take responsibility for his own life. Ironically, this book, which started off as one more source of friction between us, actually helped us develop a better relationship.

  I wish we had been able to see Michael and Colleen’s children more often, but we lived so far away, and we weren’t in California that often. And sometimes when we were, Michael’s family was away. Maybe we could have seen Cameron and Ashley more than we did, and I can understand how Mike sometimes resented the long periods between visits. But for eight long years, our time wasn’t really our own.

  A few days before we moved out of the White House, Michael started a new job as the host of an early-morning talk show for a radio station in San Diego. The first caller had a familiar voice. “Good morning, Mike,” he said. “This is your old man. I’m a little far away to hear the show, but wanted to congratulate you on your first day and wish you well.” Ronnie’s call came as a complete surprise to Mike, and I know he appreciated it. And it’s interesting that Maureen and Michael have both been active in broadcasting, because long before Ronnie became an actor, he made his living as a radio announcer.

  I can’t close this section about Michael without mentioning a story that I find very moving. During the course of writing his autobiography, Mike decided to search for his birth mother. When Jane did not respond to his request for information, he wrote to Ronnie, who put him in touch with the appropriate person on Governor George Deukmejian’s staff. Soon Michael received a detailed reply from the California Department of Social Services, from which he learned, to his great joy, that his birth mother had wanted to keep him, but that this would have been impossible in her hometown.

  Michael also learned for the first time that his birth mother had said she wouldn’t give him up for adoption unless she met the woman who was going to take him. Later she told the social worker that she had recognized Jane Wyman, but she apparently never mentioned this to anyone else.

  In the fall of 1987, Mike was in Canada when he received a startling piece of news. A woman who had been friendly with his first wife had recently met a man named Barry, who claimed to be Michael Reagan’s half brother. Barry’s mother had died in 1985, and on her deathbed she had told Barry that seven years before he was born, she had given birth to another son, who was adopted by Ronald Reagan and Jane Wyman.

  Barry was incredulous—until he remembered that his mother used to keep scrapbooks on the Reagan family. He had always assumed that his mother had a crush on Ronald Reagan, but when he went back to look at the clippings, he realized that Michael Reagan was in every one.

  Before long, Barry and Michael met. As Michael tells it, Barry was as excited as he was to find his long-lost brother. And Mike was thrilled to learn that he had other living relatives, and that, according to Barry, he bore a striking resemblance to one of his uncles in Florida. Later, we invited Barry to the White House, and I thought I could see a resemblance to Mike.

  It all sounds like a soap opera, except that it actually happened. It was wonderful that Mike finally learned the true story of his origins, and discovered that another human being in this world was directly related to him. And that his birth mother had continued to love him and to think about him throughout her life. He had finally found his roots, and it helped him find peace.

  Ever since Mike told me this story, I have been impressed by the way Irene Flaugher handled the situation. When Ronnie became governor, and then president, she kept silent. It was only when she was dying that she told her other son about Mike, because she thought he should know. I give that woman a lot of credit and think that Mike has every reason to be proud of her.

  I’ve had my ups and downs with all four children, but my relationship with Patti has been one of the most painful and disappointing aspects of my life. I wish it weren’t true, and I still hope it will change, but so far, at least, it hasn’t been a happy story. Somehow, no matter what I do, we seem to square off. And it’s been this way from the start.

  When Patti turned out to be a girl, I thought Ronnie might be disappointed. “Not at all,” he said. “The wonderful thing about having a girl is that you get to see your wife as a little girl, growing up.” It was a very sweet thing to say, but things didn’t quite turn out that way.

  I was a nervous mother, and Patti was a difficult baby from the start. She demanded constant attention—and as I look back on it, I think we gave in to her too often. When we put her down at night, she would scream for hours—at least it seemed like hours. The doctor said to let her cry it out, and that if we kept going to her, she would cry all the more. But it was hard to stay away, especially during her many tantrums. When guests came for dinner, the noises coming from Patti’s room were so terrible that I was afraid they’d think somebody was in there beating her up!

  There were also problems with eating. Sometimes after she had been fed she would lean over in her high chair and throw up. That was lots of fun, as you can imagine.

  Once, when Patti was around two, I was feeding her string beans. She held them in her mouth but simply refused to swallow them. I tried everything I could think of, but nothing worked. Finally I called the pediatrician. “Don’t give in,” he said. “Leave the room and get busy with something else, and go back to her later.” An hour and a half passed, and by now it was past her nap time, but Patti was still sitting there with those damn beans in her mouth.

  When I came in, she looked up at me with a mischievous smile on her face and said, “What I got in my mouth, Mommy!”

  When I called the doctor again, he said, “Reach into her mouth and take out the beans.”

  This was a kid with a mind of her own. She was defiant, even angry, from the beginning, and with Ronnie away so often, I was the disciplinarian. I wish I had been better at it, but I did the best I could.

  In 1958, when I was pregnant with Ron, Patti was excited. She loved to feel the baby growing in my stomach, and she wanted to come to the hospital to see him when he was born. At that time, however, hospitals didn’t allow young children to visit, and Ronnie explained that they were
afraid kids would carry in germs. But once Ron was born, it soon became obvious that Patti resented the new baby—as most six-year-olds would have.

  As Patti grew older, it was clear that she had many talents. She taught herself to play guitar and piano. She made beaded flowers, which she sold to stores. She taught herself to type, and she wrote poetry, which she sent to William F. Buckley, Jr., for his comments. She loved to act, and she was always putting on plays and dressing up in costumes. After Ron was born, Patti would give him a part in her plays, but Ron’s parts usually consisted of just standing there while Patti took center stage. During one performance, when Ron was old enough to realize what was going on, he finally got fed up and walked off.

  I always encouraged Patti and praised her for her accomplishments, but much of the time she just didn’t want to have anything to do with me. When I drove the car pool to school, she sat as far away from me as possible. When we were out together, she walked behind me instead of with me. I just didn’t know what to do.

  And yet I still have the notes that Patti would slide underneath my door, telling me how much she loved me, and that she hadn’t wanted to hurt my feelings.

  I now believe that Patti’s anger toward me stems from her unresolved feelings about her father. I also believe that Ronnie and I were too indulgent with her; we gave in too often, and paid her too much attention. She demanded it, and we gave it. For six years she was the only one. We didn’t plan it that way, but I had two miscarriages before Ron was born, and I was so happy to have a child that I was probably too protective and tried too hard with her. When Ronnie and I went out, and Patti would stand at the window and cry, we always came back to reassure her. Then, wherever we went, we called Patti when we got there. One night we forgot, and later, when we called, the housekeeper told us that Patti had been hysterical for hours. Looking back, I wish we’d helped her become more independent.