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I've noticed in several photos when Karen looks directly into the camera, her left eye looks "strange." I've often wondered if perhaps she had a bit of a lazy eye, or what...? I don't see it in any of the early photos... It's always in photos taken in the later years...

The Ray Coleman book says that Karen possibly had a mini-stroke when she was in the late Seventies...
(page 232)

(In 1977) during a visit to their Morsound equipment and rehearsal center in North Hollywood, Karen suffered what she would later describe to Steven Levenkron as "a ministroke."

One side of her face went numb. She called Richard to mention it, but dismissed its significance to him and to tell Ken Black [a Morsound employee] who was nearby when it happened. Richard believes she went to a doctor. Since nobody saw it happen, its seriousness cannot be judged, but she considered it important enough to notify her brother. Such was the bounce and determination of Karen that she quickly cast the incident aside and didn't bother to mention it to her close friends.

I wonder if the way her eye looked might not be a result of that mini-stroke...

Here's a few photos to look at... Can you see what I'm talking about?

It does look like something, but I don't really know. It doesn't look that evident, but if you look closely, you can see something different. I hope that Karen was alright. I pray that she was, but after all it wasn't that evident at all. Atleast it didn't appear to be. I wonder what caused her to have this "mini-stroke"?

I think it's just that Karen had a lazy eyelid. It sometimes happens to me, usually when I feel tired or exhausted. And my reckoning is that Karen felt this was for much of her later years, running on empty half the time and punishing her system with laxatives and ipecac.

Stephen

Was that ever proven that she actually used ipecac?

Oh here we go with the ipecac debate.

But yes, she DID use ipecac. I don't know how often or how long before her death but it was in her body during the autopsy and it was confirmed.

Horrible, just horrible. How I wish I could go back in time.

What's ipepac?

It makes you vomit. People take it when have swallowed something poisonous, but is sometimes, very rarely abused. Once taken ipecac it never leaves your body. It remains in your body forever.

Syrup of ipecac is used to induce vomiting. It is used in cases of accidental poisoning. Anorexics and bulimics use it to induce vomiting to purge their stomachs after eating. Karen's death certificate listed emitene (ipecac) poisoning as one of the contributing factors in her death, which is odd, since the autopsy report doesn't mention it. Richard doesn't believe Karen ever induced vomiting, since he says repeated retching "plays hell with the vocal cords." However, several people who knew Karen believe did induce vomiting after eating meals, citing instances where she would retreat to the bathroom immediately after eating.

Her therapist, Steve Levenkron says he kept in touch with Karen after she returned home to California, and that she indicated that she was doing well, (eating, keeping the weight on, no longer abusing laxatives and thyroid pills, etc.) but he says, he never considered asking her about ipecac...

But according to the Coleman biography, no ipecac was ever found in Karen's possession or in her apartment...

True, but it was found in her body.

The Coleman book doesn't know everything. Itchy Ramone in NYC said Karen was using it.
Anyway........the eye thing isn't that noticeable, but I also read about her mini-stroke and wondered what effect it had on her and why it happened.

Cheryl

I've always wondered too, Cheryl... It may have just been Bell's Palsy, which is not all that uncommon, although I'm not sure what causes it exactly. A similar thing happened to my bro-in-law when he spiked a really high fever once.

As for the ipecac thing... I cannot even imagine abusing that stuff OFTEN. I will admit that I did it ONCE years ago and will NEVER do it again. It is horrible... extremely gross and the vomiting is downright painful. It smells like rancid maple syrup... to this day, I cannot eat pancakes, or even go to a pancake restaurant where I might smell maple syrup, or I will become instantly sick.

To me, though, it does make sense that Karen would have used it soon before her death. There was no food in her stomach by the morning of 2/4/83, and she did seem to have binged a bit the night before. I believe she may have been wandering into bulimic territory, and may have continued down that road if she'd lived.

Okay, I'm going back to my pre-1975 videos now, where I shall again live in denial for an extended time of ignorant bliss.

I don't think there is anything physically wrong with her eye. I just think you found a handful of "bad photo's". We all get a picture of ourselves taken and look at it later and we look retarded in it! Like our bottom lip is ajar or one eye is a bit shut! I honestly think you just found same bad shots of Karen.

Karen's big beautiful brown eyes were one of her most striking features. People who have "mini-strokes" usually make full recoveries fairly quickly, usually without adverse physical side effects. I really don't see much of a difference in her eye/facial symetry in those pics... everyone is entitled to a bad photo or two.

I imagine Karen's weaken physical state caused a myriad of problems that we don't, and will never ever know about.

It's a great read, but don't believe every single thing you read in the Coleman book.

The thing about the photo used on the Greatest Hits Album "Only Yesterday" is that Karen seems to be pulling her top over slightly as if she is trying to stop the camera from seeing her body.

The left eye lid does look a little droopy, but both eyes just look sad despite her bright smile.