People_USA_April_24_2017

was her manager. “He didn’t look at me like I was

crazy like everyone else did,” explains Kerrigan.

He also helped with the disordered eating she

says was “something I felt like I could control

when everything else was out of control. Jerry

would say, ‘Just eat two more bites.’ It slowly

became easier.” In 1995 the pair married.

Kerrigan gave birth to son Matthew in 1996

as she transitioned into professional skating in

touring shows. But she would spend eight years

trying to become a mom for a second time. “I felt

like a failure,” says Kerrigan, whose doctors were

never able to determine why

she kept miscarrying. “Jerry

asked me if I was sure I wanted

to keep going. It was hard for

him to see me hurting. But I

wasn’t ready to stop.” After IVF

treatment Kerrigan finally wel-

comed Brian in 2005 and Nicole

in 2008. “Now,” she says with a

laugh, “we’re outnumbered!”

Kerrigan has done commen-

tary for televised figure-skating

competitions and occasionally

works as a skate instructor, but

“my job is being with my kids

after school and asking them how their day was,”

he says. As the children grow up, however—

Matthew is thriving as a costume designer, Brian

is a competitive gymnast, and Nicole is dedicated

to ballet—Kerrigan is open to new adventures like

WTS, which she admits has been much more

f a challenge than learning to skate. “It’s crazy,

ke ‘Let’s learn the piano and perform something

i a week!’” she says. “I struggle through certain

eps, but I figure it out. I’m a competitor, I love

t e challenge, and it makes me feel young again.

m having the time of my life.”•

was 30,” she says. But her passion for

skating—which she “took to pretty

easily” when her parents enrolled her

in group figure-skating classes at age

6—quickly became her top priority.

As she began competing on a national

level in high school, “I missed out on

a lot,” says Kerrigan. “But I knew if I

didn’t go for it, I’d regret it.”

Then came the attack at the U.S. Fig-

ure Skating Championships in Detroit

in January 1994. Kerrigan still got to

represent the U.S.—and bring home

silver—in the ’94 Olympics, but the

experience wasn’t as purely joyful

as it had been when she had won the

bronze in Albertville, France, in ’92.

“I was being followed around by the

media and everything. It was uncom-

fortable,” she says. “People in the

Olympic Village cafeteria would look

at me like I had a couple of heads.” So

instead of eating with other Olympi-

ans, Kerrigan—who says she developed

“some degree” of anorexia as she coped

with the stress of the attention—began

eating lunch with Jerry Solomon, who

‘PEOPLE

DIDN’T

TALK ABOUT

FERTILITY

ISSUES,SO

I FELT VERY

ALONE’

—NANCY

KERRIGAN

72 April 24, 2017 PEOPLE

t

c

w

“

af

sh

M

is

to

DW

of

lik

in

ste

the

I’m

THE ATTACK

In the months

following it, says

Kerrigan (with

Tonya Harding at

the 1994 Olympics

and immediately

after the incident,

bottom), “I didn’t

fit in anywhere

anymore.”

“We watchDWTS as

a family, so they’re

excited to see me on

it,” says Kerrigan

(with her husband

and kids ca. 2013).

FAMILY TRAGEDY

Kerrigan (with

dad Daniel, below

left, and with mom

Brenda at his 2010

funeral) says her

fatherdiedofa

heart attack, but her

brother Mark (below)

was convicted of

assault and battery

in the incident that

authorities said led

to the death. Mark,

a veteran, suffers

from PTSD.

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