ANDREA'S VOICE - About the Authors

Andrea Lynn Smeltzer, 19, was trained in opera, enjoyed the theater, was an avid dancer, a masterful jewelry-maker and poet. After studying in Spain for a year at the age of fourteen, she spoke Spanish fluently. At the time of her death she was studying German, with a plan to master Japanese next. Prior to college, Andrea was elected president of her high school’s Amnesty International group and was an outspoken advocate for human rights. She was the representative chosen to present the student petitions to the Guatemalan consulate in San Francisco in 1996. At Pitzer College she was awarded the prestigious Fletcher Jones Scholarship, worked as a Resident Assistant and Mentor, majored in International Business and Politics—and looked forward to saving the world. She died tragically after thirteen months of bulimic behaviors on June 16, 1999.

Doris Smeltzer, an educator for nearly twenty years, was thrust into the world of eating disorders through Andrea, her nineteen-year-old daughter, who died of bulimia in June 1999. Doris and her husband, Tom, have keynoted at numerous conferences and presented at universities and organizations internationally. As the first bereaved parents invited to present before a congressional briefing on eating disorders in Washington, DC, their story has now been told in the headlines of periodicals and in radio and television spots from New York to California. Their web site, AndreasVoice.org, averages over a thousand hits a day from twenty-nine countries—testimony to the vast expanse of these deadly illnesses. Doris was named Napa County’s “Community Hero” in 2003, received her Masters Degree in Counseling Psychology in February 2006 and is the co-founder of the nonprofit organization, Andrea’s Voice Foundation, which is dedicated to education and support for everyone touched by eating disorders. Doris and Andrea’s Voice Foundation is collaborating with a phenomenal group of women who call themselves the North Bay Coalition for Healthy Kids. They want nothing less than to change the way the world looks at “body” and health and to promote unconditional positive self-regard.

When not educating on disordered eating and providing training on bully prevention and character education, Doris is happy to garden and work on projects with Tom in their Northern California home, which they share with their cats and llamas. Doris especially enjoys spending time with her daughter Jocelyn and son-in-law, Tracy, and dancing with her grandson, Fischer Lynn and granddaughter, Trinity.
Website: www.andreasvoice.org
Email: Doris@andreasvoice.org

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