Rose Kennedy was obsessed with daughter Rosemary's weight even after lobotomy

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Elizabeth Koehler-Pentacoff's The Missing Kennedy and Kate Clifford Larson's Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter shine a light on Rosemary Kennedy's life in the shadows
She and husband Joseph Kennedy were so obsessed with daughter Rosemary's weight they told her boarding schools she was 'getting too fat'
Rosemary would apologize in letters home about the pounds she'd gained
She underwent a lobotomy in 1941 when she was 23 years old and was left unable to speak or walk properly after the botched procedure
Her mom was known to call the Catholic institution for the disabled where Rosemary lived as an adult to ask about her daughter's weight

Published: 20:59 EST, 7 September 2015 | Updated: 22:24 EST, 7 September 2015

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Rose Kennedy was so concerned about her nine children's figures that it became a 'constant theme throughout their whole lives', new books about the family reveal.

The matriarch continued to tell her eldest daughter Rosemary that she needed to lose weight - even after the tragic lobotomy that turned the girl into one of the Kennedys' darkest secrets.

Kate Clifford Larson's biography Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter and Elizabeth Koehler-Pentacoff's book The Missing Kennedy, both excerpted in this week's issue of People Magazine, claim that Rosemary was always on a diet.

Truth revealed: Two news books - Elizabeth Koehler-Pentacoff's The Missing Kennedy and Kate Clifford Larson's Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter shine a spotlight on Rosemary Kennedy's fate

Both books discuss how Joe and Rose Kennedy were obsessed with their children's weight. Rosemary, pictured in the 1930s with her family, L-R: Joseph Jr, Robert, Edward, John, Joseph Sr, Rose, Eunice, Jean, Patricia, Rosemary and Kathleen

The fear of displeasing her parents was so great that once, when she put on a couple of pounds at boarding school, she sent a letter to her father apologizing for it.

'Sorry. to think that I am. fat.,' wrote Rosemary, who was intellectually disabled.

Joe Kennedy responded by telling the school that his daughter was getting 'all together too fat'.

Larson told People that Rose's letters to her children almost always included a comment regarding their figure - 'one was too fat, one was too thin, one should be watching their weight,' she said.

The subject of Rosemary's weight did not wane after the debilitating lobotomy she received at the order of Joe Kennedy when she was 23 years old.

By then Rosemary - the Kennedys' third eldest child - had blossomed into an attractive and sexually appealing young woman.

But her concerned parents deemed her unmanageable as she began to take off from her Washington, D.C. boarding school to wander the city at night, Rose's niece Ann Gargan told historian Doris Kearns Goodwin for her 1987 book The Fitzgeralds and The Kennedys.

Rose (pictured center with Rosemary, then 19, on the right and daughter Kathleen in Mary 1938) almost always discussed weight in letters to her children, whether it was about them being 'too fat' or 'too thin'

Harsh words: During her time in London with her ambassador father (left and right), Rosemary put on some weight, which Mr Kennedy did not approve of, calling her 'altogether too fat'

By that time, Joe was busy laying the groundwork for his sons' political careers and feared that his out-of-control daughter could cause significant damage to the family name by becoming pregnant. He decided she had to have a lobotomy in 1941.

After the surgery, Rosemary could no longer speak - her mobility was damaged and 'she lost her independence for the rest of her life,' Timothy Shriver, Rosemary's nephew and the chairman of the Special Olympics wrote in his 2014 book Fully Alive: Discovering What Matters Most.

A guilt-ridden Joe Kennedy refused to visit his daughter. His wife Rose would later claim that her husband kept her in the dark about their daughter's lobotomy for 20 years.

Rosemary was shipped to St Colleta's, a Catholic institution for the disabled in Jefferson, Wisconsin, and was finally visited by her mother in 1961, after Joseph Kennedy had suffered a stroke.

As Rosemary, pictured right next to sister Eunice in 1938, entered adulthood, her parents were having increasingly hard time controlling her and keeping away suitors

At the sight of her mother, Rosemary, who was being escorted by two nuns, broke into a sprint and lunged at the elderly woman, beating her chest and screaming at her.

There would be more visits after that, but one topic of conversation continued to be Rosemary's weight.

Koehler-Pentacoff's aunt, Sister Paulus, was Rosemary's longtime caretaker and said Rose would often telephone the nuns specifically to ask about her daughter's diet.

When she visited, Rose would tell her daughter not 'to have any dessert tonight' because she needed to lose weight.

'So afterwards Sister Paulus would go into the kitchen and get an extra dessert from the refrigerator and give it to Rosemary,' Koehler-Penacoff told People. 'Because Rosemary lived for those little treats.'

Out of control: Upon her return to the stay, the attractive young woman, seen here left next to sister Jean, would often run away from her Washington DC boarding school and spent her nights wandering the city

In 1941, Joseph Kennedy scheduled a lobotomy surgery for his daughter Rosemary (seen here demonstrating a visual aid for the deaf) without consulting his family

Rosemary's siblings apparently knew nothing of her true fate. Some believed that she had wanted to seek privacy and had moved to the Midwest and worked as a teacher at a school for handicapped children.

Her situation markedly improved in the 1970s as relatives began invite her home for short visits.

Shriver recalled that although his aunt's language skills were extremely limited, she took pleasure in taking strolls, swimming and playing cards. She also enjoying getting compliments on her looks.

Rose kept mum about her daughter's lobotomy until her death in 1995, even as she gave speeches about people with learning disabilities.

Speaking to her biographer Robert Coughlin in 1972, when she knew the truth about Rosemary's lobotomy, she said that Rosemary's mind 'is gone completely' because of 'an accident'.

Mrs Kennedy also wondered aloud why God took her three able-bodied, brilliant and talented sons - Joseph Jr, President John F Kennedy and Robert Kennedy - 'and left my daughter who is incapacitated’.

Rosemary was 86 when she passed away from natural causes on January 7, 2005, at St Colleta's - her home for more than five decades. Her mother died ten years earlier, aged 104.

After the surgery, Rosemary was shipped off to St Colette in Jefferson, Wisconsin (left and right), where her mother would continue to call the nuns and ask about her daughter's diet