Once a Girl, Always a Boy: A Family Memoir of a Transgender Journey
by Jo Ivester
She Writes Press. 328 pages, $16.95
AUTHOR Jo Ivester, the mother of a transgender son, Jeremy (originally Emily), has written an intimate account of her child’s life. Once a Girl, Always a Boy is her personal narrative of Jeremy’s transition and journey—what he went through both emotionally and physically—with Jeremy’s own perspective provided from transcriptions of his his video diaries. Jeremy’s transition from female to male was obviously life-changing, but it also changed the lives of his family members. The transition itself was difficult and stressful—some forty percent of transgender teens commit suicide—but Jeremy was fortunate to have a supportive family, which made it far less traumatic.
In many ways this book parallels Becoming Nicole, a memoir by Amy Ellis Nutt, which was about Kelly and Wayne Maines as they struggled with, and came to embrace, their transgender child Wyatt en route to becoming Nicole.
____________________________________________________________
William Burton is a writer based in Provincetown, Mass.
