"When Marlo Mack’s three-year-old utters these words, her world splits wide open. Friends and family, experts, and Marlo herself had long downplayed her “son’s” requests for pretty dresses and long hair as experimentation - as a phase - but that time is over. When little “M” begs, weeping, to be reborn, Marlo knows she has to start listening to her kid.
How to Be a Girl is Mack is an unflinching memoir of M’s coming out - to her father, grandparents, classmates, and the world. Fearful of the prejudice that menaces M’s future, Mack finds her liberal values surprisingly challenged: Why can’t M just be a boy who wears skirts and loves fairies?
But M doesn’t give up: She’s a girl! As mother and daughter teach one another How to Be a Girl, Mack realizes it’s really the world that has a lot to learn - from her sparkly, spectacular M."
"In 2021, Marlo Mack released also an audiobook with the same title. "What's it like to parent a child in transition? Inspired by the acclaimed podcast How to Be a Girl, this is a highly personal and beautifully narrated memoir by Marlo Mack recounting the journey she's been on since her three-year-old declared he should have been born a girl. And Mack agrees to the child's request to be a girl. But getting the world to go along is another story.
"Putting the listener in her shoes, Mack takes us through how she explained it to her parents, found common ground with her ex, convinced educators, and developed radar for judgy parents who just didn't understand. She builds out her network of LGBTQIA+ support for herself and M. But the biggest motivation for this "mama bear" is her wonderous child who sings "Frozen", giggles through conversations about her favorite fairy toys, and offers us bits of wisdom and insight well beyond her years.
This is an unforgettable narrative of a remarkable child, a truly devoted parent, and what it means to practice motherhood in transition. Note from the author: The story I am sharing is about real people - me and my daughter and those who have lived through this very interesting time with us. To preserve the privacy of my child and others, I've changed nearly all of the names, including my own and that of my child.
Available via Amazon
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