Completed: July 3, 2025
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody
Review:
Jong-Fast does not think much of herself as a daughter. Or her mother as a mother. Or her step-father as a father (though she does give him some credit). She seems to feel that her father, especially now, has stepped up somewhat. A child who wanted for nothing, self-described as obnoxious, was reared largely by a nanny with occasional swoop-ins from the parental figures around her. She fought a battle with drug abuse (alcoholism apparently being the worst of it) and is now sober. Her mother much less. Her mother is not dead at the time of the book's writing (nor now as I write this), but she has dementia which has become increasingly intense. This book pivots around Jong-Fast's realization that she is never going to be able to fix her relationship with her mother and, ironically, she is required to care for a mother who did not provide personal care for her in largely the same way (by hiring help). Meanwhile, in what can only be described as a year from hell, Jong-Fast deals with deaths in her family and her husband's very serious bout with cancer. It is a lot. Jong-Fast reads the book and I find her voice grating...I may have gotten more from it if it didn't seem like she was whining at me the whole book. Maybe not.
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