"Tony's wife was on the phone, ringing from their interstate
home. My husband's face drained to ashen. Tony had totally castrated
himself. He had lost a lot of blood and was now in surgery."
A shocking phone call from their distraught daughter-in-law was
how Lynda and Richard Langley learnt that their son had started
his transition from a man to a woman.
The mad rush to their son's hospital bedside, anguish and fear for
his physical health, shock from the nature of his injury, and the
dread of the challenges to be faced in the coming months and years...
Lynda's account of how she adjusted to the reality that her eldest
son had decided to physically become a woman is the story of a family.
Tears and laughter, support and withdrawal, accompany Toni - now
the eldest daughter - as she maps out her new life.
And with her all the time is Lynda, her mother. Helping to select
her wardrobe, guiding her in the subtleties of speech and behaviour,
and supporting her, especially in the early stages of her new life
as a woman.
A mother's story of losing a son and gaining a daughter - a transsexual
transition and a mother's love.
While there have been some accounts of transsexual transition published
on the web, this is the first account from a parent's perspective,
and the first to be published in book form. |