I didn’t know who Jeannette is before this book. I have never watched iCarly or anything else she has acted in. Then why did I choose to read this book? Because of the title! It is meant to be intriguing after all. Did I enjoy it? Yes. Do I recommend it? I a 100% yes.

This memoir is everything the people are describing it to be: honest, raw, vulnerable, heartbreaking. And the centre of the memoir, in Jeannette’s words, is “the fragility of mom’s life is the centre of mine”. Told in two parts, before death and after the death of her mother, Jeanette told her story refreshingly with dark humour, whereas the other part of the story is about her struggles with eating disorders.

Mother-daughter relationships are complicated but to be glad for your mother's death? That sounds insane, right? But what if your mother is an emotional abuser? What if her dream is for you to be the version she wanted to be no matter what? What if you are not even allowed to shower by yourself until the age of sixteen? What if you can't eat without any judgement and are living off calorie restriction, in turn becoming anorexic? What if you aren't allowed to have an ounce of freedom and privacy over your diaries, emails, income, and even relationships?

This was the life of Jeanette McCurdy until her mother's death, and after her mother's death as well because guilt is a monster after all. Jeanette's mom wanted her daughter to be an actor and hence she bestowed special attention on her since her childhood, and in return Jeanette would do anything to make her mother happy, never prioritizing her wishes.

"She wanted this. And I wanted her to have it. I wanted her to be happy. But now that I have it, I realise she's happy and I'm not. Her happiness came at the cost of mine."

Her mother wanted to seek the benefit of her daughter's younghood so she tricked her into an eating disorder, anorexia, which is called 'Calorie restriction' and Jeanette, always thinking about making her mother happy, went into that. She told her it made it easier for her to be cast in roles much younger for her age. Her relationship with food (and in turn with acting) kept getting worse, so much so that later in life, when she wants to eat all the junk, her self-consciousness turns it into guilt and she develops another eating disorder, bulimia.

Her mom was a cancer patient but she was ecstatic, living high on her daughter's fame, always emotionally manipulating and micromanaging her. Whereas Jeanette is living with self-loathing, anxiety and shame which turns into eating disorders and unhealthy relationships.

After the death of her mother, the issues get worse but she discovers therapy and quit acting (which she never loved). She had built a narrative and a life towards the lie that her mother was perfect and that whatever she did was for her own good. But when her therapy sessions start undoing this narrative, she struggled to see the actual truth and to deal with the emotions that she was suppressing through drinking and purging. After all, it was hard to finally realize that her mother was a narcissist.

There is another aspect of the book that needs to be discussed. We don't specifically have a lot of actors speaking out about their experiences on set as child actors and how it impacted their lives but it's a very necessary perspective to hear. Some of the things that Jeanette shared about her struggles at the set, the abuse, and the stardom, were jarring and made me realise that as consumers we mindlessly consume those content without actually thinking about what goes on behind the curtain. Child actors often have pressure to be successful when they get old but only a few of them get to stardom. Jeanette was a quite self-aware child star in that narrative and she tries to explain why child stars don’t often become super successful after their popular role.

She is on the journey of self-recovery and acting towards the things she wants in her life. And I have nothing but great respect for Jeanette to come out of such an abusive environment and trauma and try to recover. I really appreciate her courage to recall these incidents and to share this personal story and struggles with the world with such honesty and dry humour. I only hope she is doing much better in her life and is now able to move forward.

From a reader's point of view, I would say that Jeanette has written the book without any flowery details thus presenting what is and what was straightforward. It makes the narrative very raw and real and relatable. I highly recommend reading this memoir, but please check the trigger warnings before you dive into it.

A truly memorable book!
Highly recommended .