🌟🌟🌟🌟💫

For anyone who has ever considered their body, and judged it not “good”, without really stopping to wonder — Not good for what? Or whom? — this memoir, written by a woman who has explored that question, painfully and from birth, will definitely set your head spinning.

Diagnosed with a potentially life-threatening disease that is cosmetically disfiguring, rare and of which very little is known (within the medical community, and certainly the general population), the author, now forty-seven years old, grows into her own ultimately life-changing relationship with her uniquely self-entangled body, as she graciously reveals her journey to get here.

This is a story that is, in parts, heart-breaking, hilarious, anger-generating, and most of all, bursting with learnings and practical advice, shared deep-from-the-heart by an author with an absolutely no-holds back candor.

Beginning with her painfully-induced struggles with disordered eating and weight “control”, to the perils of sex and dating in the brutally misogynistic culture of NYC, (and if you had ever doubted, there are indeed some scary and hateful creeps out there) for much of her youth the author is unable to escape the worst of society’s body-shaming, abuse, and marginalization. Still she soldiers on, “waiting it out”, eventually finding therapy, medication, fashion, and most of all, her own personal blend of resilience, clear-thinking, self-confidence, and pure gutsiness, bubbling to the surface to inspire her (and by proxy, the reader).

Highly recommended, this is a wonderful read, celebrating divergence in all its paths, right now, living each moment, because, as we hear in the author’s own darkly prescient wake-up call—

“One day, in a coffin, I’ll look like everyone else”.

A great big thank you to Netgalley, the author, and the publisher for an ARC of this book. All thoughts presented are my own.