Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
What do you do when, just before Thanksgiving at your mother's, your fourteen-year-old son asks you to iron the dress he recently purchased and plans to wear? Readers learn the answer and much more in this wonderfully frank, loving, and practical account of parenting a transgender teen. Paria Hassouri chronicles what amounts to a dual transition: as her child transitions from male to female, she navigates through anger, denial, and grief to eventually arrive at acceptance. Despite her experience advising other parents in her work as a pediatrician, she was blindsided by her child's gender identity. Her journey forces her to reckon with how her own childhood as a brown kid in a white world led her to sometimes parent with fear rather than love. Hassouri discovers her capacity to evolve, as well as what it really means to parent and the deepest nature of unconditional love. At its heart, Found in Transition is a universally inspiring portrait of what it means to be a family.
Synopsis
On Thanksgiving morning, Paria Hassouri finds herself furiously praying and negotiating with the universe as she irons a dress her fourteen-year-old, designated male at birth, has secretly purchased and wants to wear to dinner with the extended family. In this wonderfully frank, loving, and practical account of parenting a transgender teen, Paria chronicles what amounts to a dual transition: as her child transitions from male to female, she navigates through anger, denial, and grief to eventually arrive at acceptance. Despite her experience advising other parents in her work as a pediatrician, she was blindsided by her child's gender identity. Paria is also forced to examine how she still carries insecurities from her past of growing up as an Iranian-American immigrant in a predominantly white neighborhood, and how her life experience is causing her to parent with fear instead of love. Paria discovers her capacity to evolve, as well as what it really means to parent and the deepest nature of unconditional love.
This page-turning memoir relates a tender story of loving and parenting a teenager coming out as transgender and transitioning. It explores identity, self-discovery in adolescence and midlife, and difference in a world that values conformity. At its heart, Found in Transition is a universally inspiring portrait of what it means to be a family.