Faking It: My Life in Transition – A Memoir
Kyle Mewburn
Penguin
Author Kyle Mewburn has written dozen of books, but if you don’t have a young child in your life you might not be familiar with works like Slowcoach Turtle, The Bear in the Room Next Door, Kiss! Kiss! Yuck! Yuck! or their very popular Dinosaur Rescue series.
In the frank and profound memoir Mewburn drops the reader into one of the most emotional and significant moments of her life, it begins with her sitting in a hospital waiting to undergo a series of procedures to assist with her gender transition. In her mid-50’s Mewburn has decided to take action after a lifetime of repressing reality.
The outcome of that decision is left to the end of the book, because as Mewburn counts to ten after being administered the antiesthetic, her life flashes before our eyes as the story heads back to a Queensland childhood and times of adolescent turbulence.
What a life this author has lived. We journey through tales of teenage shoplifting and floundering in their first job as a sports reporter for a local newspaper. Mewburn shares gender dysphoria has been a constant in their life, present from their earliest years.
Adventures overseas take us to Europe, where Mewburn meets future wife Marion. Soon the author is living in Germany, learning a new language and ding an ever increasing assortment of odd-jobs along the way. Bu the early 1990’s the couple have relocated to New Zealand where their lives continue on, and finally Mewburn finds her place in the world as a writer of children’s books.
Eventually Mewburn reaches a point where she makes the choice to start living life as a woman, but it’s a big transition, not only a physical and emotional change, but also filled with the questions of whether relationships, friendships, marriages and careers can survive the change.
In telling her truth Mewburn tackles many of the often heard talking points of the anti-trans lobby. Just by sharing this personal story questions about the support people need, when they know they are transgender, and the classic – do they just need to meet the right partner, are all addressed – simply via the story that is shared.
Faking It is a profoundly honest and personal account of Mewburns life, which has possibly only just begun to fully be lived.
Graeme Watson
You can support our work by subscribing to our Patreon
or contributing to our GoFundMe campaign.
