How to Lose Your Mother: A Daughter's Memoir

“To say my mother and I are close doesn’t really express the full magnitude of the relationship. We are painfully, inexorably, chronically close, the way magnets are. Sometimes when I lie in bed at night, staring at the ceiling, I’m not even sure I exist without her. She created me and I enabled her. But there is a paradox at the heart of our relationship. As close as we were—are—there has always been, between us, an unbridgeable distance. My relationship with her has always been wildly conflicted. I know that she loved me. But I also know that she never really seemed particularly interested in me. She always told me she wanted me, desperately wanted me. But I spent most of my school breaks in a trailer park in Tampa with my nanny.”

Jong-Fast uses the metaphor of magnets to illustrate the contradictory nature of her relationship with her mother—simultaneously drawn together yet unable to truly connect. The author creates tension through the juxtaposition of extreme closeness (“I’m not even sure I exist without her”) with emotional distance (“unbridgeable distance”), revealing how physical proximity can coexist with psychological isolation. The concrete detail about spending school breaks with her nanny in a trailer park provides stark evidence that contradicts her mother’s claims of desperate love. This quote directly addresses the theme of The Complexity of Loving an Emotionally Unavailable Parent by demonstrating how a parent can express love while remaining fundamentally absent, creating confusion and pain for the child who must reconcile conflicting messages and experiences.

“Dissociation has always been her magic trick, her way of remaining in the world but also not. Was it her chronic dreaminess that made it impossible to tell if she was merely distracted, or if she was disappearing?”

The metaphor of dissociation as a “magic trick” suggests both the deliberate nature of Erica’s psychological escape and its seemingly supernatural ability to render her simultaneously present and absent. Jong-Fast creates ambiguity through the rhetorical question that blurs the line between ordinary distraction and pathological disconnection, reflecting the daughter’s lifelong confusion about her mother’s mental state. The phrase “remaining in the world but also not” captures the essential paradox of dissociation—physical presence coupled with psychological absence. This quote exemplifies the theme of The Dangers of Unhealthy Defense Mechanisms by presenting the mother’s mental departure not as a clinical condition but as a practiced skill that allowed her to avoid genuine engagement with reality and relationships.

“Sometimes when I was working on this book, I bristled at the whole project of this memoir: a daughter trying to come to terms with the loss of a mother. But I never had Erica Jong. How can you lose something you never had?”

Jong-Fast uses dramatic irony to subvert the traditional memoir narrative, revealing that the conventional story of losing a beloved parent doesn’t apply to her experience. The rhetorical question “How can you lose something you never had?” exposes the fundamental impossibility of her situation—grieving someone who was never truly accessible. The author’s resistance to the memoir format (“I bristled”) reflects her awareness that her story doesn’t fit expected patterns of mother-daughter relationships. This quote encapsulates the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent by illustrating how the absence of genuine connection complicates even the process of mourning, leaving the daughter without a clear framework for understanding her loss or her grief.

“An important caveat is that my mother wasn’t a mean alcoholic like my grandmother (who used to get drunk, and scream at everyone, and pull off her clothes on the crosstown bus). But Mom wasn’t in there when she drank, even when she was in there. My mother wasn’t bad, she was just gone.”

Jong-Fast uses italicized emphasis on “in there” and “was” to highlight the paradoxical nature of her mother’s presence—physically present but emotionally absent. The contrast between the grandmother’s dramatic, disruptive behavior and the mother’s quiet disappearance illustrates different forms of abandonment through substance misuse. The final declaration that her mother “wasn’t bad, she was just gone” captures the particular pain of loving someone who retreats into themselves rather than lashing out. This quote exemplifies the theme of the dangers of unhealthy defense mechanisms as Jong-Fast describes her mother’s use of alcohol as a means of psychological withdrawal. The observation connects to Jong-Fast’s broader argument about the unique challenges of having an emotionally unavailable parent who chooses absence over engagement.

“I wanted to say something else. I wanted to tell the doctor the bigger truth and explain that I’d never known her, that she’d never known me. That I loved her, that I burned for her, but that none of it was enough. How could I say that? You can never tell anyone the whole truth. As the daughter of Erica Jong, I’d gotten pretty good at whitewashing reality. I ended the call and felt something that’s very hard to describe. It was the bereft, broken feeling of something ending before it ever got the chance to start.”

The metaphor of “burning” for her mother conveys intense, consuming longing that suggests both passion and pain. Jong-Fast’s admission that she has become skilled at “whitewashing reality” reveals how living with her mother’s fame and dysfunction has forced her into a pattern of concealing difficult truths. The paradoxical phrase, “something ending before it ever got the chance to start,” captures the tragedy of a relationship that was always potential rather than actual. This quote embodies the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent, illustrating how deep love can coexist with the recognition that a meaningful connection was never achieved. The passage demonstrates Jong-Fast’s central argument that fame creates additional barriers to authentic family relationships, forcing children into protective roles that prevent honest communication.

“This is where I need to reiterate that my mother has always been almost entirely without self-reflection. She can’t ever look back at something and take stock of it. It has always been too painful for her to pause and wonder if perhaps she could have done things differently. Not being able to learn from past mistakes makes any kind of forward progress almost impossible.”

Jong-Fast uses clinical, almost diagnostic language to describe her mother’s psychological patterns, with phrases like “entirely without self-reflection” and “take stock of it” suggesting an analytical distance. The logical progression from inability to reflect to inability to grow creates a sense of tragic inevitability. This quote relates to the theme of the dangers of unhealthy defense mechanisms as it describes how Erica uses denial and avoidance to escape confronting uncomfortable realities about herself. The observation supports Jong-Fast’s larger point that her mother’s psychological defenses, while protecting her from pain, ultimately prevented the personal growth necessary for meaningful relationships.

“Here is something crucial to remember: I am the product of that person, that person who left every man the instant he got sick, or, even worse, boring. That woman created me.”

Jong-Fast uses direct address to the reader, creating an urgent tone that emphasizes the significance of this self-revelation. The phrase “or, even worse, boring” reveals her mother’s value system, where abandonment due to illness is preferable to abandonment due to mundane normalcy. The declarative sentence “That woman created me” serves as both an acknowledgment of maternal influence and an expression of inherited traits the author recognizes in herself. This quote directly relates to the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent, as Jong-Fast grapples with understanding how her mother’s patterns of abandonment have shaped her own identity and capacity for relationships.

“She was singularly the most glamorous and inaccessible person I’d ever known. She would often complain that she’d spent all the book money. She’d lie awake at night worrying about how we’d survive another month, how she’d be able to pay for my expensive private school. But then sometimes she’d take me out on extravagant shopping trips despite needing said cash. There was always a sense that reality and her actions weren’t actually all that connected. The magic of fame made it very hard, almost impossible, for her to be a normal responsible person.”

Jong-Fast juxtaposes “glamorous and inaccessible” to capture the fundamental contradiction of her mother’s character—simultaneously alluring and emotionally distant. The author uses specific financial details and contrasting behaviors (worrying about money versus extravagant spending) to illustrate her mother’s disconnection from practical reality. The metaphor “magic of fame” transforms celebrity status into an almost supernatural force that distorts normal human behavior and responsibility. The phrase “almost impossible” suggests that fame creates insurmountable barriers to authentic relationships and grounded living. This passage embodies both the theme of the corrosive effects of fame and the theme of the dangers of unhealthy defense mechanisms, demonstrating how celebrity status enabled Erica to avoid facing practical realities while simultaneously making a genuine connection nearly impossible for both mother and daughter.

“The reason I knew Mom was a liar was because her story always changed. Sometimes it was one thing, then sometimes it was an entirely different story. This shifting reality, this strange post-truth ecosystem she inhabited, and that I for a time inhabited too, made me completely unable to know what was real and what was a lie with her.”

Jong-Fast uses the metaphor of an “ecosystem” to describe her mother’s manipulation of truth, suggesting that lies create an entire environment rather than isolated incidents. The phrase “post-truth ecosystem” connects her personal experience to broader cultural concepts about the malleability of reality. The admission that she “for a time inhabited too” this false reality demonstrates how children absorb their parents’ distorted worldviews. This quote exemplifies the theme of the dangers of unhealthy defense mechanisms by showing how her mother’s inability to maintain consistent narratives created an environment where truth was unknowable.

“Even back then, I think (though I don’t know this firsthand, because I wasn’t actually there) that Mom was anxious about losing her fame. Almost from the moment she got famous she was worried about becoming unfamous. The truth was that Mom never understood how she got famous, and never thought she deserved it. So I think that made her even more afraid that the condition was merely on loan.”

Jong-Fast uses parenthetical qualification to acknowledge the limits of her childhood perspective while still offering adult insight into her mother’s psychology. The neologism “unfamous” creates a stark contrast with “famous,” emphasizing how her mother viewed celebrity as a binary state rather than a spectrum. The metaphor of fame as a “condition” that was “merely on loan” suggests her mother experienced celebrity as both a disease and a temporary privilege that could be revoked at any moment. The paradox that her mother “never understood how she got famous, and never thought she deserved it” reveals the psychological complexity underlying her behavior. This passage illuminates the theme of the corrosive effects of fame by demonstrating how celebrity created a perpetual state of anxiety and insecurity that shaped her mother’s entire worldview and, consequently, her parenting.

“Imagine that. Imagine that the worst thing that’s ever happened to you is portrayed as a figment of your own imagination. By your own mother.”

Jong-Fast uses repetition of “Imagine that” to emphasize the absurdity and pain of her situation, while the italicized phrase “By your own mother” creates a dramatic pause that underscores the betrayal’s source. This quote captures the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent, as it demonstrates how Erica Jong’s inability to acknowledge her daughter’s genuine suffering reflects the painful patterns that defined their relationship.

“I never thought of not bleeding to death as an act of heroism. I wasn’t a hero for not dying in childbirth, I was just, as so many times in my life, lucky. But that’s the problem with being lucky, with being born into a lucky situation—you know that the luck, like fame, is only temporary. Luck runs out for everyone sooner or later.”

The comparison between luck and fame reveals the author’s understanding of privilege’s fragility, drawing from her experience as the daughter of a famous writer. The metaphor of luck “running out” suggests an inevitable reckoning, while the universal statement “for everyone sooner or later” broadens her personal experience into a philosophical observation about human vulnerability. This reflection connects to the theme of the corrosive effects of fame, as Jong-Fast recognizes that both celebrity status and fortunate circumstances are temporary conditions that can create false security and unrealistic expectations about life’s stability.

“I was deranged. I am deranged. I am bits and pieces of a normal person and I don’t want that for them. No one wants that for their kids. No amount of fame is worth turning my children into the weird hollow doll I am.”

Jong-Fast uses present tense to emphasize the ongoing nature of her psychological fragmentation, reinforced by the metaphor of being “bits and pieces of a normal person.” The stark declarative sentences create a confessional tone that demonstrates her unflinching self-awareness about her psychological state. The metaphor of the “weird hollow doll” suggests an artificial, performative existence lacking authentic substance. This quote addresses the theme of the corrosive effects of fame, as Jong-Fast explicitly connects her psychological damage to celebrity culture and her determination to protect her children from similar harm. The passage reveals how fame creates a false self that replaces genuine identity, leaving behind only a “hollow” performance of normalcy.

“My mother never believed that I was a drunk. She never believed that she was one, either, always claiming that she was too famous to get sober.”

The phrase “too famous to get sober” reveals the absurdity of using celebrity status as justification for avoiding recovery. The repetition of “never believed” emphasizes the persistent nature of their denial and the way fame becomes a barrier to authentic self-reflection. This quote addresses the theme of the corrosive effects of fame, showing how celebrity status can become an excuse for avoiding personal accountability and genuine healing. Erica’s fame creates a framework that prevents her from confronting her addiction, ultimately harming both herself and her daughter.

“I’d always thought of myself as a very honest person, incredibly frank, but my inability to say the word ‘cancer,’ or ‘nursing home,’ indicates what a liar I am, how I have an inability to face simple facts. Mom always thought of herself as a truth teller, but the truth was that she lived in her own dreamworld, a fantasy of her own making, in which she was the one and only queen. Saying wildly inappropriate things when intoxicated does not necessarily a truth teller make. Could it be that Mom and I were actually the same?”

The metaphor of her mother as “the one and only queen” in her “dreamworld” illustrates the theme of the dangers of unhealthy defense mechanisms, showing how her mother constructed elaborate fantasies to avoid confronting reality. This passage demonstrates one of the memoir’s central arguments: The children of emotionally unavailable parents often inherit their parents’ coping mechanisms, even when they consciously reject their parents’ behaviors. The revelation connects to the broader theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent, as Jong-Fast grapples with recognizing herself in someone she simultaneously loves and resents.

“But this baffling emotional dishonesty made me perpetually confused. What was true? What was real? Was my mother’s inability to connect with me all in my head? Was this maybe my problem and not hers? After all, people would always tell me how much my mom loved me, because she would tell them how much she loved me. But I never felt very loved.”

Jong-Fast uses a series of rhetorical questions to capture the psychological confusion that defines her childhood experience with an emotionally unavailable mother. The repetitive questioning structure mirrors the circular thinking patterns that children often develop when trying to make sense of contradictory messages from their parents. The contrast between public declarations of love (“she would tell them how much she loved me”) and private emotional reality (“I never felt very loved”) exposes the performative nature of her mother’s affection. The phrase “baffling emotional dishonesty” encapsulates how her mother’s behavior created a fundamental uncertainty about reality itself. This quote exemplifies the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent, as it demonstrates how children often blame themselves for the emotional void they experience, questioning their own perceptions rather than recognizing the parent’s limitations.

“You can’t pre-grieve your parents much as you might want to, or need to. As an addict, I was always looking for a quick fix, a way to skip the hard work. I was the second or third generation in the family to love diet pills. I would take them instead of eating. You can cheat your weight, but you can’t cheat grief. Even if your parents never loved you, or you never loved them, or some weird combination of the two, grief still comes for all of us.”

Jong-Fast uses parallel structure to contrast what can and cannot be “cheated,” creating a powerful juxtaposition between superficial solutions and fundamental human experiences. The metaphor of addiction as a “quick fix” extends beyond substance misuse to encompass the broader pattern of avoidance that characterizes her family’s approach to emotional pain. The phrase “second or third generation in the family to love diet pills” reveals how destructive coping mechanisms become inherited family traits. The final sentence acknowledges the universality of grief while simultaneously recognizing the complexity of mourning parents who were emotionally unavailable. This passage demonstrates that despite a lifetime of avoiding difficult emotions through various forms of escape, certain fundamental human experiences cannot be circumvented or controlled.

“This is something I’ve noted about the way famous people are regarded—non-famous people often can’t accept that the rules of human existence still actually apply to famous people. Such is the power of fame: because my mother is, or was, famous, it’s almost as if she’s post-human.”

Jong-Fast uses the term “post-human” as a metaphor to illustrate how fame creates unrealistic expectations that transcend normal human limitations. The phrase “rules of human existence” encompasses universal experiences like aging, illness, and cognitive decline that fame cannot override. This observation connects to the theme of the corrosive effects of fame, demonstrating how celebrity status creates harmful illusions that prevent people from accepting natural human frailty and mortality.

“She is both alive and dead. She is both my mom and not my mom. We are through, we are over. The mother I was desperate for, that mother, she is gone, and she will never be. We will never have the relationship I desperately wanted. I will never be able to go back and fix it.”

Jong-Fast uses paradoxical language to capture the liminal state of her mother’s existence with dementia, emphasizing the contradictory nature of loving someone who is physically present but emotionally absent. The parallel structure of “both alive and dead” and “both my mom and not my mom” creates a rhythm that mirrors the author’s psychological confusion about her mother’s condition. The repetitive use of “never” reinforces the permanence of loss and the impossibility of resolution. The declarative tone shifts from philosophical observation to raw grief, moving from abstract concepts to deeply personal pain. This passage embodies the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent, as Jong-Fast grapples with mourning a relationship that never truly existed while her mother remains physically alive.

“She was a terrible mother, ergo I shouldn’t have to be a good daughter. But of course I was wracked by guilt. I wasn’t a good daughter; she wasn’t a good mother, but we were not even. We would never be even. There was no way to get even. That hole in my heart would never be filled no matter how much ice cream and Prada shoes I tried to fill it with. I would always be empty and alone. I would always be a bad daughter.”

Jong-Fast uses logical reasoning (“ergo”) to justify her behavior before immediately undermining that logic with emotional reality, demonstrating the conflict between rational thought and deep-seated guilt. The repetition of “even” creates a mathematical metaphor that suggests relationships can be balanced like equations, yet the author acknowledges this is impossible. The specific material items “ice cream and Prada shoes” represent attempts at self-soothing through consumption, highlighting how external comforts cannot address internal emotional wounds. The circular structure returns to “bad daughter,” emphasizing the inescapable nature of her self-perception. This passage explores the theme of the complexity of loving an emotionally unavailable parent by illustrating how childhood emotional neglect creates lasting patterns of guilt and inadequacy that persist even when the parent becomes vulnerable and dependent.

“You never grow out of your unhappy childhood. You are never not that unhappy bitter little girl; even now, even at forty-five, I’m still the sad, angry girl who is the last picked for sports, the last invited to sleepovers, forever waiting for my mom to show up at a school event—any school event. And she never shows up. She never comes, not once.”

Jong-Fast uses present tense (“You are never not”) to emphasize the permanence of childhood trauma, suggesting that past emotional wounds continue to define adult identity. The repetitive structure of “the last picked…the last invited…forever waiting” creates a litany of abandonment that builds emotional intensity while demonstrating how childhood experiences of rejection compound over time. The stark finality of “She never comes, not once” reinforces the absolute nature of maternal absence that shaped Jong-Fast’s formative years.

“Why couldn’t she have been happy about this? She had finally gotten what she’d wanted, but now it was meaningless. Did she even understand what any of it meant? Did she even remember that she had a legacy? And does a legacy even matter if you don’t remember what you’d done and who you were?”

Jong-Fast uses a series of rhetorical questions to express her frustration and confusion about her mother’s inability to appreciate finally receiving recognition from The New York Times Book Review. The questions progress from specific (“Why couldn’t she have been happy?”) to philosophical (“Does a legacy even matter?”), reflecting the author’s movement from immediate disappointment to broader existential concerns about memory, identity, and meaning. The juxtaposition of “what she’d wanted” with “meaningless” highlights the cruel irony of achieving long-sought recognition only after losing the cognitive ability to understand its significance. The final question about legacy mattering if one cannot remember one’s accomplishments raises questions about the nature of achievement and identity.

“I spend a lot of time wondering if I’m not taking care of them because they didn’t take care of me. I spend a lot of time wondering if I hadn’t been raised by nannies would I be a better daughter. Is this my way of getting them back for that unhappy childhood I find myself unable to escape? Am I trying to get back at them? Am I, at twenty-six years sober, finally trying to settle the score?”

Jong-Fast uses a series of rhetorical questions to expose her internal struggle with caregiving responsibilities, creating a confessional tone that reveals psychological complexity. The reference to being “twenty-six years sober” introduces the element of recovery, implying that even sobriety cannot fully resolve deeper psychological patterns rooted in parental neglect. Jong-Fast grapples with whether her reluctance to provide hands-on care stems from legitimate self-protection or vindictive retaliation for her own childhood abandonment.