How to Lose Your Mother: A Daughter's Memoir

In How to Lose Your Mother: A Daughter’s Memoir, Molly Jong-Fast writes about her experience as the only child of feminist icon Erica Jong (author of Fear of Flying), providing insider knowledge of fame’s effects on family dynamics. The memoir belongs to the contemporary literary memoir genre, specifically focusing on mother-daughter relationships and family dysfunction. It explores themes including The Corrosive Effects of Fame, The Dangers of Unhealthy Defense Mechanisms, and The Complexity of Loving an Emotionally Unavailable Parent. Jong-Fast—a contributing writer at Vanity Fair, political analyst at MSNBC News, and host of the podcast “Fast Politics with Molly Jong-Fast”—chronicles what she calls “the worst year of her life” (9), when her mother was diagnosed with dementia while she simultaneously dealt with her husband’s cancer diagnosis and multiple family deaths. Jong-Fast examines the complex emotional terrain of loving an emotionally unavailable parent while grappling with inherited patterns of dysfunction.

This study guide refers to the 2025 Viking e-book edition.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of substance use, addiction, emotional abuse, disordered eating, mental illness, illness, and death.

Summary

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Molly Jong-Fast’s mother, author Erica Jong, developed dementia, forcing Jong-Fast to confront decades of family dysfunction while simultaneously dealing with her husband’s cancer diagnosis and her stepfather’s Parkinson’s disease. Jong-Fast frames her story as both a therapeutic exercise and an attempt to understand her relationship with her mother before dementia made it impossible. She positions herself as a reluctant observer of fame’s destructive power, having grown up as the daughter of a literary celebrity who never recovered from losing her cultural prominence.

The memoir reveals a multigenerational pattern of dysfunction rooted in narcissism, addiction, and the psychological toll of literary fame. Jong-Fast’s grandfather, Howard Fast, had similarly struggled with the transition from celebrity to obscurity, and her grandmother had an alcohol addiction, creating a cycle of instability that profoundly affected Erica’s ability to maintain relationships and emotional presence.

Jong-Fast’s childhood was marked by profound neglect and instability despite material privilege. Her parents’ marriage deteriorated due to infidelity and jealousy, leading to a contentious divorce that left young Molly primarily in the care of her nanny while her mother pursued her literary career in New York City. The household atmosphere was chaotic, featuring her mother’s frequent absences, a persistent stalker, and eccentric tenants.

A particularly traumatic aspect of Jong-Fast’s upbringing was her mother’s alcohol addiction and substance misuse. As a child, she witnessed dangerous incidents, including her mother driving while intoxicated and causing accidents. She describes sessions with a celebrity therapist who encouraged her as a child to confront her mother about substance use, interventions that proved futile, as her mother would promise to stop but never follow through.

Throughout the memoir, Jong-Fast explores how her mother’s literary celebrity created both privilege and profound dysfunction. Erica Jong achieved significant fame with Fear of Flying, which sold over 20 million copies and established her as a prominent cultural figure. However, Jong-Fast emphasizes that her mother never recovered from eventually losing this celebrity status, becoming increasingly desperate to reclaim her former prominence.

This obsession with fame manifested in her mother’s willingness to exploit personal family situations for commercial purposes, including publishing a children’s book about Jong-Fast’s experience with her parents’ divorce, complete with inappropriate content. Jong-Fast describes how she grew up as a repository for strangers’ opinions about her mother’s controversial work, a role that continued into adulthood, until people began expressing concern about her mother’s mental decline.

The central portion of the memoir focuses on overlapping medical crises that forced Jong-Fast into the role of family caretaker. Her husband Matt was diagnosed with neuroendocrine cancer that had spread to his lymph nodes, with a 40-50% chance of recurrence. Simultaneously, both her parents were declining—her mother from dementia and her stepfather Ken from Parkinson’s disease—yet both refused to acknowledge their conditions.

Jong-Fast describes the painful irony of finally having her mother’s attention after years of desperately seeking it as a child, only to no longer want that connection. She found herself speaking to her mother as if addressing a child, highlighting the complete role reversal that had occurred. The author admits to feeling like a bad daughter to someone who had been a “terrible mother,” acknowledging this imbalance while recognizing that no amount of material comfort could fill the emotional void created by their relationship.

A significant revelation in the memoir concerns her parents’ financial irresponsibility. Despite having appeared wealthy throughout Jong-Fast’s childhood, her mother and stepfather had been living far beyond their means, spending extravagantly on luxury items while failing to secure their financial future. Jong-Fast inherited the burden of liquidating their estate, selling their possessions through auction houses, and managing the enormous costs of eldercare while dealing with her own family’s medical expenses.

This financial crisis forced Jong-Fast to transform into the family’s most responsible member. She describes dismantling her childhood apartment, confronting closets filled with designer clothing that represented her mother’s lifelong belief that material goods could solve personal problems, and selling her parents’ entire book collection—an act she recognizes as both a practical necessity and emotional revenge.

Jong-Fast’s memoir extensively explores how childhood abandonment shaped her adult relationships and recovery journey. She achieved sobriety at 19 years old, successfully completing rehabilitation and maintaining sobriety for over 25 years. Her recovery stood in stark contrast to her mother’s pattern of failed sobriety attempts and her excuse that she was too famous to consistently attend Alcoholics Anonymous meetings.

Jong-Fast says she developed emotional walls that protected her from forming deep connections with others, with the exception of her own children. This defense mechanism emerged from growing up with a mother who was physically present but emotionally unavailable, despite constantly professing her love. Jong-Fast describes her mother as someone who had existed in a state of perpetual dissociation—present yet absent—which had become literal through dementia.

The memoir’s final chapters chronicle the death of Jong-Fast’s stepfather and the immediate aftermath. Despite her emotional detachment and reliance on hired caregivers, Jong-Fast ultimately accepted her role as the responsible adult in her fractured family unit. When signing Ken’s cremation release form, she identified herself as his “daughter” rather than “stepdaughter,” suggesting a final acceptance of their relationship.

The book concludes with Jong-Fast’s recognition that she became the stable, responsible adult in her family despite her perceived inadequacies. She acknowledges that her efforts to make peace with her traumatic past were futile, accepting that some battles cannot be won and that moving forward requires abandoning the hope of retroactively fixing childhood wounds.