Jennette McCurdy has announced the release of a memoir detailing the abuse she suffered at the hands of her late mother, who pushed her into becoming a child star.
In I’m Glad My Mom Died, the former actor – best known for playing Sam Puckett in Nickelodeon’s iCarly and Sam & Cat – details her gruelling childhood in the limelight, including how her anxiety and self-loathing led to eating disorders and addiction.
Taking to Instagram, the iCarly star posted the memoir’s book cover, announcing that it will be released on 9 August.
“I laughed and cried a lot while writing it and I’m proud of what it’s become,” McCurdy wrote in the caption.
McCurdy’s mother, Debra McCurdy, died of breast cancer in 2013, after being diagnosed when her daughter was 3-years-old. In 2019, McCurdy wrote a personal essay in HuffPost detailing her history of eating disorders, aided by her mother and the wider entertainment industry.
The former actor first spoke directly about her mother’s abuse in her one-woman show – also titled I’m Glad My Mom Died – which she performed in Los Angeles and New York City in early 2020.
McCurdy says her mother was obsessed with making her “cripplingly shy” daughter a star, and started bleaching her hair and whitening her teeth when she was 10 years old, and performing vaginal and breast exams and not letting her shower alone until she was 17.
She told Entertainment Weekly: “I feel I didn’t have the tools, language, or support necessary to speak up for myself back then, so this book is a way for me to not only honour that experience and give voice to my former self, but hopefully to encourage young people to speak up for themselves in environments where they may be conditioned to just ‘play ball’ and ‘be a good sport.’”
Speaking about the book’s colourful cover, McCurdy added: “Confetti spilling out of an urn felt to me like a good way of capturing the humour in the tragedy.”
She added: “Ultimately, I chose a facial expression that I think reads as sincere, a little pained, and a little hopeful.”
I’m Glad My Mom Died will be published by Simon & Schuster on 9 August 2022
