You Only Live Twice

What if the labels that were supposed to define you—daughter, wife, mother, Catholic, lesbian—were the very things keeping you from being whole?

From the moment Jay DeFazio wrapped a towel around his waist like his dad instead of under his armpits like his mom, something felt off. Through decades of Catholic guilt, forced femininity, a volatile marriage, and desperate attempts to fit into boxes that were never the right shape, Jay searched for answers to a question he didn't yet know how to ask.

You Only Live Twice is the unflinching story of a life lived in two genders—first as someone trying to meet everyone else's expectations, then as the man Jay always knew himself to be. With raw honesty and unexpected humor, Jay chronicles the confusion of childhood crushes on female teachers, the suffocating weight of wedding dresses and gender roles, the darkness of psychiatric hospitals and addiction, and the terror and relief of finally speaking an unspeakable truth.

This is a memoir about survival and transformation, about the price of living inauthentically and the courage it takes to claim your own life. It's about being a mom while becoming a man, about losing relationships and finding unexpected love, about the messy, non-linear path from self-hatred to self-acceptance.

For anyone who has ever felt like a stranger in their own skin, or wondered if it's too late to start over, Jay's story offers something invaluable: proof that you can dismantle your entire life and rebuild it into something true.