Laverne Cox stopped by the Today show to discuss her new memoir.
Cox’s Transcendent, published Tuesday by Gallery, recounts her life and career as one of the country’s most prominent transgender actors, known for her roles in the series Orange Is the New Black and Doubt.
Today show co-host Jenna Bush Hager noted that Cox has said that there are things in her memoir that she has not told her therapist or close friends.
“There’s so much to talk about in therapy that we just haven’t gotten to it yet,” Cox replied with a laugh. “I’ve always been really guarded, I guess, my whole life, and I’m open with my friends, and I actually feel more comfortable being open on TV or in my work than I do with my really, really good friends. I think because of early betrayal, abuse, bullying, I just learned not to trust people.”
Hager asked Cox about her relationship with her mother, to whom the memoir is dedicated.
“It’s very complicated,” Cox said. “My beautiful mother…I understand now that a parent is supposed to love and protect you for who you are and not for what you do.…She did a really good job of caring for me, but I don’t think she loved me, and I don’t think she had the capacity to. I’m a very complicated person to understand, but I understand now she did the best she could, that she, too, was deeply traumatized, and a lot of that trauma’s been unprocessed.”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
