Book excerpt: A shocking phone call from their distraught daughter-in-law was how Lynda and Richard Langley learnt that their son had started his transition from a man to a woman. The mad rush to their son's hospital bedside, anguish and fear for his physical health, shock from the nature of his injury, and the dread of the challenges to be faced in the coming months and years... Lynda's account of how she adjusted to the reality that her eldest son had decided to physically become a woman is the story of a family. Tears and laughter, support and withdrawal, accompany Toni -- now the eldest daughter -- as she maps out her new life. And with her all the time is Lynda, her mother. Helping to select her wardrobe, guiding her in the subtleties of speech and behaviour, and supporting her, especially in the early stages of her new life as a woman. A mother's story of losing a son and gaining a daughter -- a transsexual transition and a mother's love. While there have been some accounts of transsexual transition published on the web, this is the first account from a parent's perspective, and the first to be published in book form.