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Outbyte PC Repair FREERepair Windows errors before they cause bigger problemsFix Now →Outbyte Driver Updater FREEScan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →In her 2022 memoir I’m Glad My Mom Died and interviews about it, Jennette McCurdy describes a childhood shaped by pressure to act, strict control over food and privacy, and bodily boundaries she says her mother crossed. These are McCurdy’s accounts—not independently adjudicated findings—and the severity of the experiences she recounts is why readers ask what her mother did to her.
McCurdy says her mother pushed her into acting
McCurdy has said that she wanted to write, while her mother, Debra, pushed her toward acting when she was six. In a 2022 Vogue interview, McCurdy described acting as her mother’s ambition rather than her own. The Guardian’s 2022 interview recounts that when McCurdy said she no longer wanted to audition, her mother became distraught. McCurdy felt that refusing was not really an option.
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That pressure was part of a wider pattern she describes: her career and choices were closely bound up with her mother’s expectations. McCurdy has said she faced harsh realities as a child and teen performer, telling the Guardian, “I absolutely think there are a lot of harsh realities to child and teen stardom.”
She describes control over food, privacy and daily life
McCurdy’s account includes her mother’s involvement in ordinary parts of her life, from what she ate to whom she could see. The Guardian reports that Debra micromanaged those choices. The publisher’s description of the memoir says McCurdy shared her diaries, email and all her income with her mother.
#1 Best Overall
McCurdy says the control over food was tied to keeping her looking young enough for child roles. The publisher’s summary says she ate very little and weighed herself five times a day under what her mother called “calorie restriction.” The Guardian and Vogue both recount McCurdy’s explanation that her mother wanted to delay puberty and preserve her youthful appearance. McCurdy connects that restrictive eating to later anorexia and bulimia; that is her account of the relationship between those experiences, not an independent medical finding.
She says her mother crossed bodily boundaries
McCurdy has described her mother showering her and touching her body while saying she was checking for cancer. The Guardian reports that the examinations included her breasts and vagina. McCurdy says the practice continued into adolescence: Vogue describes it as continuing until she was 17, while the publisher’s description says the showers continued until she was 16. The accounts differ on the precise age, but both describe the behavior as lasting well beyond early childhood.
Rank #2
She recounts hostility when she resisted or grew older
The Guardian reports McCurdy’s account that her mother screamed when she resisted, blamed her for the recurrence of her cancer, and sent a hostile email after McCurdy was photographed with a boyfriend. The email, as McCurdy recounted it to the Guardian, was demeaning and focused on her appearance. Together with the limits she describes on her relationships and choices, these episodes show how she says pressure and control continued as she became a teenager.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why the memoir’s title does not tell the whole story
I’m Glad My Mom Died expresses McCurdy’s relief that her mother was no longer present to harm her; it should not be read as proof that she felt no grief or affection. In a 2022 interview reported by the Associated Press, McCurdy described “abusive love” as complicated and said the feelings were “mixed and messy.” Her account holds anger, relief, compassion, grief and love together.
Rank #3
McCurdy recounts these experiences in full in I’m Glad My Mom Died, published by Simon & Schuster in 2022. The publisher lists print, ebook and audio editions.
Quick Recap
Rank #4
What readers should keep in mind
- The incidents above are attributed to McCurdy’s memoir and interviews, rather than presented as independently verified findings.
- McCurdy’s mother died in 2013. The sources cited here do not include a response from her.
- “Worst things” is a reader’s framing, not a ranking McCurdy is quoted as giving. The experiences she describes span career pressure, control, disordered eating and violated bodily boundaries.
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