Becoming Nicole

We meet a 2-year old boy named Wyatt, who is watching his reflection in the door of the oven. His dad, Wayne, is filming the scene, encouraging the boy to flex his muscles, but Wyatt can’t seem to do this in a boyish way. Wyatt becomes self-conscious when Wayne makes this request. Wayne wants to do masculine activities with Wyatt and his twin brother, Jonas. He dreams about fishing with them and buying them baseball gloves.

Nutt then discusses how individuals are defined by their own bodies but connected to the bodies and perceptions of others: “How can you occupy a physical space, be a body in space, and yet be alienated from it at the same time?” (xvii). Like it or not, she concludes, people are defined by others in many ways, and the “misfits of society” must deal with a burdensome, unspoken question: “What does it feel like to be a problem?” (xix).

We learn that Wyatt and Jonas Maines are identical twins who were adopted at birth. Their adoptive parents are Kelly and Wayne Maines, a couple who struggled with infertility and went through many miscarriages.