These two eldest daughters struck up a friendship over thirty years ago. With Lisette quite tall and Wies quite small, with Wies being a mother of two daughters and Lisette a mere aunt, they look very different and lead different lives. Yet, since they began to look at their similarities through the eldest daughter lens, the Dutch authors have become aware of deep underlying patterns that they share with millions of other eldest daughters in the world.
As authors, they have not left themselves out of the equation as each chapter starts with one of them reminiscing about an occasion that made a great impression and shaped them into who they are today.
There is no doubt in the authors’ minds that the more eldest daughters deepen their insight into the patterns of the eldest-daughter paradigm, the freer they will start to feel. They will no longer need to be scared, as Lisette has been ever since she can remember, that you’ll be a disappointment as people invariably expect too much and once they get to know you, they don’t really know how to get rid of you. Nor do you need to be anxious like Wies, who tended to think that all she had accomplished up to now doesn’t really account for much, that she needed to push herself harder to make sure people see who she is.
