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Meredith Baxter to pen autobiography

By Stephen M. Silverman, PEOPLE.com
Meredith Baxter's autobiography will center on her life as a mother, actress and breast cancer survivor.
Meredith Baxter's autobiography will center on her life as a mother, actress and breast cancer survivor.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
  • Meredith Baxter, who came out as a lesbian December 2, will write an autobiography
  • Her publisher said the book will be a look at her life as an actress and a mother
  • Baxter has been in a relationship with partner Nancy Locke for four years
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(PEOPLE.com) -- Having come out in the pages of PEOPLE earlier this month as a lesbian mother, Meredith Baxter -- who played the popular TV mom Elyse Keaton on the '80s sitcom "Family Ties" -- will now put her entire story to paper.

This week, the Broadway Books imprint of Crown Publishing Group announced it had acquired a yet-to-be-written, yet-to-titled memoir by Baxter, who "will present a fully realized portrait of her life as an actress, mother of five children and grandmother, and will candidly discuss her fight with breast cancer, her 19 years of sobriety, entrepreneurship and her decision to come out," the publisher said, according to The New York Times.

Before Baxter, 62, first started dating women seven years ago, the thought of being gay "had never crossed my mind," she told PEOPLE.

Having been in three failed marriages to men (most famously to actor David Birney), the actress and skin-care company operator -- who is now in a four-year relationship with building contractor Nancy Locke -- said of her many difficult years before coming out, "I was never comfortable with myself."

But she was quick to add, "That doesn't mean I was questioning."

Speaking to Matt Lauer on a December 2 episode Today show, Baxter also said: "Some people would say, well, you're living a lie and, you know, the truth is -- not at all. This has only been for the past seven years."

Terms of her book deal, as well as the prospective publication date, have not yet been announced.

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