Editor's note: In her memoir, Linda Thompson has chosen to refer to Caitlyn Jenner prior to her transition by her former name, Bruce. Therefore, quotes from her book feature Caitlyn's former name and masculine pronouns, though it is our practice at USA TODAY to use the gender a person identifies as.

Linda Thompson is known for a lot of things: she's an Academy Award-nominated songwriter and appeared on The Princes of Malibu with her sons, Brandon and Brody Jenner. But she's been in the news lately for another reason: She's Caitlyn Jenner's ex-wife.

Thompson released A Little Thing Called Life: On Loving Elvis Presley, Bruce Jenner, and Songs in Between Tuesday and shared these memories of Caitlyn, her spouse from 1981 to 1986.

1. Their relationship was like a "fairy tale" 

The two met in 1979 when Thompson handed Caitlyn a trophy for winning a tennis tournament at the Playboy Mansion. They began dating when Caitlyn's relationship with Chrystie Jenner was over, though she was pregnant with the couple's second child. Thompson writes, "Bruce was a romantic, thoughtful guy – the type of man to send flowers and to remember anniversaries with flowers, gifts, and a card."

She said the only time Caitlyn was really short with her during their marriage was when she was pregnant. "I surmised that he was actually jealous of me and that I was living in the body that he felt he was meant to have,” Thompson says.

2. When Caitlyn revealed she was transgender, Linda thought she was going to confess to cheating 

"I thought he might be about to tell me he'd had an affair while on the road," she pens. "As it turns out, that would've been the good news."

Thompson says Caitlyn told her, “For as long as I can remember, I’ve looked in the mirror and seen a masculine image staring back at me, where there should have been a feminine reflection. I have lived in the wrong skin, the wrong body, my whole life. It is a living hell for me, and I really feel that I would like to move forward with the process of becoming a woman, the woman I have always been inside.”

3. Caitlyn thought she could re-enter her sons' lives as a "female relative"

Thompson reveals that Caitlyn contemplated traveling to Denmark to have reassignment surgery and coming back to the U.S. as a female. When Thompson asked about their children, Brandon and Brody, she says Caitlyn thought “maybe he could reenter their lives as a female relative. He was grasping for a lifeline, and it was a desperately confusing time for both of us.”

4. Caitlyn surprised Linda with her new appearance

Linda says she traveled to the Big Apple for what she thought would be a last-ditch effort to save their marriage. “Why don’t you come and be with your husband in New York?” Thompson says Caitlyn asked. Though she imagined she would be greeted by her spouse's masculine physique, she was shocked by what she saw.

“Bruce opened the door dressed as Caitlyn," writes Thompson. "Full wig. Full makeup. Heels. A nice feminine dress adorning his muscular body. And a big smile on his red lips.

I crumbled right there and burst into tears. It was a devastating moment for me," Thompson says. "All my hopes and dreams came crashing down in that hotel hallway.”

5. Caitlyn's sons questioned her appearance at an early age

Thompson's sons came to her when they saw Caitlyn's breasts as she was getting out of the shower, after her attempt to transition in the '80s. Thompson covered for her ex by saying, “When you stop training and you stop lifting weights, sometimes the muscle turns to fat," she says. "So his pectoral muscles have probably just gotten a little flabby and look like boobs.”

Thompson eventually told Brandon and Brody Caitlyn was transgender when they were 31 and 29 respectively. Caitlyn had a conversation with her sons later, prior to her transition.

For more insight to Thompson's experiences, pick up A Little Thing Called Life, currently available where books are sold.

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