I Wasn’t Always a Homegrown Mom

Me cooking up a storm at age 2

I wasn’t always a homegrown mom. Not that I didn’t think about it.

I’d dreamt of being a wife and mom since I was very young, in my own delusional way. In the beginning, I thought I’d be a terrific housewife akin to June Cleaver, or Lucy Ricardo. Let me tell you, it was all about their dresses. One of my parent’s favorite shows was Roseanne. Man, I hated that show, and not just because they wore sweats. Their life was so messy. When I had a family, life would be anything but messy.

My house would be tidy, my kids respectful, my husband adoring. And me? Gorgeous, dahling. I also wanted to be a writer, teacher, fashion designer, and Punky Brewster’s best friend. But I fantasized about being a wife and mom more than anything else.

I made family newsletters, family mailboxes, and held family parties in my bedroom. I started babysitting when I was twelve years old and practiced all my best stuff on other people’s kids. We did crafts, cookies and bedtime stories. For the few hours their parents were gone, I got to live out my fantasy of being a mom.

Sure enough, I grew up and married fairly young. I had a reality bite or two along the way, but deep down, I still placed those fifties sitcom expectations on myself. It would take years for me to understand that the perfect wife I’d created in my mind was nothing like the picture God had painted of the perfect wife.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. My story actually starts in 1996 when I was holding down three jobs and keeping up pretty good with the night life. I was eighteen and putting off college, putting off church, and putting off making any decisions at all about my life.

Yeah, I was just living in the moment, free for the first time in my life. Well, almost free. I had a boyfriend I wasn’t too sure about, but I was putting off dealing with that, too. Until one night when I found myself on my knees in my bathroom, pregnancy test in hand and an anxious boyfriend pacing outside.

I took one look at the little pink line and knew. All those decisions I’d been putting off were going to have to be dealt with. Soon.

Part 2