I Will Always Love You

14th Birthday Party

My mother had me when she was 42 years old. She decided, after seventeen years, that one daughter just wasn't enough. She needed a smaller human to interact with on a day to day basis. She wanted someone to dress up again, to share stories with, and to play with. That's where I come in to the picture.  I will not lie to you dear reader and tell you that my childhood was super awesome because it wasn't. I was born into a poor, single parent house hold. I was born to a woman who had an obsessive personality and that personality both helped and hurt us. I was born to someone who got sick when I was eight years old and passed away when I was sixteen. I tell you this not because I see my self as a victim or view my story as the worst ever told. I tell you this because it is what happened. My mother was a loving, angry, silly, manipulative, fun, scary, and large woman who I didn't get a whole lot of time with. Eight years is just enough to consciously know what a family dynamic is and to realize yours is different. It is just enough time to be terrified of someone and still love them because they are important and they teach you things and they feed you and give you hugs. It's difficult to remember things before eight years old and to think of my mother as independent, with out a speech impediment, and taking care of me when I spent half of my life with her taking care of her. That being said, it's mother's day. She did what she could and it got me here somehow.

My actual mother was the only parent I had growing up. But I had so many strong women surrounding me it is ridiculous. From friends parents to family, I never lacked female role models. My grandmother had five girls and each of them had two kids. Seven of those ten children are girls. Girl power is kind of a thing in my family and it starts with this beautiful woman right here.

Kindergarten Grandparents Breakfast

She managed to raise five kids, four of which were under seven all at one time, and still maintain a strong relationship with her church. She has found a way over the last 60-something years to teach not only her five children but her ten grandchildren and her twelve great-grandchildren what it means to be kind, caring, and unconditionally welcoming to other people. Happy Mother's Gran

 

I didn't just make rent payments and pay for groceries, clothes, electricity etc on my own at eight years old. My mother lived off of welfare and we moved to government housing. After two years of that, my sister decided that such things were not acceptable and gave up her dreams to come back and help. She swooped in and saved the day and it took me a long time to see it that way.

Sister's couch

At the time, I was angry. She had moved away, like most young adults do, when I was six years old. The sister that I was so obsessed with as a little girl became someone I was mad at. I didn't want her to leave, I didn't want her to disrupt our little family, and I didn't understand why she was doing just that. Fast forward three years and I was still mad. To my ten year old mind, she wasn't helping. She was another disruption. I had everything under control (no, no I didn't) and she was going to mess it up.

That isn't true. She saved us. She saved me. My sister worked so hard to make sure I had some sense of normalcy, family, and security. She took over taking care of my mother and pushed me to focus on school and friends. She encouraged me to find things I was passionate about and she tried to be supportive in all of those things. We fought. We fought a lot. She struggled to balance being a guardian to a preteen, a good wife, and a care taker to a 55 year old woman who was slowly going out of her mind. She dealt with so much stress and I was not a great sister (I was a brat) in the beginning. Somehow, she did it. She created a home for everyone and some how didn't murder us. Props to you sister.

She's a mother of her own children now. Two wonderful little boys who stole our hearts the moment they came into this world. She had practice with my mother and I so those two should be set. Happy Mother's Day Kristen! I love you and I don't say that (or thank you) enough. I hope today was awesome! (I TIRED TO CALL YOU AND YOU DIDN'T ANSWER!!!)


Now, this post is long enough but it needs to be just a little bit longer. I could go on about Susan who taught me how to ride horses, love the outdoors, and find fun in simple tasks. I could talk about Lisa who let me practically live at her house with her four other children, who dragged me to church, and let her real daughter and I be as crazy as we wanted to be. I could talk about Beth (Lisa's mom) who encouraged self expression, caring about others, and taking care of yourself. I could go on about Patty (whose name I have suddenly forgotten how to spell) who opened her doors to me whenever she could, supported my mom and I when we needed it, and who took her daughter and I on all kinds of fun adventures.

I can't be more grateful for these people than I am today. Mother's Day is hard for me and I struggled to write this but it is the truth that all of the people, and many more, that I have talked about here are more important to me than they realize. I wouldn't be here, I wouldn't be this way, and I probably wouldn't be this successful in life.

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers that have touched our lives. I hope today was wonderful and that you were given all of the things you deserve. I wish the best to all of you for the rest of time and may your children forever be grateful for you.