“Before you go to your friend’s house for a play date, text her this: ‘I fully expect baskets of laundry, toys on the floor, and children in pjs. I anticipate all the kids will fight, be loud, and ask for snacks (constantly). I can handle that. Let’s warm up nuggets, put on a Disney movie, and do those dishes together. I’m so thankful for a friend like you.'”
“She would make comments about finding a new family for her son if we didn’t give her the extra money, dangling her baby boy in front of us like a carrot. I truly lost my faith in humanity. She pretended to be a lot of things, but a decent human being was, by far, her greatest act. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison.”
“I threw heavy flower pots through the glass front door and begged the police officer to shoot me. Sadly, the beast that is addiction took over. As terrifying as it was to unearth such a deep truth about myself, suddenly everything began to click. I began to recognize why I couldn’t stay sober for even an hour. I was not the woman I was raised to be.”
“Around 6 a.m., I heard her crying by my bed. ‘Mommy, my head hurts, my throat hurts, and my chest hurts really bad.’ This child never cried. She was breathing weird and for a bit, I thought she was being dramatic. Then in her weak, sweet, little voice, she asked, ‘Mommy, am I going to die?’ Something wasn’t sitting right. Every few seconds, she would say, ‘Mommy’ or ‘Hello,’ just so I knew she was doing okay.”
“Today, I yelled at you. You didn’t do anything wrong. You were just playing like a normal 3 year old would…but I yelled at you. I told you to stop…to be quiet…to just listen to me. You spilled your water. It was an accident…but I yelled. I told you be to careful…to pay attention…to just sit still.”
“No matter how hard I worked, how dedicated I was, or how much effort I put into my classroom, I was still considered ‘just a teacher.’ My parents did not raise a quitter.”
“The other day one of my son’s friends, who has been spending a lot of time at our house, called him ‘Rich Boy.’ At the time, my son really didn’t have much to say about it, but at bedtime something was on his mind that he needed help sorting out. ‘Mommy, why was Charlie calling me Rich Boy?’ I felt tears begin to sting my eyes and clenched my toes to will them back into place.”
“As soon as I woke, I immediately went looking for my husband. I don’t know how, but I knew something was terribly wrong. I searched room-by-room and when I got to the office, I saw it. A note on the desk. I remember screaming in my backyard, crying to the 911 operator. ‘Can you tell me about his erratic behavior?’ I watched the blood on my hands go down the sink as I tried my best to answer questions. Guilt washed over me.”
“Nothing readies you for when your 8 year old has completely lost control; for when his behavior disorders become so powerful his brain is no longer acting as a part of his body but has now waged war on it. But today–thank God, today–I kept it together.”
“We jumped in the car to run some evening errands. ‘Stay there. We are sending help,’ she said urgently. The thing that defined our relationship was snack wrappers. It’s embarrassing to admit how much of our daily interaction revolved around me telling him to, ‘pick them up!’ It is always the unimportant decisions that change lives.”
