Confession #6: On My Own

I was not an only child but my sister and I were 8 1/2 years apart and never very close. I was the baby of my ENTIRE family until I was 18 when my cousin had his first child. I never babysat a baby in my life. I never held a baby, never changed a diaper, nothing! I was never shown how or what to expect. My mother never raised me to be a mother, she raised me to be a Power Woman who's in charge of her life and needs no man to make her whole, let alone children.

This worked pretty well with my sister who has become successful beyond expectations after years and years of hard work. She has no children and she's not married, and I think she likes it this way. The realization that I didn't want her or my mother's so-called ideal life came when I was offered a chance of a lifetime to become an executive to a quickly growing company with an amazing pay rate, even a personal trainer! I turned it down because I saw what this life had done with my sister, and I wanted something more. I wanted to be a wife and a mother...

So, after a while I did settle down, get married, and had a child. I had no idea what I was in for! There were a few extenuating circumstances for a more difficult-than-usual start at being a mother, but when it came time for me to give that final push...I clamped down! I didn't want to be a mother! I had NO IDEA how to do it! (And I gave myself a 4th degree tear in the process). But out he came. They cleaned him up, I suppose...I was crying too much to see anything. They laid him on me, but I didn't know how to hold him the right way. Literally, I thank God for blessing me with a child that knew more than me on how to take care of him because the little guy just scurried right up and started nursing without any encouragement from me!