I Was Mean To My Mom For Years — Until A Chance Meeting With A Stranger Changed Everything

When I tell the story of my childhood, my adoptive father, John — a gem of a man, who wanted a family as much as we needed a father — is often the hero. My mother gets credit for marrying him when I was 10. She did many other things right, I’m sure, but I don’t remember them, because as I’ve since learned firsthand, mothers do not always get credit for things like keeping small people alive and safe and delivering them to school on time with their teeth brushed and their book reports proofread.

When my father left my mom with three young daughters and loan sharks banging on the door, my mother kept us afloat. She sold our house on a cul-de-sac, moved us to an apartment and began working in the city to pay the bills.

As a first grader, I couldn’t see the ways she was suffering, the uncertain future she faced, or the responsibility she mustered. To me, she seemed out of control, with angry outbursts I couldn’t predict. One morning when I was 8, spacey and bookworm-ish, she tugged me by the hair to the mirror.

“You can’t wear that shirt to school,” she screamed.

“What’s wrong with it?”

“Look at it. What do you see?”

“It’s plaid,” I pleaded. “Red, black. That’s all! Is it too fancy for school? Too small on me?”

“It’s wrinkled,” she screamed, smacking me. “Hurry and change. And don’t make us late.”

When she read this essay, my mom remembered lashing out at me in her closet. She’d lost her engagement ring the night before and she was distraught, retracing her steps to find it. The ring was the last tangible link she had to my father — and at that point, she thought he still might return.

But I didn’t know that then. Alone, in tears, I went back to my room with the pastel rainbow carpeting. Recently, Mom told me she paid extra