My story starts when I was about three years old. I can barely remember it, but one of my few memories was sitting on the couch in the living room, my parents were yelling at each other and I saw my mom kick my dad in the stomach. My next memory is her crying in the bathroom with the door locked and I was banging on the door screaming for her to let me in. Then I remember I was in the front yard, my mom was running with my younger brother down the street and I was crying for her to let me go with her as my dad held onto me by the sidewalk. The police came to my house and they handcuffed both of my parents, loaded us up and took us away to a foster home. I wasn't there long according to my dad but it felt like years to me. My next memory is visiting my mom who was in prison and we were saying our goodbyes because my dad was getting custody of us and we were moving out of state. I just remember being confused and scared.
I didn't see my mom again until I was 18. My older sister, grandma from my dad's side and I picked her up from the airport. She immediately acted like we were just friends, it was so strange. She never really called me throughout my life, a few times in my lifetime doesn't count to me, she always chose sex and drugs over her children, and mainly she never apologized. She had been offered free plane tickets many times throughout my life to come see us but she declined year after year after year because drugs were more than my brothers, my sister and myself and there she was acting like nothing was wrong.
Now that she was there I started trying to hang out with her every Wednesday for a BBQ where she would just get drunk with her friends and I would just watch. It was entertaining because my dad sheltered me for years. She never brought up the past at all, it was weird but I didn't want to talk about it either.
When I was a kid I remember being with my uncle's now ex wife and we were watching a Dr. Phil show about Mother's Day and she looked at me teary eyed and asked if I was sad about Mother's Day. I didn't know what she meant by that at the time because I felt complete, but I now know what I was missing all along. Being a mother has brought up a lot of suppressed feelings that I almost wish would stay somewhere in my mind hidden away from me or just go away completely. I am having to deal with emotions I never felt before and it gets hard.
Courage is something that you have to dig out of yourself. It's having a fear and being willing to stare it in the face and over come it. After never having a good motherly example in my life I was so afraid to become a Mom. Thoughts kept coming to my mind like “I know it is supposed to be fulfilling and rewarding to be a mother, but why wasn't I fulfilling to my own Mother, what if it is a genetic chemical imbalance, what if I treat my children the same way and effect their lives in the same way?”
This is where courage came in for me! I was so terrified about being MY mother when I was pregnant. I kept thinking I would end up like her, distant from my baby, wanting to be away from my baby as much as I possibly could, unloving and have no motherly instincts whatsoever. It turns out it all has come naturally to me and I hope to be the best and most courageous mother Paisley could ever have! I love bonding with my daughter, I babywear most of the day so she is close to me, I co-sleep with her so I know she is safe and can be comforted at any time throughout the night. Being a Mom is the most important and wonderful thing I have ever done. I would never trade it in for any amount of drugs, fame or money. 
