“While grocery shopping, an elderly lady was talking to my boys. She was very kind, saying I had such a beautiful family. Everything was great and we were all smiles… until she noticed my tattoos. ‘Is that your grandma’s signature? What a disgrace.’ My mouth fell open. I grabbed my kids, and saw her writing my license plate number down.”
‘Such a shame. You have such nice boys you’re exposing to filth.’ She kept glaring. ‘Tisk tisk. I should call CPS and report you.’: Elderly woman scolds mom for tattoo honoring late grandmother
‘I am OVER IT. I spotted your car swerving. I could see your sweet kids strapped into car seats in the back.’: Mom’s desperate plea to put your phones down while driving
“Texting away driving 55 mph on the highway with your babies on board. I was close enough for you to swerve into me. My babies were on board too, and my blood just boiled.”
‘I was not okay. I had lost my child to death, and I was losing myself to life.’: Mom’s powerful vow to ‘claw her way out’ of ‘the darkness’ after sudden loss of 7-month-old son
“I spent far too many moments considering all the ways I could be with my son, in whatever afterlife he exists in. I even shut my own husband out. I was done living like this. I vowed to do better. I don’t know how strong I can stay. I am fragile. But I do know, I am trying.”
‘That ‘perfect’ mom, she’s a myth. The one you’re comparing yourself to? She doesn’t have it all together either. She might just be better at hiding it.’ Woman encourages moms to embrace their imperfections
“I see you. Scrolling through your phone, measuring yourself to the highlight reel of friends and family. Looking at the other mamas in school drop off and at work wondering how they make it look so easy. Can I be honest with you? It’s an illusion.”
‘At 15, I became pregnant with my daughter. I had to raise a child while still growing up myself. I received hate and rumors spread.’ Teen mom beats the odds to graduate college and ‘reach success’
“Everyone recognized me by pregnant belly, rather than by my face. I dealt with dirty looks and whispers in the hallways. In college, I got pregnant with my son. It wasn’t easy. I have been in abusive relationships, been days away from planning a wedding, only to find out I was ‘only an option.’ I wanted to give up, on everything. But I was strong for my children.”
‘There are concerns in the ultrasound.’ My doctor used scare tactics to push me into terminating my baby. I tried not to break down.’ Mom fights back after being pressured to abort baby with brain defects
“My doctor told the story of another mom’s heartache to scare me into doing what she wanted me to do. Why was she pushing termination on me SO hard? And why the heck was she calling to tell me over the phone?! Not ONCE did she apologize or say, ‘I’m so sorry.’ Instead, she told me how to parent.”
‘Don’t give up on me. My husband, you can’t love away my abuse or trauma, but just knowing you want to, makes my world feel whole.’: Wife suffering from PTSD thanks husband for staying with her through ‘horrific pain’
“All you need to say is, ‘You are safe. You are loved.’ Six words can free us from the prison of our minds. Please don’t walk away. Abandonment is what we wait for.”
‘You got a baby BROTHER!’ He jumped up. ‘YES! I knew it was a brother! Now I get to share a room!’: After 4 sisters, adopted son finally gets a brother ‘handpicked’ for him by his ‘dad in heaven’
“We adopted my brother. My father was dying of cancer and Easton had just lost his mom. All he ever wanted was a brother. We let Easton hold him first. He began to sing, ‘You are my sunshine’ to him. Nobody prompted him to do it. It’s like he knew this whole time, his little brother would light up his life.”
‘I smashed my head on the glass coffee table and woke up with no idea what month it was. In tears, my mom called the geneticist. If I wanted to keep living, I NEEDED a service dog.’ Woman recalls how dog has saved her life ‘countless times’
“The last thing I remember was yelling for my mom. She raced up the stairs, only to be shocked. My tiny puppy had grabbed onto my sweater and was pulling with all of his might in the opposite direction to keep me from falling off the toilet and getting yet another concussion. If you talk to any dog mom they’ll tell you their dog is their world, but my dog GAVE me my world.”
‘Mama, a man touched my butt.’ It’s not every day that your daughter jumps off the playground slide and says this. But that’s exactly what happened 2 weeks ago.’ Mom gives 5-year-old a powerful lesson to end silence surrounding sexual abuse
“My heart immediately started beating out of my chest. ‘WHO? WHERE IS HE?!’ My head turned in every direction. ‘He left.’ Next came a flurry of questions. ‘Was it a tap? A pinch? A squeeze?’ She burst into tears. ‘A squeeze. It hurt A LOT, mama.’ My daughter doesn’t want to go to the playground anymore. She’s scared. I am LIVID.”
Adoptive Mom Shares Plea For Kindness After Employee Shames Her ‘Baby Weight’
“It took everything in me not to cry.”
‘I had a C-section. What comes with a major surgery? Pain meds do. The day after we came home, I went for a pain pill. They were gone. ALL OF THEM!’: Woman slides into deeper addiction at the hands of her boyfriend
“My ex-boyfriend walked back into my life. He didn’t look the same though. His big, strong build had dwindled down to a scrawny man. I could tell something was wrong. I went for it anyway. That turned out to be a decision I will not soon forget. It didn’t take long for me to become pregnant, with not one but TWO babies.”
‘Keep your big ole mouth shut. Don’t you dare look down on another mom. Don’t you dare.’: Mother of 3 says to keep the ‘judgmental eye rolls’ to yourself before life serves you ‘humble pie’
“Me with my first baby: I will never buy my kids tacky character tees. Evvvvvvver. Mark my words. Me after 3 kids: Whatever. I wear the same clothes I slept in to the grocery store, so who am I to be picking out people’s clothes anyway?”
‘I saw my kids dead, over and over. It was my constant fear.’: Mom suffers severe PTSD after losing daughter to Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood
“I lived in terror after my daughter died. I had to turn on the light every 5 minutes to check on my kids, because I knew for certain one of them had stopped breathing. I didn’t realize I had PTSD. I just felt like I was losing my mind. I was so stressed, the panic just kept coming. Many people think PTSD only happens to soldiers. It doesn’t.”
‘I was teased that toothpaste had calories. I hated the whispers and stares. I thought it was cool to not get my period anymore. I’m ashamed of this.’: 43-year- old mom finally confident in body image after struggling with eating disorder most of life
“It intensified when I left my parents’ home and went to college. I drastically reduced my food intake. I hate thinking about the look of shock, disappointment, and concern on my mother’s face. She hadn’t seen me since Christmas, so when I came home for Spring Break, my mother was worried sick over my frail appearance. I felt guilty, but not guilty enough to change.”
‘What about me?’ He sees all the babies getting adopted. He deserves a family too. Our answer was a shaky, scared ‘yes.’: Foster mom on the ‘trauma’ yet ‘joy’ when you ‘say yes to an older child’
“Within 24 hours I went from mothering toddlers, to a 7-year-old. I wasn’t sure what to do. We were walking on eggshells, wondering when the lid would blow. I was closing his bedroom door. He stopped me. ‘Mommy, you’re a really good Mom.’ I slid down the door in silent sobs. Those words, coming from that boy, meant more than any accolade I could ever receive.”
‘We lost a beautiful woman. She was a wife and mother. She was kind, upbeat, smiling, and generous.’ Mom reminds women to ‘check on the mom wearing lipstick’ after losing friend to postpartum depression
“She ran circles around the rest of us, volunteering, coordinating and simply ‘making things happen.’ I, like many, were surprised when her death announcement addressed her struggle with postpartum depression. Her social media portrayed happiness and perfection, never indicating she was suffering.”
‘Stop telling moms not to blink. It’s okay for us to miss some stuff.’ Mom’s candid response to those who claim ‘we only have 18 summers’ so ‘make your moments count’
“Don’t tell me we only have 18 summers. I’m a mom who can’t get enough of my kids, but quickly has ‘had enough.’ I’m a mom who wanted nothing more than to be a wife and a mother, and here I am, being those things. Well, guess what? It’s a lot harder than I ever imagined.”
‘You’re supposed to be glowing, showing off your pregnant belly. Instead, the bones in your chest are popping through as your body wastes away.’ After struggling with IVF, Mom now battles Hyperemesis Gravidarum in surprise pregnancy
“I realized trying to conceal the severity of my symptoms for the sake of ‘keeping my chin up’ was incredibly dangerous. I needed help. My precious baby needed help. My body is forced to keep my baby alive by slowly killing me in the process.”
‘I want to live!,’ I was screaming. The cops were on their way. I was trying to get out of the bathroom, trying to get my boyfriend off me, trying to hide in the tub.’: Single mom’s empowering story of surviving domestic abuse with infant daughter
“I had 3 months to figure out my escape. I stopped fighting back with my daughter’s father and kept calm. He was losing control, and it drove him crazy. ‘You’re not gonna take her from me,’ he’d say. I’d wake up to him pacing the kitchen talking to himself. I stayed quiet and texted a friend who said, ‘Wait 10 minutes, and then you call the cops. He could be lying.’”
‘I dropped 10 sizes on a starvation diet. ‘Wow, you look GREAT!’ I basked in compliments, but deep down I wanted someone to grab me and say, ‘Hey, I think you need help.’ Woman explains why congratulating weight loss is ‘problematic’
“I dropped to one meal a day. Coffee for breakfast, Red Bull at 3 p.m., light dinner. They’d look and say, ‘Congrats! You look awesome!’ It made me feel REALLY good. But part of me wanted to shout in their faces. They might as well have said, ‘That not-eating thing you’re doing? Totally working. Keep it up!’ It fueled me.”
‘He asked me, very plainly, ‘What do you like to do outside of work?’ I awkwardly tried to explain things that didn’t start with being a Mom. Later he asked, ‘Do you want to get your MBA?’ Mother of 3 goes back to school in her 30s
“I asked her, ‘How did you do it all with 4 children?’ I will never forget her answer. ‘You find a way to make it work.’ That next month, I got pregnant with our third son! My first class began the exact day I was in the hospital delivering Wyatt.”
‘My husband calls. ‘I’m at the ER. I had a heart attack.’ I start spinning. Where’s my purse, where’s my keys? I’m on my way!’ Wife’s shock as husband’s heart miraculously ‘heals itself’
“We each took a deep breath and looked at each other. ‘There is nothing more I can do to help Mike’s heart,’ he says. The doctor said his heart did it’s own bypass! It had healed itself! WOW! I mean WOW! Are you kidding me. We couldn’t get out of that hospital fast enough.”
‘I found myself divorced and single at 40, no kids. I didn’t want to wait any longer! As my adoption match fell apart, I fell in love. Life changed overnight.’ Woman takes in special needs stepson after mother’s sudden death
“It felt like a bomb went off in our family. My head was swirling with fear, confusion, doubt. We went from being a carefree couple that traveled to full-time caregivers of a medically complex child. Call it intuition, gut instinct. I had no idea what to do or how to do it, but I knew with absolute certainty I was ready.”
‘I’ve given birth. The world is gonna get whatever’s in THIS swimsuit. I have a swimsuit and a body. So YES, I already have a swimsuit body!’ Mom has ‘99 problems and a summer body ain’t one’
“Is there any part of the year that puts more pressure on us women to be ‘snatched’ than summer? After giving birth, swimsuits fit weird and my belly is CLEARLY visible. My rapidly changing size made me doubt what was appropriate for a ‘bigger woman’ at the pool.”