Nic Narrates

Sometimes I hear myself and realize I sound exactly like my mother.

“Did you wash your hands/ brush your teeth/ get your homework done?”

“Please help me keep the house clean for when your Grandma and Grandpa visit.”

“Your dad is grumpy. Let’s let him sleep.”

I spend quite a bit of time with Kit’s son and if things work out between he and I…well…POOF! I’m a step-mom. I’ve always known this. It’s still intimidating.

All this time I’ve thought of myself as “the cool aunt.” Someone that he could go on scary carnival rides and sneak pizza for breakfast with. The person who will make up silly songs and inside games with him on rainy days.

That’s me. That’s my role. But is that really what a “step-mom” does? Aren’t I supposed to be a hag or something, locking step-children in their rooms with the sewing, talking mice or sending them away to boarding school in the Swiss Alps?

Sometimes I worry about all of this. I have no “mom” credentials. I can provide no “mom” references upon request and may not even be able to hold a baby properly (good thing he’s not). And all those years of “growing into being a parent” as you watch your children grow alongside you are lost to me.

What if I mess up? What if he falls down and skins his knee? What if, in a few years as a teenager, he resents me? What if he doesn’t like my Christmas cookies? What if I hurt his feelings? What if I fail?

The truth is, he doesn’t need any mothering from me because he already has a great mom. Knowing this, I still find myself trying to protect him on bike rides and make sure he has eaten. And last weekend when I showed him how to make a (Jello no-bake) cheesecake and shuck corn, I couldn’t have been happier to share with him something that my own mother and I used to do together when I was his age.

It’s in moments like those that I wonder, who is this person? Where did she come from? But, I think I already know.

Filed under: childhood, mothering by Nic