by BG Torres

Created on: July 07, 2008

The best advice my mother ever offered me was never to rely on anyone else. When it comes to life, you can not go through it expecting the world to take care of you. My mother was raised by a single working mom in an era when single mothers was unheard of. Living in a one room apartment, my grandmother scraped by a living for herself and my mother teaching my mother how to succeed in life and most importantly how to rise above.

My grandmother never took any form of government assistance, but instead took odd jobs when extra money was needed. My mother was then tought how to be self sufficient and how to provide for herself. By watching her mother work, she herself learned the importance of budgeting and how to make the most of a situation. She learned skills that she otherwise may have never learned.

Years later, my mother married and had her own children. Being the wife of a military man, she had the opportunity to enjoy being a stay at home mother but once my father's military career ended she opted to return to the workforce. I watched my mother work and succeed and never felt her absence. She was still always there helping with mine or my brothers functions, never missing anything that was important to us. She tought me that you can have both, a family and a career. My mother worked because she wanted to provide for us the things that her mother could not, and from that she rose far above her lower class income she was born into.

Now I sit here raising my own daughter and am teaching her the same things. I know that because of the things that I have learned and watched that if necessary I could provide for myself and my children. I am dependant on no one and I want to see my daughter grow up with these same strengths and to know that nothing is out of her reach. I work a full time job but make sure that there is always time for my children, some days are harder than others but it is my obligation to be a mother above anything else.

Today's society calls more and more for women to be self sufficient with an increase in divorce rates and single mothers. By teaching my daughter it is ok to be strong, smart and independant I am helping to give her skills to succeed in life. Working is not a burden or a means but an opportunity to grow herself. I don't want her to see her feminity as a handicap was many of us are tought to believe, but instead an opportunity to have two meaningful careers if she so desires.

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