by Charlotte A. Cavatica

Created on: July 20, 2008   Last Updated: July 21, 2008

When I was a little girl, I used to tell my mother that I wanted to be just like her. I wanted to have a daughter of my own, but no husband because I wanted to raise her my own way. I looked up to her for doing what no other moms of my friends did, not understanding that being a single mom was not the ideal. She appreciated my viewing her through rose-colored glasses, but was also quick to tell me that raising me by herself was her choice because I'm better off without my father in my life. She stressed that it's incredibly hard to be a single mother and she would hope that I would fall in love with a man that would be a wonderful husband and father so that I wouldn't have to go it alone as she did.

Growing up, my mother worked 2 jobs for as long as I can remember. After school, I would walk to the insurance office where she worked 8 to 4 every day and would sit in the back room to do my homework in the time between my arrival and 4pm. At 4, we'd head home, she'd make my dinner and would then leave to go to her 2nd job from 6pm to 10pm. This was our schedule 5 days a week, every week. She typically spent the weekends sleeping straight through. I didn't realize it at the time (I thought she was just really tired), but in retrospect, she was most likely suffering from clinical depression.

The day after my 14th birthday, I went and got a work permit so I could get a job of my own in the hopes that I'd be able to make enough so my mom could quit her 2nd job. Because your hours are severly limited at 14, I had a difficult time finding jobs that would put me on the schedule for such a small amount of time. Finally I did find a job as a dishwasher in a local pizza place. It was a fairly short-lived position because I hated it and by law I couldn't work enough hours to put a dent in what my mom would need to quit her 2nd job. I continued my search and it wasn't long before I applied for a position as a cashier at a local drug store and was hired. I worked the maximum number of hours that I could every week and was thrilled when I turned 16 because my working hours increased. I began working 3pm to 10pm shifts on most week day nights and 7am to 3pm shifts on weekends. My mother might have been able to quit her 2nd job, but if she could, she didn't.

When I arrived at my junior year in high school, my mother started to become obsessed with my getting into college. I always knew that she wanted me to go to college since she never did, but I had no idea the intensity with

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