The Poor Mom Revolution

    When it comes to life, there’s always a defining moment that changes the trajectory of where your life’s going and how you’re going to get there. I’ve always played by the rulebook. Always doing the right thing and always looked two steps ahead to make sure I thought everything through before making a final decision. It’s how I always lived my life, how I felt successful and it always worked out… until I was about 36 weeks pregnant with my second child. 

    I remember it like it was yesterday. I was completing my practicum for my master’s degree in a special education classroom working as an aide with less than a month to go before I was set to graduate. I absolutely loved the job! I was able to work with kids in small groups at their individual levels and didn’t have to take work home or lesson plan so it was perfect with a young, growing family. Within weeks of my due date, I was told that my position was no longer being renewed for the next year. I guess I knew that teaching contracts were only for a school year at a time and stability wasn’t guaranteed, but never in a million years did I expect to be part of that statistic. For the next week and a half, I dove head first into looking at alternative certifications that I could complete over the summer to stay within the school. I even considered going back to teaching full time in a different grade. With one dead end after another and two days until maternity leave… I came to terms with the fact that I had no job, a brand new baby, a new lease on my beloved RAV4 and no plan. Like I said before… I’m a planner and this situation that fell into my lap was nothing short of sucky!

    Now as much as I wanted to give up and cry, and I did a little bit, I was determined to find a job for the upcoming school year. I went on maternity leave Friday, May 8th, 2015 just 3 days before my daughter was born. I’m not quite sure how everybody else copes with job loss, but it was absolutely terrifying! I printed out a county map of Pennsylvania and mapped every school district within an hour radius. I then created cover letters and searched every website for job openings. While in the hospital getting ready to give birth to my daughter,  I wasn’t thinking about much else and the moment she was born I began applying for teaching jobs through indeed in between feedings. 

    I’ve always dreamt of having kids and starting a family. I would always imagine the extreme joy with looking into my baby’s eyes and seeing them for the first time. That pictureque  moment you see in the movies where the world stops and slows down and nothing else matters. Unfortunately, with the mix of joy was sheer terror. The fear that I wouldn’t be able to support my babies, the fear of not having medical insurance after the 30 day window was over, the fear of failure, and feeling so incredibly alone in all of it. 

    That’s when the pity party set in. I worked my butt off to graduate with a degree in both early and elementary education and went back for my master’s in special education. I was a hard worker, respectful and always with a “I’ll get it done” attitude. None of this made sense. Then realizing with a brand new family and this life we were working so hard to create…I had absolutely nothing going for me. I felt absolutely defeated as a mom and with it became very depressed. 

    After working as hard as I had to get to this point, within 3 weeks we went from an income of 2 to 1 and could barely make ends meet. I was the one that held benefits for the family. I was the one that had the stable income. And in that moment my world was turned upside down.

    Of course, that’s not where the story ends. I wouldn’t be the person I am now or the one sharing this story if I didn’t persevere and learn a hell of a lot from it. This is the point of my life when I learned things get shitty before they get better and no matter how hard it is… We all need a little helping hand sometimes.

    Thankfully, I was able to find a local job teaching in a private school that summer and started in August. The job had no benefits, making barely $30,000 a year before taxes, but the silver lining was being super close to home with a tiny commute. This is when my husband began to discuss government programs with me as a way to help us get back on our feet. This was my undoing. 

    I love that our government provides support for those that need it, because it can make the difference for those needing to decide whether to pay for a place to live or providing food on the table. I just never in a million years thought we’d be in that position. Being a new mom, we qualified for the WIC program. We were able to get food necessities like fresh fruits and vegetables, milk, bread, rice and cereal as well as formula and baby food. As thankful as I was during that time, I was mortified, ashamed and so incredibly embarrassed. I constantly felt judged because I had unknowingly judged others in this exact position. I’m getting “free” food, with a brand new baby and a new car outside? 

Imagine this…

    Your newborn baby is hanging in their car seat in the shopping cart as your holding hands with your 2 year old and pushing the cart to the checkout isle. Standing there with these old school “WIC” checks in your hand as you see the cashier make a slight face and eye roll. They get on the loud speaker and make an announcement for the manager to come to isle 2 to handle a WIC check transaction as 3 more people are now forming a line behind you. You hear the feet tapping, eye rolls and judgements almost immediately as the manager has to view every item in your cart individually to make sure they match the checks you’ve been given. The process takes about 15-20 minutes as you feel the sweat dripping down your back and wishing you didn’t have to come back next week and repeat. 

    My husband repeated to tell me that the program was there for this reason and we’ve worked for the ability to use it while we got back on our feet. The feeling in the pit of my stomach never went away. I never talked about how I was feeling until I had no other choice. At rock bottom, I reached out for help and started a journey figuring out how to get past this mental block through therapy. 

    This is a reminder that your worth is not defined by a job or a personal struggle and sometimes bad things happen to great people. It’s not about the situations that happen to you, but how you overcome and rise to the occasion. Remember who you are and that your journey isn’t something you need to go through alone. I pushed so many people away at a time I needed them the most. I’m learning now that if I had only realized my greatest strength was my resilience and this wasn’t anything to be ashamed of… maybe just maybe… I wouldn’t have shut out the world and taken so long to find my way back. So many of us have a journey that if we only shared our experiences we’d feel a little more connected to each other and could even help if we were brave enough to share it. This is one of those stories and I hope you share yours too!