The StepMonster

When I was five my parents got divorced. My father got full custody of both my three-year old sister and myself. And my mother....well, my mother got nothing. In fact, I saw my mother a grad total of 3 times between the time I was five and six-months after my 18th birthday. There were many circumstances that caused that, including my move overseas with my father who worked for the State Department. I don't hold a grudge towards either one of them for any of those years. Like so many other things, it happened, it cannot be changed, let's just move on.

Three years after my father's divorce he remarried a wonderful woman. Well, not so wonderful a the time. I have always been rebellious, and hard-headed. I used those attributes to make my stepmother's life very difficult. In fact, I was such a problem child and caused her and my father so many headaches that by the time I was 16, they couldn't handle me and sent me to live with my Aunt Caryn (she is by far the most amazing woman on this planet and deserves a post all of her) in North Carolina.

Throughout those years things between my stepmother and I were strained, but also shared some really wonderful memories. However in my heart I think I felt like I was betraying my birth mother by calling my stepmother "Mom." In every sense of the word, she was my mom. She stayed up late with me when I was sicks, came to band concerts, took me shopping for my first bra, all the things that Mom's do for their children. Still I felt like I was betraying a memory if I was to call her "Mom."

Eventually it became impossible for me not to call her "Mom." However I need someway to easily tell the difference between her (my stepmother) and my Mom (my birth mother.) So I called my stepmother, the StepMonster. Somehow I got away with calling her that behind her back for years. She never found out.

Around the time I graduated for high school and went off to college, the relationship I had with my StepMonster changed. We became closer, we got to really know one another, and created a bond that is still going strong to this day. I eventually told her about the nickname and too my surprise she laughed. I occasionally refer to her as the StepMonster only because it is an easy way to explain who I am speaking about, but it hold no malice like it used to. I can say that the StepMonster has been there for me more times then anyone else. And I love her for it.