Tag Archives: motherhood

In honor of Mother’s Day, we’re interviewing our moms to find out how their lives changed when we were born and what they learned about love and life as a parent. Today, Emily’s mom.

I am not one for words, which is why I am a designer at The Frisky, not an editor, but my mom is one of the most amazing people in my life. After constantly fighting with her throughout my teenage years, my mom and I have become best friends (finally!). I talk to her just about every night and I don’t know what I would do without her and her words of wisdom. I know a lot about my mom, but not that much about what it was like for her when she had me — besides the fact that she got gestational diabetes and it stuck! — so it was really interesting to learn what her life was like before me! Keep reading »

In honor of Mother’s Day, we’re interviewing our moms to find out how their lives changed when we were born and what they learned about love and life as a parent. Today, Annika’s mom.

My mom and dad knew each other when they were growing up in Barbuda, an island in the Caribbean. They didn’t get along, but as they became older, a romance blossomed when they both lived in NYC. My grandmother helped my dad become a U.S. citizen, and he was a part of the family before he and my mom married in 1979. I was born soon after, but my parents divorced after two or three years. Although I know my dad and spent time with him throughout my childhood, I have to say that it was my mom who did the day-to-day raising of me. She supported my creativity with dance and art lessons and taught me to develop my own opinions, even when my opinions caused me to get detention every day. That’s why she and I have had this attitude that it’s us against the world. My mom is my best friend and she’s usually the person I prefer to talk to before everyone else. She’s my sounding board and gives great hugs. But that’s not to say we don’t argue.

I know pretty much all there is to know about my mom’s past, but I was still curious to ask her about being pregnant and raising me, her only child. Keep reading »

In honor of Mother’s Day, we’re interviewing our moms to find out how their lives changed when we were born and what they learned about love and life as a parent. Today, Amelia’s mom.

I think I have been truly heartbroken twice in my life. The most recent one was obviously when my relationship with my ex-fiance ended. But the first time my heart broke wasn’t due to a boy. When I went away to college, I was bowled over by the truly unexpected pain of leaving my mother behind. We had always been close, but in my teenage years we fought loads, as teenage girls and their moms tend to do, and I’m sure I shouted, “I can’t wait to get out of this house!” more times than I choose to remember. But when I moved hundreds of miles away to go to school, I missed her so goddamn much. I felt a hole in my heart that I know she shared, which eventually subsided, of course, but I’ll never forget that feeling — it made me realize how much I should and do appreciate and love her. (And, lucky for my brother and me, she recently moved to New York City!) That’s why I was excited to interview my mom, Cheryl Parry, who is a wonderful painter, in addition to being a longtime English as a Second Language (ESL) educator. Keep reading »

In honor of Mother’s Day, we’re interviewing our moms to find out how their lives changed when we were born and what they learned about love and life as a parent. Today, Kate’s mom.

My parents met the cutest way ever—waiting on line to see Shakespeare in the Park in New York City in June of 1967. They married a year and a half later, but their journey toward becoming parents was hardly a straight line between point A and point B. While I am the oldest of their two children (hey Lizz!), I was not their first baby. In 1978, they had a son named Matthew. At three months old, he died during a surgery to mend a heart defect. It was an incredibly sad period in my parents’ life, and one that I’ve never quite understood how they got through with such grace, poise, and hope. So I was very curious to ask my mom, Marianna DeMarco Torgovnick, what it was like becoming a mother again a few years later, when she had me. Keep reading »