The Writing of – Do You Know Your Mom’s Story?

The writing of – Do You Know Your Mom’s Story?

The idea for this book really came about because of 3 things.

1. I got the opportunity to really get to know my mom’s journey and understand who she was, what she really wanted and why she had made some decisions she had.
2. I had been interviewing women born before 1945 who stepped outside the norm – they worked or got educated. They had incredible journeys but many had not shared their story with their family.
3. When we reach old age we should know that our lives mattered, we feel connected and loved. Unfortunately, not many really do feel like this.

Growing old is a given, unfortunately we don’t have much choice about it happening. It’s going to come whether we want it or not but the sad truth is that non of us really prepare for it. In fact we do what we can to run the other direction.

Getting to know my mom

What really struck me in getting to know my mom’s story, was how much she had influenced my life. I thought I was in charge of my life but I discovered that I had been out to prove something to her. She was one of those women who had stepped outside the norm—she graduated from University 1 of 2 women in a class of 126. Pretty impressive. She had hopes and dreams but she got married and stepped away from that. It really disheartened me to see her play ‘second fiddle’, when obviously she was a strong independent woman. Unknowingly I had set out to prove to her that I could do it all, be educated, have a career, be married and raise a family. What a hole I dug myself into.

Writing this book

My relationship with my mom had directed my life in ways I couldn’t have imagined. As soon as I mended and understood my relationship with my mom, that’s when I knew I’d step into my dream of becoming an author. And I did.

Talking with my mom, interviewing the women who stepped outside the norm and working with seniors early on in my career, showed me how important that mother-child relationship is. It doesn’t matter our age, we are always looking for Mom’s acceptance, Mom’s approval, Mom’s love—whether we consciously know it or not.

The biggest thing I learned was that we all want to know that we matter, that we are loved and feel connected. My goal is to help grow, mend or heal the relationship between mom and child. I know that not all relationships can be fixed but if each of us were to mend it from our perspective, we could go into old age feeling good about our life and our journey.

Do You Know Your Mom’s Story? 365 Questions You Need to Ask Her.

Truly we could probably ask her a question a day for the rest of our lives and really not know her full journey or all that she has learned.