To Fake Ring It or Not

Reading Ms.SingleMama’s post about the single mom who wears a fake wedding ring got me thinking about how much I’ve changed and grown in the last two years.

When I was pregnant with Lucca I worked at an exclusive athletic club. My job entitled standing on my feet all day, scanning members cards, and wishing them a fantastic workout. I had just moved back home in my parents’ house and was severely struggling with who I was and the belly that was bulging in my god-aweful uniform. I ate greasy Joe-Joes covered in ranch dressing everyday and cursed the Heidi Klum mommies that bounced beautifully, carefree and married, into the gym.

I stood behind the desk, folded towels, and tried hard not to stare when each of them would hand me there card with 4k diamond ring on their left hand. To say I felt fat, ugly, and inferior is an understatement. The day came when my belly popped and I no longer could pass off my new look as a few extra pounds of weight gain. I was obviously pregnant.

Dreading going into work and running into old classmates from my high school who were now married and living the storybook life, I dug through my old jewelry box and found a favorite ring of mine. A sweet, younger boyfriend gave it to me. I’m pretty sure he got it from QVC, the home-shopping network, but I didn’t care. I slid it on my left hand, stared at it, and imagined for a moment it was there because someone loved me and the life growing inside of me. I breathed a sigh of relief, pleased at the thought that, though it was small, at least it would protect me from nosy old acquaintances that would see me, glance at my belly and say suspiciously, “Oh! Look how cute you are! I didn’t even hear that you had gotten married. How are you?”

I wore the ring to work for two months. I was so fragile, scared, and knew only to feel ashamed about my ’situation’. This was NOT the life I had planned: 4.0 student, captain of the Varsity cheer-leading squad, and now knocked up, poor and alone. The ring was buffer helping me avoid the fast approaching reality that I would be a single mom.

Something switched in me though, just before Lucca was born. I began to bond with my belly, now in full bloom, and I felt myself beautiful. With the overwhelming joy that I would soon meet my son, nothing–not my promising past, nor my uncertain future–mattered anymore. I stopped wearing the ring and mustered up strength I never knew I had, to look people in the eye and say “nope!” when they asked me if I was married or had a boyfriend.

It’s amazing what motherhood can do to spark a change in your core. For the love of my soon to be born son, I made a simple decision, and from that my whole world changed course. I decided I did not want Lucca to ever feel ashamed that he did not have a father, and so that meant I had to learn to not feel ashamed that I did not have a husband. I was done judging myself with eyes of others. I was going to be a mother, and yes I was single, and dammit, I was going to be proud on both fronts.

In 12-Step programs there is a great mantra that says, “fake it till you make it.” When it came to remedying my self esteem to prepare myself for single-motherhood, I didn’t have time for weekly meetings or a sponser. But magical experience of child-birth proved effective enough. I was empowered, and I didn’t need to fake it anymore with any ring.

What use to be a source of shame for me, now is honestly a point of pride. When I have Lucca in my arms and I am carrying two tons of groceries to the car by myself, and somehow finding my keys and unlocking the trunk at the same time–and doing this all with a genuine smile on my face, I love it when I catch someone glancing down at my bare left hand.

I still wear my pretty pearl and diamond QVC ring sometimes, but on my right hand, never the left. I stand for a community of single parents who embrace their life, not despite the fact they aren’t married, but because they realize that life is much bigger than that issue– Life is wonderful and their family is perfect, as is.

Have you all experienced a turning point from shame to joy in your single parent life? If so, I want to hear it! Inspiring stories are better than a double shot latte in the morning, and we have a revolution to begin.

The future belongs to proud single parents and their children, rock on!