My parents were divorced when I was less than a year old. I have no memory of my mother and my father being happy together. I never witnessed them celebrate their anniversary, and I never had a Christmas Card. Sometimes, I thought that divorce was the worst thing thats ever happened to me. After all, it turned my life around without me even knowing it. I’ve had 19 years of two Christmases, two Thanksgivings, and two Birthday Parties (etc.) which sounds really fun on paper, but was actually quite devastating. When you hear the sob story of divorce, it’s safe to assume the child has had nothing but sadness in their entire life. Actually, this is not entirely true.

There is something called a Step-Parent. A stepdad, or a stepmom is someone who has the overwhelming responsibility to be the ‘secondary’ parent. Personally, my stepmom had to love my sister and me, and treat us like we were her own. I always thought that was extremely unfair, because we certainly didn’t treat her like our own mom. There were times in the beginning when I secretly resented her for being the piece in my life’s puzzle that jammed itself in to fit. She was the only thing standing between my mom and my dad being back together again, as if it were even close to being that simple.

Stepmoms have to not only treat the kids like her own, but discipline them like her own, and try to leave a lasting impression on them. All of this, while having an excruciatingly prominent barrier between each other. They are not your kids, they are someone else’s kids, but you have to pretend without being able to actually pretend. Yet, if you ask a stepmom, she doesn’t say she has “a daughter, a stepdaughter, and a stepson”, but rather they always end up saying “two daughters, and a son”. The selflessness of a stepparent always amazes me.

In my custody arrangement, my mom had majority custody. I stayed with her in Illinois, and I visited my dad and stepmom (in Georgia) for the summer, sometimes Christmas. My stepmom was my mom away from home, and sometimes I even felt guilty. I could never call her mom (I always called her by her first name), because I felt as if it would betray my birth mother. But when my stepmom had been with me for the first ten years of my life, I asked myself why I even hesitated. This woman, this amazing woman, had been looking after me since before I could remember. Why was it such a crime to consider having anything more than my mom, and my dad’s second wife? Was my stepmom not there to read me bedtime stories every night? Wasn’t she the one who taught me pieces of French every night? Did she not play with me and my dinosaur toys when my dad was at work? How about those softball games, or taking me to my very first drama camps? Eventually, I was happy to consider her a full-on second mother. However, it was interesting to see the respect that my stepmom had for my mom. She never tried to be my mom, she never tried to replace anyone or diminish anything. Her entire purpose was to make sure that I was feeling happy and loved, all year around. This is the highest quality of human.

But, then everything turned around again. This time, I had the ‘opportunity’ of seeing everything with full consciousness and memory. I still very easily remember the car ride with my dad, where he informed me that he and my stepmom would be getting a divorce. This is where the fairy tale-gone-wrong becomes a little less cute. This is where my stepmom no longer is legally obligated to know who the heck I am. This is where my stepmom became a woman that I once lived with. I wasn’t her kid genetically, and now I was no longer even her kid legally.

I will be honest, there was a part of me that was scared that she would never talk to me again. Now that she wasn’t a part of my family, she wouldn’t feel any need to give me attention. I was worried that I had now just simply become a reminder to her of her ex-husband, and somewhat of a past life. But, this is the part that gets me every time- even though she had no obligation to love me, it seemed as if there wasn’t even a hiccup. She still went to all of my plays, she still devoted all of her time that she possibly could to making me happy. The bond between her and I became so unbelievably genuine, that it didn’t matter who my dad was married to. She is my “former stepmother” on paper, but is my second mother in my heart.

Now that my dad has been remarried again for a few years now, it’s been difficult keeping in touch with her. I always have to schedule a specific time to go and see her, and it’s only for a day at most. Yet, every time she sees me, she greets me like nothing ever stopped. To me, I am her only son, and I feel the warmth in her heart when she talks to me. Every year, I still receive a birthday card (to her, when you see this- thank you for the card this year, I loved it!) every year. She still texts me to get updates on how I am doing, she is at the sidelines of every event in my life to cheer me on, and I know that she will always be there for me if I were to ever need anything from her. She has left a lasting impression on me that will continue to grow. I still call her by her first name, but when I say her name, what I really mean is “Mom”. I used to consider her a puzzle that jammed itself in to fit, but I found that my puzzle couldn’t be complete without her.

To conclude, I’m sure that she is not the only “first stepmother” out there. This is a tribute to all of the women who selflessly take these random kids into their lives, and build their entire world around them. Even though that time is over, and you are no longer legally responsible, your heart doesn’t change. You have no obligation to love them, but you do it anyway. The first stepmom is the unsung hero of a kid’s divorce-driven life. This world is a better place because of her, and people like her.