Anonymous

I don't recall meeting my first love. It seems he was always with me.

This article originally appeared on Mamamia

While I may not get flowers on Mother’s Day, I live with the daily responsibilities that go along with the adulting of parenthood as a full-time caregiver.

I’ll be the first to admit that a large part of my twenties was spent in a euphoric haze brought on by fairly regular pot smoking. I loved the stuff — and it certainly loved me. I don't feel I ever had a “problem” with it, but I did feel a strong pull to have it in my life.

For more than 20 years, I believed I was a slut. A shameful, vile, one-time slut, but a slut all the same. It was you, Mr White Canterbury shorts, that led me to believe this. But, since reading the letter from Brock Turner’s victim, I realized, what you did, Mr White Canterbury Shorts, was in fact rape.

I had a rough idea of what I wanted to say to him about porn. The way I parent is to give my children all the information and then let them make decisions for themselves. I feel that if I restrict activities I make them more alluring. That’s why I don’t join my mom friends in banning technology throughout the school week and that’s why I don’t ever ban junk food. Instead I sit the kids down, explain my concerns, and then monitor their use or consumption, making suggestions along the way.

I thought I knew everything I needed to know about personal style and fashion until I started teaching elementary school. I had more fashion lessons this year than a makeover-show contestant, courtesy of 6-year-old girls.

Like too many others out there, we have a father who gave us some of his genes and not a whole lot more. Specifically, my father is an alcoholic — has been for the entirety of his adult life.

Over those five years, I volunteered on hot summer days and rainy mornings. I stood in snow, wearing warm layers and fleece mittens. I volunteered beside women and men, many of them young, like me, but some older and wiser and living out a lifetime of experience on those sidewalks.

This article first appeared on Mamamia and has been republished with perm