At the time, the women's movement was fighting for my rights. But in their well-meaning desire to allow women equal opportunity to do anything men could do or even better, they inadvertently squashed this little girl's dream.They turned my desire to be a mother into something that was considered "old fashioned" and not as exciting as traveling the world, enjoying the freedom to do anything I wanted to do (as long as it wasn't simply to get married and have children). I eventually bought into the idea that motherhood wasn't enough to earn people's approval. I had to be more than "just" a mother. As the years passed, I began to feel like it was my responsibility to validate the hard work of the generation of women before me by taking advantage of the newfound freedom and rights they had worked so hard to implement.

The only problem was that my honest desire was to be a wife and mother. What did I want to be? I wanted to be loved. I wanted a peaceful life. I longed for security, normalcy, and time to spend with the children I longed to have. In some ways, I did aspire to something my mother never had. In that way, my dream reflected more than what was possible for my mother. She had to endure a life taking care of four children in a home with my father, who was diagnosed as paranoid/schizophrenic. In our home, there was no normalcy. There was no peace. And my mother, who had to work hard just to put food on the table, was also stripped of precious time with her children. So in some ways, I was like the women of generations past who wanted more than their mothers were allowed to have. In the 1960s and '70s, the women's liberation movement paved the way for many opportunities for women but frowned on a women's right to chose to be a mother only. The message was clear: women who stayed home to be married and take care of their kids were unhappy. People assumed that women who stayed home to raise their children had other desires they weren't fulfilling, because they felt trapped in "having" to be a mother. In this confusing time, many women who were genuinely happy at home developed a sense of guilt in not having any other, grandiose dreams. "What's wrong with me? I am just a dull housewife," they seemed to be saying.

The new paradigm claimed that motherhood was something you did when you weren't brave enough to pursue the thing you really wanted to do. Or at least that was what was largely assumed, as evident in television, books, and movies of the era. In adopting the philosophy of "liberated women," we robbed women of their right to be happy as mothers only. Young girls like myself were being fed the message that we had the choice to be anything that we wanted to be, so why choose to be "merely" a mother? Apparently mothers weren't as valuable as businesswomen, artists, athletes, or politicians. It was as if the culture was trying to deprogram something that was innately bred in me as a child, a desire so deep in my DNA that it felt unnatural to deny it: my desire to be a mother.

A New Dream

Like a lost and confused child wandering in an unfamiliar neighborhood, I took the advice of people who seemed to have my best interest at heart but weren't really listening or interested in what I truly wanted. Through many conversations like the one I had with Aunt Claire, I was eventually lured away from my innocent hopes and dreams into a future that looked promising but ended up being a destructive path.

The women in my life were beautiful and strong, and they encouraged me to go out to find my dream. After all, how else could I support myself? Men were unreliable, and they were not supportive. With no positive male role models in my life, I learned early on that perhaps it was better to move on to plan B--getting a job and making a life for myself.

Even as a little girl I could sing well. So I put everything I could into singing, hoping to become famous and make good money. I knew that if I became a famous singer, then the women I admired so much would be proud of me. In my mind, I had decided that if I became famous first and had the money and security I longed for, then maybe one day way off in the future I could then decide to marry a great man (if there was one out there), have children, and buy a home for myself.

In the meantime, I concentrated on perfecting my voice and performance skills. I now had a new passion. I wanted to be a singer. I was intensely motivated and focused, knowing that if I succeeded as a singer, one day I could finally afford the luxury of motherhood.