Introduction
There’s a name for when things don’t work out the way you thought they would. It’s called “life.”
I’m known by my viewers as the “funny mom,” the mom who finds humor in every nook and cranny of motherhood while shoving brownies in her mouth and drinking coffee straight out of a coffeepot. I love humor. I need humor. Tackling life without it is like trying to eat soup with a fork. Sure, you’ll still get a tiny bit of nourishment from eating that way, but you’ll miss out on so much goodness. Before I could laugh about being a mom or embrace the mind-bending challenges of life, I needed something much more vital and basic: I needed hope.
Thirteen years ago, I was a single mom sharing a bedroom with my two rambunctious, wonderful, exhausting young children. I was juggling two jobs and taking every shortcut I could, including not being too proud to accept breakfast help from my friend who worked at Starbucks and let me have the leftover, stale pastries that were no longer fit for their display case.
On one particularly stressful morning a few years into my parenting gig and not long after my divorce, I was awoken by the loud clang of two human alarm clocks—my two- and three-year-olds. Sleep deprivation, plus a lack of personal space and time, can often make one feel like they’re having a hangover—a parenting hangover. I hadn’t had anything to drink the night before, but I had consumed so much of my anxiety and tears that I felt completely disoriented come morning. I’d been up late, hunched over next to my kids’ bunk beds, gathering documents and filling out paperwork for a big adventure I had scheduled for the following day.
That morning, after buckling the kids in their car seats, I pleaded with them to please make sure at least 80 percent of their muffins (the previously mentioned Starbucks treat) ended up in their mouths and not on their clothes or the floor of my car. And off we went on our adventure.
Life tip: always refer to stress-inducing appointments as adventures.
Our “adventure” that morning was at the Department of Social Services. A few days prior, I had sold my old wedding ring to cover that month’s rent, and now I was hoping to be approved for food stamps. Other than my car—which I needed in order to get to my jobs—I was fresh out of valuable possessions I could sell in order to help pay the bills.
When my name was called, my lovely children were pinballing around the waiting area as if they were hooked up to an IV of pure sugar. I scooped them up, one kid in each arm, and walked to the window to turn over my paperwork. The woman working there curtly fired a string of questions at me, glanced over the documents I’d painstakingly compiled, and didn’t once even bother to lift her head to look me in the eye. Not being able to provide the basics for my children made me feel worthless. Not being treated like a human deserving of eye contact by the woman standing between me and the resources I needed only amplified my self-loathing. I wondered for a second what her life was like. Had she ever felt depressed and lonely and overwhelmed and broke and suicidal like I did? Did she have children she loved more than anything in the whole wide world? Did she feel they deserved so much better than what she could ever offer?
Hours later, flooded with relief but also reeling with shame, the kids and I were back in the little room we shared. I could barely hold in the surge of sadness that started to consume me as I wrestled Matea out of her shoes and coat while attempting to coax Luka to just try going potty before naptime. In the midst of this chaos, Matea gently grabbed my cheeks in her tiny hands. She looked deeply into my eyes with her big brown ones and said, “Mommy, I wuv your cute widdle face.” My heart burst. How did she know I needed that love right then, at that moment?
“Baby girl, you are so sweet.” My eyes filled with tears now. “I love you and I love when you grab my face like that with your precious little hands.”
And with her hands still planted firmly on my cheeks, she said with her cute lisp, “I have boogers in my hands.” (Before kids, that would have been gross. After kids? Just a normal Tuesday.)
Once the kids were finally down for their nap, I picked up one of the many books I had been reading. I wasn’t a big reader growing up, much to the dismay of my scholarly parents. My father once risked his life in a plane crash because he refused to slide down the emergency exit without first grabbing his books. He was the last passenger to exit the plane, clinging to his bag of books. But I didn’t inherit my father’s addiction to reading. I had always been too antsy to sit still with a book. Or to sit still at all. Until one day, I wasn’t.
I’m not sure if my eyes needed a break from crying or my mind craved distraction from the utter failure that had become my life, but I was suddenly captivated by reading. Hope was the common thread that kept me turning the pages of the books I found—books about other women whose lives looked nothing like mine but who were chasing down and finding the same solace I was after: hope.
I spent many nights on the floor next to my kids’ beds, counting my waitressing tips to make sure I had enough to cover bills that month, feeling like a worthless mom, escaping into my books when the days became too much, so cried out and screamed out that I was becoming numb to it all. The bad, the really bad, the occasional good, the status quo. It all felt the same. It all felt like nothing.
And then one day I found the guts to stop floating through my life like a helpless character.
With enough time and creativity, a couple of years later, I was able to stockpile my resources—financial and emotional—and afford two bedrooms for my little family. Two bedrooms meant more than just extra space. It meant that I wasn’t stuck anymore. I went from sleeping on the floor next to my kids’ beds to having a mattress, then to having a bed, and finally to having my very own bedroom. I was moving forward. I allowed myself to fall in love again. I built a career that gave me purpose. I watched my children thrive.
Ten years after my life had ground to a halt, I found myself sitting in a fancy-schmancy building across the table from fancy-schmancy people. It was the type of meeting I actually shaved my armpits for (like, both of them) and for once wore a blouse not yet baptized by fluids harboring my children’s DNA. The fancy people praised me for the videos and posts I’d been sharing online for a few years and they admired my large social media following. They thought I was successful enough that they wanted to offer me something more. “So, Kristina, what do you ultimately want? A television show? A speaking tour? What do you want to do with your life?”
Without any thought, I blurted out: “I want to be for others what I needed when I was at my lowest.” As I spoke, I could feel my voice catching in my throat.
I’d never said those words aloud before, or even thought of them specifically. Yet there was my mission, as clear as day. The answer to why I had fought through everything. The answer to what made me get off that floor and live again. The reason why I felt such a strong pull to share my story, my humor, my hope.
Every human I’ve ever met is broken. Every parent I’ve ever met struggles. We all feel regrets; we’re wounded by our failures, hobbled by our insecurities. When you’re in the midst of the worst of it, the darkness feels permanent. But it’s not. It is possible to find meaning and value and connection and humor in your life right now—in your relationships with your kids, your friends, your spouse, and yourself. It is possible to stop feeling defeated and stuck. Hold on for dear life and do not give up. But don’t hold still and be passive; don’t go numb to the good happening all around you, even when life is at its messiest. You do not need to be transformed by the latest twenty-seven-step program. You do not need to take pointers from that mom who seems to have it all figured out. (FYI, she doesn’t. No one does.) You don’t need to aspire to more—more money, more stuff, or more answers. You just need to show up. Just as you are. Flawed and unshowered or perfectly polished. Just as you are.