My family structure changed forever on the night of the “Cheetah Girls 2” premiere.
At the time, I remember being pretty annoyed — not because of my parents’ separation, but because the Cheetah Girls were just starting to sing their way through Barcelona, and now my mother was whisking my 8-year-old self away and ruining the fun.
What my mother was actually doing, though, was leaving my father and bringing us a few miles north, back to her childhood home.
She grew up the youngest of six children in a big Italian family. At the time of her split from my dad, my grandparents had already passed and her brothers were out of the house, but her two sisters still lived under one roof.
When we arrived at my mother’s childhood home, my aunts took us in with open arms. One of them, Annmarie, was already offering to let me skip school and get ice cream — because, you know, I was now a kid of divorce.
In many ways, that night marked the beginning of something much bigger than a new home. It was the start of me being nurtured within a remarkable sisterhood, one that would profoundly shape the person I would become.
My mom and I instantly made ourselves at home
Both of my aunts were unmarried and child-free. Living with them was supposed to be a temporary setup, but because of the childcare support my mom needed, it made sense to stay as long as possible.
Growing up, living with three mother figures felt natural: being carted off to school and activities by Annmarie, eating her famous pasta e fagioli at dinnertime, and occasionally being left to my own devices to play Webkinz.
I slept in a bedroom wedged between my mom’s room and Aunt Annmarie’s, while Aunt Louise converted the downstairs office into her own room. Almost 30 years later, what began as an emergency landing spot remains our permanent family set-up.
At different life stages, I’ve been closer to different ‘moms’
After my parents’ divorce, Aunt Annmarie became my primary caregiver while my mother worked.
Annmarie drove me to school, to after-school sports, and everywhere in between. She is the family’s undisputed matriarch, the oldest sister with an encyclopedic memory and an unmatched arsenal of one-liners about life.
We drove each other crazy during my teenage years, but the older I got, the more I saw myself in her: her obsessive cleaning habits, her fierce protectiveness, and her “it’s all going to hell in a handbasket” sense of humor.
During college, it was Aunt Louise I gravitated toward. We bonded over traveling, our love lives, and our shared ambitions, like starting our own businesses. We’d FaceTime for hours each week and never ran out of things to say. We still don’t.
To everyone in the family, she is the therapist and the first call in a crisis. She likes to joke that when I finally “make it,” I’ll owe her back pay for all our sessions. If I can, I plan to honor that debt.
Then there’s my mom, Teresa, with whom I’ve been close my whole life. More like best friends than mother and daughter, we would take trips from Long Island into New York City and to Miami just to lounge and read. She knows me like no one else does.
I feel immensely lucky to have had such different “moms” and vibrant women to turn to throughout my life. I believe my personality, ambitions, quirks, and work ethic can all be attributed to each of them in different ways.
Being raised by 3 women made me into the person I am today
Authority in our household functioned less like a parent-child dynamic and more like a sibling hierarchy. We had what I called “The Three-Strike System”: If Annmarie said I couldn’t sleep over at a friend’s house, I’d ask Teresa.
If that didn’t work, Louise was my last resort — and she was almost always on my side, ensuring it was never two against two. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t use this to my advantage from time to time.
Emotions often ran high in my household, shaped by sisterly tensions that existed long before I came into the picture. Although there were never arguments about how to raise me — with my aunts always deferring to my mother — conflict was still common.
Does Annmarie like the house a certain way? Yes. Does Louise get irritated when Teresa doesn’t vacuum to her standards? Absolutely. Friction was inevitable, but with fierce love comes fierce disagreements.
As an adult, I’ve noticed the ways in which I was raised differently from my friends. I was always spoken to like an adult and vice versa (hence why I’ve always called my mother “Teresa” rather than “Mom,” which surprises some people).
I’ve also acted as an emotional referee between my “mothers,” translating one’s love language or remorse. “That’s not what she meant,” I’d insist to one.
“She was hurt, not angry,” I’d tell the other, softening sharp edges and rephrasing apologies before they had the chance to land wrong. I learned early that love isn’t always spoken in the same language, and sometimes it needs a third party.
My upbringing shaped my instinct to read a room, to make space, and connect with others quickly. It’s why I keep my friendships close and my circle wide, why strangers rarely stay strangers for long.
More than anything, I am grateful for my non-traditional upbringing — despite being a little light on boundaries — because it taught me how to show up for others.
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