Celebrating My Understanding Mom-Olivia Starke

When my mom was expecting, perhaps she dreamed of a cuddly sweet little girl with pigtails and pink frilly dresses who'd take to ballet and other girly pursuits. My mom might've had notions of playing dress up with me, and showing me off to a family who ooed and awed at her precious daughter. After all, I ended up being an only child so I'm sure there were many expectations.

Instead, what she got was a huge tomboy with a perpetually dirty face, and I had no clue what dolls were good for outside of playing fetch with the dogs. I was very much a little boy when I was a little girl. I played with toy trucks, kept pace with my boy cousins, and often brought home pockets filled with creepy crawlies. To be fair, growing up on a farm didn't leave room for a fear of dirt, but I probably loved getting covered in it more than what's reasonable.

My mom received comments from her large and generally narrowed-minded family about my non-gender appropriate behavior--at least as they viewed it. I can recall a few comments by aunts and uncles who had those girly little girls. But my mom ignored them, let me be who I was, and never once tried to force pink or dolls on me. She dressed me in boy's jeans, cowboy boots and shirts, and my Christmas's were always filled with Tonka trucks and Hotwheels.

I am so grateful for being allowed to make my own decisions, even at a young age, and being accepted for who I was. I think this has made me the opened minded and independent person I am now. I love my mom most for this :)

Olivia Starke

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Author Bio:

Olivia Starke calls the Ozarks home. One of the most beautiful areas in the country, she loves hiking trails with her dogs, kayaking on the numerous waterways, and enjoying southern Missouri's fresh air and sunshine.

She's also 'Mom' to four dogs, a growing number of kitties that show up at her door, and four VERY spoiled horses that do little to earn their keep. Not that she'd ever hold that against them.

She's a HUGE fangirl of Doctor Who and to a lesser extent Supernatural, and has a pretty interesting love triangle (or square?) going on in her head between the Doctor and the Winchesters. She’s also sort of completely in love with BBC’s Sherlock--well more precisely, Benedict Cumberbatch.