The Girlfriend Mom

After tap-dancing through life as a childfree woman, Dani fell in love with a divorced dad of two and stepped into the amorphous role of a parent’s live-in significant other—or babysitter without compensation. Presented with a Whitman’s Sampler of motherhood, she made rookie mistakes, like leaving the 11-year-old alone in the house while running to CVS for raisins and donating to the Alzheimer’s Foundation as the kids’ Christmas gifts. 

    Seven years in, Dani got her bearings and sunk deeper into her semi-parenting, surprising herself and those around her. She kept Nicole’s teenage secrets, whistled while she laundered Tyler’s athletic supporter, and anointed herself “the Girlfriend Mom.”  

    And then she was dumped for a natural blonde. 

    It wasn’t a traditional divorce, and Dani had no visitation rights—but she and the kids wouldn’t break up. And she went from keeping a guardedly warm distance to fighting for a place in their lives, including befriending the kids’ mother—the ex of her ex. A laugh-out-loud story about the lengths to which we go to for love and family.