Some women feel like they’re ready. Others try for years before they get pregnant or before an adoption becomes final. None of these were my experience. In fact, I couldn’t have been less ready or more surprised to become a mom.

Here’s the thing though: we all have completely different, one hundred percent unique experiences when it comes to becoming a mother.

Somehow though, we’re always fed the same narrative:

Girl meets man of her dreams.

Man pops the question.

Girl gets married.

Girl gets pregnant.

Girl, man and child live happily ever after. The end.

But life doesn’t follow a script. In fact, it doesn’t give a shit about your script. Your script is actually a fantasy and life will do whatever the hell it wants with you. It’s your job to roll with the punches.

It’s just really scary to roll with the punches when that punch happens to be a brand new life that you’re in charge of.

I’m sharing my story of becoming a mom (and all of the fears that went along with it) on Glamamom today. If you like it, please share it—especially with new or soon-to-be moms who might not realize we were all terrified once.

What scared (or scares) you about becoming a mom?

I was already sweating. Crammed in between chairs and dodging elbows attached to scissor-wielding hands that were dancing around wet heads, I didn’t have space to take off my jacket or my huge scarf. So I stood there, smiling at the reflection of my daughter. She was silently cringing as a stranger brushed her hair, which was a hilarious contrast to the seemingly uncontrollable screeches I got treated to when I did the same thing. I caught her eye and smiled at her before getting sucked into the conversation happening next to me.

“So you’re watching the kids today, eh?”

A small Italian man with a big New York City accent was snipping away at another man’s head, the guy’s newly shorn sons wrestling in a chair nearby.

“Giving the wife a break?”

That’s all it took. Frustration and rage boiled up inside of me until I felt like a kettle on the verge of shrieking. I felt my face become tomato red as the two men chuckled and shrugged as if they each understood what it was like to have to take one for the team.

There were so many things I wanted to say right then.

This post is sponsored by thredUP, but all opinions are mine.

Bad Ass Babes is a series that features women who have gone out into the universe and made it a better, more interesting place. These are the women who make the world go ’round. The women that our daughters need to know about and hear about and learn from.

It’s been a while since I’ve featured a nice, feisty bad ass babe. So instead of delivering you just one, I’ve partnered with thredUP (my favorite online secondhand clothes retailer) to celebrate the one year anniversary of their #badassmoms series.

Throughout the last year, #badassmoms has celebrated some incredible women who are defining a new norm. These ladies are making modern choices, building supportive communities, and turning their dreams into reality. The women featured have been from all over the country, with different points of view and different lifestyles. They’ve discussed topics from parenting to health to entrepreneurialism to life after loss, in a way that is brutally honest, and unapologetic. These ladies are true bad asses.

I picked three of my favorites to highlight here. What I love about these women is that they each figured out what they wanted in life and found a way to make it happen, no matter what the obstacles may be.

Today was school picture day for the girls. I took what I consider a totally non-traditional approach to the whole thing. I think the technical term for it would be the Ain’t Nobody Got Time for That Shit Approach. It’s kind of my signature approach lately. I’m thinking of getting it trademarked.

I think it started with a text I got from another momma alerting me to the insane price gouging on the photo packages (which reminded me of this hilarious meme I shared on Facebook a couple of weeks ago). School picture prices are totally out of control—especially when I can guarantee that at least one out of two daughters will have no interest in being fake happy for a stranger.

But, maybe even more importantly, how much worth am I actually going to assign to a stuffy, sure-to-be-awkward photo five years from now? Sure, it might be giggle worthy. But will it really tell me anything about my daughter’s personality when a stranger combs her hair the way he or she sees fit and then spends roughly ten seconds with her before moving on to the next kid in line?

You know those little things called feelings? Well, I’m feeling all of them right now.

For the last week I’ve been like a quickly moving ping pong ball trapped in a very small space. My emotions are bouncing wildly all over the place and I can barely keep up. One second I’m so freaking sad that summer is ending. I’m on the verge of tears at the thought that my baby (my baby!) is going to climb onto a school bus and be whisked away into the land of big kids. The very next second I’m positive that I will rip my hair out right now if that god damn bus doesn’t come.

It’s making me feel insane.

This is motherhood. For real.