One of the hardest lessons I learned from being a stay-at-home wife and mother of two was how quietly dependence can turn into codependency. Staying home to raise my children was real work. There was somewhere along the way I stopped feeling like an equal partner. 

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Let me lay it out, just as handwashed clothes with Ivory soap were placed on a clothesline to dry on a warm summer’s day. For years, I carried this quiet pressured weight wondering if tying the knot at 20 meant I was falling behind. Never spoke about it out loud. I let the thought settle deep. Often it showed up every time I caught myself measuring my life against somebody else’s highlight reel.