How do you change your legal name...

How do you change your legal name? I ask not because I do not like 'Theresa', I am proud to be named after my GreatGrandmother...

I ask because since I became a mother, I dont think I have even heard my legal name, unless I am at work. I remember the days I may have answered to 'baby', 'cutie', or even 'hey!!!' Now, as I walk through Walmart, I hear a itty bitty teanichy (Sis, you know this word) voice scream out, "MOMMY!"

I turn and frantically look around, I feel the hairs on my arms raise and sweat beads start to form... This is a cry for help, it is not a 'mommy, I'm playing with you' scream, it is a 'mommy, I am wearing gas panties and sitting on the stove' scream... I start having heart palpitations as I look up and down the aisle and the next aisle... Wait, my kids are at home... Whew!

This let me know I have lost my identity, I am no longer Theresa, I am 'Mommy', 'The girls mom", and a few other mommy titles.... I went to sign the check for daycare, which is more than my car payment, and signed the damn thing Mommy.

Bill collectors even call me asking for Mommy... how and when did this happen, I hear my children in my sleep and for the life of me I wish "You are my Sunshine" had never been scribed... Who wrote this shit anyways... not to mention 'Mr. Sun, Sun, Mr. Golden Sun...'

I find myself walking through the grocery store on the phone with my sister and we are trying to remember the words to different childrens songs... Between the 2 of us, we can tell you EVERY childrens show, EVERY character ever invented, the time and channel each show comes on, and probably who produces each one. We even know the real people that play most of the characters... (Sad, I know...)

It is however, a wonderful feeling to have my kids laughing and playing when they dont know I am watching. The oldest pretends to be me and to hear her mock me and laugh and play with her sister makes remembering my real name unimportant.