It’s really interesting to be a woman and to get to 45 and not be married and not have kids. Especially when you have just pushed out your fifth kid on TV. You start hearing crazy shit like: “Oh, you just haven’t found the right guy yet,” “What are you going to DO?” “Oh, you poor thing,” “why is someone like you still single,” “have you ever thought of having kids?” “why don’t you just have a kid on your own.” It’s never ending and not helpful.

I grew up planning a wedding. My dress was going to be corseted with multiple antique Victorian camisoles spilling off my shoulders and I would change into a white double-breasted suit, wide leg trouser (with an exaggerated cuff) for the reception. I dreamed about being chosen by a powerful, sexy, kind man who had full lips and gave good hugs and having baby boy named Lauren.

But…I also dreamed of winning an Oscar and being on the cover of magazines and making a difference in the world, helping women find our voices. And from that dreaming, I have built an incredible life. I have become a woman that I am proud to be.

And then someone tells me about their friend who adopted a child at 52 and how “it’s never too late for your life to have meaning,” and my worth gets diminished as I am reminded that I have “failed” on the marriage and carriage counts. Me! This bold, liberated, independent woman. I mean, I work out, eat well, I mostly show up to work on time, I’m a good friend, a solid daughter, a hard worker, my credit is good, I take out the garbage before it gets smelly, I recycle, and I won a Golden Globe! I’m killing it! So, why? Why do I get snagged this way? As if all that I have done and who I am doesn’t matter.

I look back and think about all the ways we’re told that those two #goals: being chosen and having kids, are what makes you worthy. I mean: Nursery Rhymes. Fairytales. Books. Movies. Sixteen Candles, every love song, and even Black-ish—all reiterating this narrow story of “husband plus child equals woman”. And the patriarchy—the patriarchy is not pleased with me right now. I’m failing at my function. Let me tell you, Mike Pence is fucking confused by me right now.

Frankly, I often get a little confused. So, here is something I have done way more than I care to admit: Trying to gather the courage to tell my ex (whom I love by the way) that I want to date other people even though we were no longer together—we are broken up and have been! And during this last bout of doing just that, I did what enlightened ladies do and I got out my journal. I’m sitting there free writing, maybe conversing with my inner child, and I write down: MY LIFE IS MINE. My life is mine.

Those words stopped me in my tracks and honestly brought so many tears to my eyes.

so many tears to my eyes. Seems so obvious, but obviously it wasn’t. Because I have NOT been living my life as if it was my own. I mean to a certain extent yes but on a deep level no.

So, if my life is actually mine…then I have to really live it for myself. I have to put myself first and not be looking for permission to do so.

But, when I put myself first, what comes back at me from well-meaning people—most men, social media, random ladies at the gym, Mike Pence, whoever—they tell me in all sorts of ways that I am being selfish, pushy, aggressive, controlling, relentless, stubborn, a slut, a nag, oh, and my favorite, a ball breaker, because god forbid a few balls get broken along the way.