Can I have my grown up badge now?

I turn 30 tomorrow.

I'm ready.

A good friend of mine told me that she cried on her 30th birthday.

I'm excited.

12 years ago when I turned 18 and officially became an adult, I was 3 months pregnant with my daughter. I got maternity clothes for my birthday.
Everyone says that teens having babies have to grow up so fast, and it's true. I did, but that doesn't mean that you're recognized as such.

"you're such a baby" people said. And everyone felt sorry for me, and gave me pitying looks. The grown up responsibilities and challenges were there, but without first earning my place in a grown up world.

No one wants to rent an apartment to a 19 year old, a 20 year old, a 21 year old....
you're too young, you're not trustworthy.

And there were lessons to be learned, things I needed to find out the hard way, growing up to do, but I've shouldered the responsibilities, kept my job, found people to rent to me, bought cars, paid insurance, birthed and nursed 3 children, been to countless dr appointments, changed countless diapers, juggled work and daycare and college, thrown 23 birthday parties, been to 15 parent-teacher conferences, and dance practices and baseball practices and basketball practices and gymnastics practices, and recitals and parades and Halloween costumes and and and....

taught them to read, and to use their manners and to use the toilet, and have been responsible for their lives as well as mine....

and I'm not a baby.

Recognize.

30!