I started lying when I fell in love.

My marriage was on the rocks when I started taking tennis lessons from a dashing young pro.

But reallyIwas the one on the rocks.

My identity as a full-time stay-at-home mom of four didnt mesh with my perfectionistic, workaholic, creative personality.

I felt like an injured athlete, stuck on the sidelines.

Did anyone seemeunderneath the bibs and diapers, the paintbrushes and snack baggies?

After having my twins, Id tried for five years to have a third child, to no avail.

And then after I finished nursing my daughter, I found out I was pregnant again.

It was like a joke.

The younger two would be 17 months apart.

Anxiety veered sharply intodepression, where it always arrived if left unchecked.

I was incredibly happy to be a mother, but I was also sinking.

I cried often, hiding on the bathroom floor to just get a minute to myself.

I was snapping at everyone.

People I didnt know well asked, Are you okay?

The advice I kept gettingkeep going, come on!just wasnt possible.

The crush of it was overpowering me.

I felt like I was about to go under.

I found myself fantasizing about getting into a car accident, canceling plans, developing physical ailments.

Something to look forward to.

Where I could be me.

For months, the tennis pro didnt even know how many kids I had.

When he met my baby in the parking lot, he exclaimed, Theres another one?!

Our conversations werent about the stresses in life.

They were about the foods we enjoyed, courts wed played on, songs we loved.

Or possibly a hairstylist; he cut all his friends and family members hair and his own.

He wasnt looking for anything to happen.

He hadnt taken a vacation in more than a decade.

We got increasingly close all summer until we both realized:Wait.Neither of us wanted the lessons to end.

Labor Day was coming, and I was heading back to the city with the kids.

And then for dinner.

The next week, the beach.

Then the end of my marriage.

Getting separated and divorced was the hardest thing Id ever gone through, a unique brand of grief.

Wasnt my job as a mom to suck it up and get through it?

Who said I deserved to be any happier than I was?

Getting separated and divorced was the hardest thing Id ever gone through, a unique brand of grief.

And yet, to most people I knew, I was still hiding it.

I didnt want to tell anyone until everything was sorted and we could tell the kids about the separation.

I made excuses for why I couldnt attend this meeting or that coffee date.

I felt my skin crawl.

And then there were the kids.

The younger ones were too little to understand what was happening, but my twins picked up on everything.

My daughter, then nine years old, was eerily perceptive.

Who was the man on the phone?

Where are you going?

Why are you dressed up?

Why are you wearingeyeliner?

The kids were like the K9 Task Force, sniffing out any scent of a equipment.

I quickly became well-versed in hacks like hiding photos on my iPhone.

I even went so far as to getanother phone,until the kids found the box.

and then a confused Why did he hang up?

Multiple therapists advised against telling the kids the truthfor their own good; it was too soon.

First they had to get used to their parents separating.Divorcing.Thenthey could start to process someone new.

Six months, maybe longer.

Terrible momdidnt even begin to describe how ashamed I felt.

I still couldnt eat because I was so upset leaving the kids on the days I didnt have custody.

My life had collapsed, seemingly along with my morals.

How much more would I have to sacrifice to change the course of my life?

(Sometimes it still is.)

He retired from tennis soon after we got together but still plays regularly for fun.

It was a brutal, horrible time, partially of my own making.

And yet I didnt regret it.

I had to do it.

I introduced them to him, and they also fell in love, some faster than others.

The lying could finally stop.

The tennis pro and I will celebrate our seventh wedding anniversary this June.

What was once a dirty secret is now a source of pride.

Over time,howit all went down took on less importance.

I had found the strength to do something incredibly difficult, and I was willing to do it.

Professionally, I also changed course.

I went back to work.

I started a podcast that took off,Moms Dont Have Time to Read Books.

On the back cover: What if you could rewrite your own story?

After everything I am, indeed, happy.

Im not proud of that, but Im not sorry.