She was fifteen. Her baby sister was eighteen months old. And their mother was passed out down the hall at two in the afternoon.
For most of her life, Jody Lamb had one job: find a way to finally fix Mom.
She drew the curtains so the neighbors wouldn't see. She kept the secret from teachers, friends, everyone. She rocked her baby sister to sleep and got so good at holding a family together that nobody noticed she was coming apart.
The job continued into adulthood. On the outside: college degree, steady career, big smile. On the inside: chronic anxiety, deep exhaustion, untangling her parents' collapsing finances, and the unshakable belief that if she just tried a little harder, her mother would stop drinking and they could all live happily ever after.
The job she'd accepted as a little girl nearly cost her everything.
My Job Is Me is the story of a daughter who spent decades trying to love her mother into sobriety, and what happened when she finally stopped. It's about the secrets kids keep, the pain that travels quietly from one generation to the next, and what it costs to put everyone else first. Told with unflinching honesty and unexpected warmth, it ends not with a cure, but with something better: peace and a family changed by letting go.
For the millions who grew up around addiction, and for anyone loving someone they cannot change, this is proof that a completely different life is possible.
Your first job in life is to take good care of yourself. It's never too late to start.
Includes a resource guide for readers beginning their own healing journey. From the award-winning author of Easter Ann Peters' Operation Cool.
