When we first moved in and I walked around our property in Fallbrook, it felt like a childhood fantasy come true. It was a picturesque house with a green yard and a white picket fence. There were flowers everywhere, and there was even an idyllic pond. It was springtime. I had a perfect husband, and I was going to have a baby. It was easy to flash forward to strolling the land with Dean while our three kids tumbled along beside us. It all made sense…except, that is, when it came to waiting on guests hand and foot at all hours every day.
Running the inn was anything but a fantasy. I didn’t anticipate the guests taking surprise photos of us while we tried to clean the house or prepare breakfast. I didn’t know there would be vandals and Peeping Toms. I never want to plunge another toilet again. And, for all that hope and sweat, the inn wasn’t exactly raking in the big bucks. We didn’t know what the future held.
Regardless, I was looking forward to being the mother I had missed. But it wasn’t just about me as a mom or Dean as a dad. It was important for us to be parents together. My father had always doted on me, often in ways that I later realized were damaging to the family. One of my earliest memories is being at my dad’s bedside when I was about five. He wasn’t feeling well, and I was visiting him. He told me I was his angel and that he loved me more than anything in the whole world. I asked, “What about Mommy?” And he replied, “No, I love you the most. I love you more than Mommy.” When he said that, I looked up and saw that my mother was standing in the doorway. From the look on her face I knew that what he’d said was wrong, but I was too young to have any idea why. Now I think that sort of comment set the tone for my relationship with my mother.
His ranking of us in the hierarchy of his love wasn’t the only problem. When I showed my dad my schoolwork, it was like I invented Wite-Out. I could do no wrong. But his response was so over the top that, comparatively, my mom’s reaction was never enough.
My whole life I always blamed her for our relationship. Now I know that he fanned the flame. He set her up to fail. As I got older, my mother tried to explain some of this to me. She told me that he made her the bad cop. He’d tell her not to let me do something. She’d tell me no. Then I’d go to him and beg, and he’d say yes. He villainized her.
My mother reached out first. Some time after the crazy, grief-laden, anger-filled mess that played out in the tabloids, my mother sent me an e-mail. It was a really nice e-mail saying that she knew I was pregnant and I was going through one of the most special moments of my life right now. She said she would always love me. She wanted to be a part of this time in my life and would like to get together. The end said, I love you. It was a heartfelt e-mail, and it filled me with hope.
At the time she e-mailed, I’d just found out that she and Mark had broken up. I was sure it wasn’t a coincidence. It was easier for him when we didn’t get along. Before writing back, I took the time to think carefully. I certainly didn’t like all the drama and conflict, but I also felt very calm and happy in my life. Was I ready to reopen that door? Wouldn’t it just happen all over again? This was our pattern: She hurt me; I backed away; she acted nice; I started to think she’d changed; we got close again; I got hurt again; and so on like that. At what point do you decide a relationship is just plain bad for you? But soon I’d be having a baby. I wanted my mom to see me pregnant. I wanted her to be part of the baby’s life. I craved her love and influence. That overpowered the reality of our relationship.
Dean and I talked about it. Together, we decided that I’d e-mail her back. But I had to do so knowing that I’d have to accept her for everything she was and everything she wasn’t. Taking her back on my terms? We knew that wasn’t an option. I wrote back thanking her and telling her how much her note meant to me. We were up in Fallbrook. We’d just remodeled our inn and were about to welcome our first guests. It was such a joyful, crazy time in my life. I was nine months’ pregnant, blissfully happy with my husband, and about to be a mom. I suggested that we meet the next time I was back in L.A. I didn’t want to dredge up all the bad stuff to get to the good stuff. But I knew we had to hash some of it out. How else could we move forward?
But our plans to meet were interrupted. Liam made an early arrival.
We hadn’t quite finished shooting the first season of Inn Love when my water broke. It was the middle of the night. I woke Dean up and showed him the sheets. He said, “Yeah, seems like it.” As we drove to the hospital I couldn’t stop wondering what our son was doing in there without my amniotic fluid. I figured he was flopping around like a fish out of water, slowly dying. Okay, so I wasn’t the most calm, optimistic mother-to-be.
To me pain was part of the childbirth experience. I didn’t want to be the kind of person who said, Oh, yeah, I got my epidural. Never felt a contraction. But after hours at the hospital I texted Jenny to say, You didn’t tell me contractions hurt this bad! Bring on the painkillers. Meanwhile, Jenny was texting me to ask, What are you going to do about your mother? Did I want her at the hospital for the birth? We still hadn’t seen each other or talked about anything. I had no plan. Jenny offered to leave a message for my mom and brother that I’d gone to the hospital.
At some point Dean slipped out of the labor and delivery room, and talked to my mother. They decided that she’d come to the hospital. He wanted to surprise me, but one of the nurses told me she was on her way. “Don’t leave us alone!” was my first reaction. I texted Jenny and told her she had to come.
For whatever reason, my mom didn’t show up for four hours. Dean was pacing. I was contracting. Jenny and Mehran had arrived and were trying to keep me calm—we were anxiously awaiting the arrival of…my mother. Of course. A big moment in my life and—I know she didn’t plan it that way—it was about her.
And then, at long last, my mother appeared. I started to cry when I saw her. Excluding my father’s funeral, it had really been a year since we’d been in the same room. I realized in that moment that this was exactly what I wanted and needed. I wanted her to see my belly before I gave birth. I wanted my mother to be with me in that moment.
We were waiting for me to dilate when Jenny said to my mother, “Do you know what the baby’s name is?” It was then that I realized my mother hadn’t asked. Mom said, “No, they haven’t told me.” That didn’t sound like a question to me, so I said, “Mom, do you want to know his name? It’s Liam.” There was silence. Everyone looked at one another. Dean jumped in and said, “Liam Aaron McDermott.” There was still no comment.
The only explanation I can offer is that my mother likes to be included. She likes to feel like part of the process. If I’m right, she was upset that she hadn’t been told. If she had to ask, she wasn’t going to ask. At that moment something changed in her face. It was as if she’d remembered what it is about me that offends her.
Oh, right, and about the baby who was struggling to enter this world? He wasn’t responding well to my contractions. His heart rate was dropping, and I had stopped dilating. It eventually became clear that a C-section was in order.
It didn’t seem like I’d been in surgery long when the doctor said, “Thirty more seconds—here he comes!” Then I heard Liam’s first cry. That’s when it all became real to me. Liam became real when I heard his voice. For nine months we’d waited, and I thought about who he would be and what it would be like to have a baby. But as real as it was and felt, I didn’t connect the two until I heard his voice. It took my breath away. I was overwhelmed with love. My whole world changed. Dean said, “Oh my God, he’s gorgeous,” and brought him over so I could see him. I looked down at my baby and said, “Oh, he is. And thank God he has a good nose.”
The next day when my mom came to visit me in the recovery room, a crowd had gathered. Dean’s son was there with Dean’s sister Dale and her husband, Stuart. A couple friends—Jenny, Amy, Sara, and Mehran—were also there. My mother’s cell phone rang. She sat down in a chair in the corner of the room and said into her phone, “I don’t know, there’s all these people here. I might just
call the driver to come pick me up.” All those people were Dean’s family, and my family, and Liam’s family. For all my mixed emotions about my mom, I wanted Dale to think she was great. But nobody in Dean’s family reacted to the comment. Dale just gave her a warm hug. Later she said, “No matter who she is, that’s not who you are. She doesn’t reflect on you.”
That day Mehran reported that during my delivery my mother said, “It’s great that we’ve made up, but she and I have a lot to talk about. That whole So NoTORIous thing really hurt me.” Jenny, always protective, was angry at him for telling me, but Mehran said he’d never keep anything from me. I wasn’t surprised that they were of different opinions. Mehran reveled in the crowd in the hospital room. Jenny thought Dean, Liam, and I needed space. That’s why Jenny and Mehran are such amazing friends to me. They both take care of me. If Mehran is my husband (second to Dean), then Jenny is my mother and sister all in one.
When you have a baby of your own, it makes you realize a lot. The feeling that I had when I first heard Liam’s cry—I can’t help but think that somewhere deep down my mother feels that same way about me. She’s my mother. She loves me. How do we work as mother and daughter? We haven’t figured it out yet. We may never figure it out. We’re not a good fit. We may go back and forth forever. There’s no tidy, perfect bow like the ones that my mother crafts in her gift-wrapping room. But Liam’s birth changed things. It may not have brought us closer, but it connected us.
Back home Dean and I settled into life as new parents. For any parent, I imagine, there are too many amazing moments that can’t really be described. But what I loved the most was when the three of us took a nap together in our bed, with Liam safely tucked between me and Dean. Liam completed us. I’m a mom and a wife, and I’m happy. I have a family. I always wanted to be a mother. But meeting Dean added another element to that desire. Being a mom also meant creating a life that was part me and part Dean. I’d always wanted a baby, but I’d never given much thought to the love that would foster that child. Being a parent with the man I love fulfills me.
When Tori & Dean: Inn Love premiered, it scored the highest ratings with women aged eighteen to forty-nine in Oxygen’s history. Still, I was sure it wouldn’t get picked up. Just watch, I thought. It’s the story of my life. But then Oxygen ordered a second season. Finally.
Even more rewarding was the response people were having to the show. Dean and I put up a page on MySpace, and I started reading the comments and responding to viewers. The biggest response seemed to be people saying, “You’re so normal. You’re just like everyone else. You have a normal relationship. You could be my neighbor.” A friend of mine said shattering my image as a spoiled rich girl was making a mistake. But it meant the world to me. For once in my life what people saw matched up with how I saw myself.
Not long ago Mehran said to me, “Look where you are now. Can you believe it? You’re married. You have a baby.” I knew what he was saying. For a while there it looked pretty unlikely. When I got together with Dean, my friends thought, Here we go again with Tori. Jenny, Suzanne, Sara, Amy, Jennifer—they’ve all now said individually, “Look where you are.” For once my instincts were right. It worked out. Dean is my soul mate. For all the mistakes I know I’ve made, it’s hard to have deep regrets when things turn out so right. It starts to feel like destiny. Dean, Liam, our work, wherever it may lead us, our lives together—it feels safe, protected by the love we have for each other.
Most parents want their kids to lead a better life, growing up with more advantages and opportunities than they had. I was born into a family that seemed to have everything. But I hope if I’ve made anything clear in this book, it’s that perception and reality aren’t always the same. I am who I am because of and in spite of all of those impressions. We are not defined by the family into which we’re born, but the one we choose and create. We are not born, we become. The biggest thing I want for Liam—and any other children Dean and I have—is a family in which he knows it’s okay to talk about stuff. I want to find the right balance between knowing about his life and not being overbearing. I want to find a happy medium. (And when I say “happy medium,” I’m not talking about Mama Lola. For all my respect for her, my maternal instincts compel me to protect Liam from chicken-blood baths and the like.) I want him to know that I care about his day-to-day world. I want him to be happy and feel loved (and not to have a paparazzo camera in his face every time he leaves the house).
My whole life I wanted to be normal. Everybody knows there’s no such thing as normal. There is no black-and-white definition of normal. Normal is subjective. There’s only a messy, inconsistent, silly, hopeful version of how we feel most at home in our own lives. But when I think about what I have now, what I strived to reach my whole life, it’s not the biggest or best or easiest or prettiest or most anything. It’s not the Manor or the laundry closet. Not the multi-million dollar inheritance or the poorhouse. It’s not superstardom or unemployment. It’s family and love and safety. It’s bravery and hope. It’s work and laughter and imperfection. It’s my normal.
Acknowledgments
There’s no awards ceremony music to pull me offstage here, and I want to thank so many family, friends, and colleagues for their love and support, so here I go:
My daddy: I’ll always be a daddy’s girl, and I miss him every day. I hope I continue to make you proud. Nanny, who made me the woman and mom I have become. I miss you so much. Mom, we have our ups and downs, but I’ll always love you. Randy, who was born my little brother but has often guided me as a big brother. Uncle Danny, who has been a second father to me. Jack, I believe there’s no “step” in “son,” and our relationship is a happy testament to that. Aunt Kay, who has always been such a positive and fun influence in my life.
Jenny, my best friend and sister, whose love and support proved to me that family is what you create. Mehi, my gay husband and best friend, we’ve been through bad and amazing times together, and I would go through them all again just to be with you. Amy, Sara, and Jennifer, thanks for being the understanding and caring best friends that you are. We get one another, support one another, and will always be one another’s family. Bill and Scout, whose generosity and friendship mean the world. You are always there for my family, and I can’t picture our lives without you. Geordie, Marcel, and Suzanne, whose humor, loyalty, and honesty make them amazing friends. I cherish our individual friendships with all my heart. Jeremy, whose cynical humor and shared laughter I miss. You got me and I got you. I’ll always hold you in my heart. Kevin and Tammy, thank you for being lifelong friends.
Ruthanne, my friend, who believed in me when most didn’t. Thank you for seeing me through good times and bad times and for taking a personal interest way beyond an agent’s call of duty. Gueran, my hardworking agent and one of my closest friends, without whose perseverance and loyalty this book would not have been possible. You turned it all around for me and my family in many ways. Meghan and Jill, who, like two angels, came into my life and career when I needed them. Thanks for being unbelievable publicists but even better friends. Jamie, my lawyer and friend, thank you for your loyalty, honesty, and continued guidance all these years. Jacob, Lee, Jonathan, Jo, and Carlos, my wonderful agents at UTA, thank you for supporting me and being there for me. Chris and Mike, who brilliantly executed my vision and dream. The best thing I got out of So NoTORIous was gaining you as friends. Jennie, it’s been eighteen years since 90210 started, and we’re still close. Zach and James, with whom in a short period of time I found friendships I hope to maintain forever. Loni, who became a true “Mom” and friend to me. I will cherish forever our talks and your sage advice. Dan, who found this book a home. Patrick, who believed in this book, edited it brilliantly, and remembers more about 90210 than I do. Hilary, without whom this book and my story wouldn’t have been anything. Sometimes fate works out, and it did when I met you. Randy and Fenton, who make “reality” more fun than I ever imagined. Thank you for producing and being as passion
ate about Tori & Dean: Inn Love as I am.
Dr. Jason Rothbart, who brought Liam, my most precious gift, into this world. Dr. Ann Wexler, who made me face my truths. I hope you are proud of how far I’ve come and the person I’ve become. You had a huge part in that. Isabel, my dear Isabel, who has taken loving care of me and my babies for the past fifteen years. We would have been lost without you. Doreen and David, who I know are watching over our family. Thank you, our angels, for bringing your son, Dean, into my life. My Canadian family, who so quickly embraced me. I thank you for giving me what I’ve always wanted—a big, loving, close family. And I love all your hugs! Uncle Nolan, whom I’m glad to have back in my life. Aunt Renate, who has always been such a wonderful mothering figure in my life. Mama Lola, who I believe changed the course of my life and allowed me to find true happiness with Dean. Patsy, who loves my little man so much. You are and always will be family to us.
Mimi La Rue, diva, princess, and fashionista. You’ll always be my number one (fur) baby. Ferris and Chiquita, who both came from Much Love Animal Rescue, quickly stole my heart and found a place in my family. You demonstrate why rescue is so rewarding. Much Love Animal Rescue, all of you are amazing and give so much of yourselves. I am proud to be a part of your amazing organization, which I shamelessly promote: www.muchlove.org.
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