When I auditioned for the university dance department, I quickly realized one of these things is not like the other.

All the girls there were tall and lean in their black tights, black leotards, and perfect little buns (with no flyways). And there I was, short, muscular, tan tights, bright leotard, and hair just in a ponytail with curly flyways everywhere.

As the audition proceeded, all the girls did their pieces, which were important, meaningful pieces of modern dance.

And then I got up there and did my audition piece, which was a jazz dance to Huey Lewis and the News’ “Hip to Be Square.”

At the end of it, the head of the department looked at me and said, “Wow. We’ve never had one like you before.”

And I thought to myself, Wow. He’s not referring to my music choice. He’s talking about my arm.

You see, I have a prosthetic arm. I’ve always had a prosthetic arm—I was born with part of my left arm missing, and I got my first prosthetic arm when I was three months old. So I’ve always worn it.

And I was under this delusion that it was normal, because I went to school in a cocoon, essentially. I was with the same kids from kindergarten through twelfth grade, so everybody knew me. No one ever really thought about Mary’s having a prosthetic arm.

So when I was at this audition and this man said this to me, I realized, Oh, my gosh. This is how the rest of the world sees me.

At the time of the audition I actually couldn’t even wear my prosthetic arm, because I had been injured about a year before, dancing in high school with my rap group, B-PIE (Bourgeois Posse in Effect).

I was not wearing a prosthesis, which seems like it would have been a big deal. But because I was in this cocoon, I was embraced, and it wasn’t a big deal. To have this man say this to me, it really rocked me back. And I realized I didn’t want people to judge me on that. I wanted them to get to know me. So I decided that summer, before I started the University of Michigan, that I was going to go back to wearing a prosthetic arm.

My parents went through the process with me, and I got a lovely arm from a French doctor that was hand-painted by French artists. They even put in little freckles just to make sure that the arm was Irish to go with the girl. And all that for the bargain basement price of twenty thousand dollars.

But when I got to school, I looked normal. Nobody would see me and right away notice anything different. This was great. It was greatly aided by the fact that I wore long sleeves all the time.

The only trick of it was not letting my roommates know. It’s a little difficult to not have people find out when you live with them, because when you have a prosthesis, you cannot wear it twenty-four hours a day. You must take it off and let your skin breathe, otherwise your skin will break down and bleed and all sorts of bad things happen.

So the way that I got around my roommates’ finding out is that every night I would climb into my bed, pull my covers up tight to my neck, and slip my prosthetic arm off underneath the covers. And then when the sun came up and my eyes opened, the arm went right back on, and I would come out of bed. I did this the whole time, four years. I got through college, and very few people found out. It was great.

Then I moved to Chicago, and I was dancing and living my young professional life. I met a fella, and we decided to get hitched. Like any good bride-to-be, I focused on the most important thing: the dress.

I went dress shopping with my mother, and I quickly discovered which dress was the dress, because when I walked out of the fitting room, my mother started to cry. The only problem with the dress was that it was strapless. This was a little concerning to me, and I didn’t think I could actually wear it.

But my mother said, “You know what? I’m going to get really long gloves made.”

And that’s what she did. She had super-long gloves made that matched the trim of my dress. On the morning of my wedding, they were laid out there in my mother’s bedroom as I was getting all ready to be the bride.

I looked at those gloves.

And I decided not to wear them.

I thought, I am about to spend the day with my family, my friends, with a hundred fifty people who love me. Why should I care?

But then I got to the church. I stood right at the back, and as I looked down, I quickly grabbed my veil from behind me and covered my arm. Even on my wedding day, I had to fight to look normal.

But life continued. My husband and I moved to New York, and I was acting and performing and doing great and getting jobs, and for the most part nobody knew.

Sometimes they would find out after the fact, and I’d be like, Well, you already hired me. Too bad, so sad. You don’t want to be that guy who fires me.

In one particular instance, I was working with a company that is called an integrated company, which means they have able-bodied and disabled actors working together. I was the lead in this play. We were doing a lovely new Off-Broadway play, and the New York Times came to review it. Fantastic! The Times comes, and they love the play. Their only criticism was that it was unfortunate that the lead was played by…an able-bodied actress.

This was my coup de grâce. I had arrived. The New York Times just called me able-bodied! Who was gonna refute them? Not me.

I felt like the king of the world in this moment.

I thought, Now I have proof that everyone sees me as normal.

But then I became a mom. Boy, oh, boy, did this open up a whole new can of worms. Because as I was expecting my child, I had all the crazy thoughts that you have during your pregnancy, through the long ten months (it’s not nine, that’s a lie—it’s ten months).

You think, Will the baby have my eyes? Will the baby have my mother’s great legs? All these things that you really hope your baby will possess.

But then I got to add in things like, Will my baby be embarrassed by me? Will my baby not know what to tell his friends? Will he wish he had another mother?

So I decided, before I had my son, that I was going to appear normal to him, too. And I brought the baby home and was taking care of this little five-pound, ten-ounce guy and trying to do all these things with my prosthesis on.

And it was challenging.

Changing a little baby in a diaper is hard enough, but to have a six-inch piece of metal hanging at the end of your arm that doesn’t rotate or do anything to assist you in changing this squirming baby…Now, I was muddling through, doing everything that I could to look like what moms look like. Two hands, kid, don’t worry about it. It’s all covered!

The thing that I was scared of the most was actually bathing my son, because—little-known fact—you cannot get prosthetics wet. Metal, water, not good. So I’d avoided it.

But after about ten days, my mother very lovingly looked at me and said, “You must bathe this child. He’s filthy.”

So I decided, Okay, I can do this. I can do this.

I prepped the sink area. I had a towel on the floor for any splashes. I had a towel off to the side to wrap the baby in. I had the washcloths, the soap, the shampoo, all right there—hypoallergenic, of course. And then I had the little slant that you put into the sink so that he can lie there comfortably while he’s getting bathed. All I had to do was get the baby in there and bathe him without getting my arm wet.

So I took the baby in my arms, and I placed him in the sink and took off his diaper. And as the water was getting ready, I could see my son starting to get a little anxious. He’d never been through this before, he didn’t know what was happening to him. I slowly moved the faucet over so the water hit him, and he started to get scared, because this was a totally new sensation for him. And I was panicking, because I was trying to hold the baby in place with my hand and at the same time trying to grab the washcloth and soap.

He starts freaking out and crying, and he’s looking to me to help him. The one person that he could trust, the heartbeat he listened to for those ten months, he needed me to say, “It’s okay. You’re okay.”

And he looked at me, and all I was doing was crying. I was freaking out that I couldn’t do this. I couldn’t take care of him because I was so afraid of getting my arm wet and doing it wrong.

And as I looked at my son in that moment, something clicked.

I took off my arm, I threw it on the ground, and I just took care of my son. And we were together, me and my son, discovering our normal. This is how it was going to be for us. Nobody else.

As time went on, I really never wore my arm when I was taking care of him, because everything went a lot better without it. Like, I didn’t have to rest his head on the metal or wood of my arm while I was feeding him.

I wore my arm so little that when he was two years old, we were standing in my kitchen, and I put my arm on, and he turned and looked at me and said, “We going out?”

I know that there will still be more questions. He’s only four now. And there will be times that he might be embarrassed. He might be ashamed. He might not know what to say.

I also know he’ll look at other moms who can do things that I can’t do. You know, like give a high ten. (You will always get a high five from me, kid, a high five.) Or play patty-cake. Or he’ll see other moms hold their kid by their fingers and pick them up with both hands.

I can’t do that.

But maybe one day my son will look at those other moms and go, “Wow. I’ve never seen one like that before.”

---

MARY THERESA ARCHBOLD lives by her family motto: “ ‘Yes’ leads to adventure!” It has taken her down many exciting paths, like when she took a Moth Community Workshop with Larry Rosen, her former sketch-comedy director. That led her to The Moth Mainstage, Radio Hour, podcast, and now book. She’s also told some stories from her life with NPR’s This American Life, Risk!, and her own storytelling podcast, Funny Parents. Other adventures she has said yes to include TV (Law & Order: SVU, Bull), film, Off-Broadway (working with Pulitzer Prize–winning playwrights), and creating her own work. Her duo sketch show, Jazz Hand: Tales of a One-Armed Woman, began at Fringe NYC (Outstanding Actor Award) and eventually got her invited to perform it at the Kennedy Center. Her short dance-comedy film, Jazz Hand, was a finalist in the NBC Shortcuts Festival (Best Actor Award). Her upcoming adventures include a number of projects devoted to dance comedy—the intersection of two of her favorite things. Hands down her favorite adventure is as mom to two wonderful boys who make each day brighter, full of laughter, and who make her heart happy. Find out more at maryarchbold.com.

This story was told on September 24, 2015, at the Players Club in New York City. The theme of the evening was Flip the Switch. Director: Larry Rosen.