Mommy! Watch Me

Captain Diane Diekman, the fourth woman promoted to that high rank in naval aircraft maintenance, considers herself married to the U.S. Navy. Still, for two decades, she has yearned to be a mother. While commanding a Department of Defense contracting agency in Los Angeles, she learns the judicial system sometimes terminates parental rights and makes children available for adoption. At age fifty, she becomes a mother to two little girls. She makes her first parenting mistake almost immediately, and there are more to follow. The sisters, ages five and seven, declare, “We’re going to stay with you forever.” But their past trauma causes tantrums that raise the neighbors’ eyebrows. “Call the cops!” they scream. “She’s murderin’ me!”

What has she gotten herself into?

The expected six-month trial period before finalizing the adoption stretches into a year, and then two. Will Captain Diekman be able to take her daughters to her new duty station in Washington, D.C.? How will she balance her military career with the needs of two little girls?

Mommy! Watch Me is the story of an adoptive mother’s devotion and unconditional love. Told through the eyes of a single parent who learns as she goes, this memoir discloses the struggles of families who adopt young children with traumatic pasts.