Moms. That\u2019s what I\u2019m best known for playing on TV.<\/p>\n
Maybe you\u2019ve seen me as beleaguered stay-at-home mom Debra Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond<\/em> or in my current role as Frankie Heck, a Midwestern car saleswoman and mother of three, on The Middle<\/em>.<\/p>\n In real life I\u2019m a mom too, of four boys! I love my family and I\u2019m grateful to be making my living as an actress\u2014both are huge blessings in my life\u2014but there was a time when I wasn\u2019t sure I\u2019d have either.<\/p>\n It was 1989 and I\u2019d just moved to Los Angeles after a nine-year stretch of trying to make it as an actress in New York. I was 31 years old (that\u2019s ancient in Hollywood) and was renting the cramped back bedroom of my cousin\u2019s girlfriend\u2019s mother\u2019s house\u2014yup, that\u2019s how low I was on the totem pole. I had gotten engaged\u2014my fianc\u00e9, David, was also an actor\u2014and was just barely scraping by, auditioning for every bit part you can imagine.<\/p>\n Back in my hometown, Bay Village, Ohio, most of my friends were married, with families, and had homes and steady jobs. I longed for that. Still, I put acting first. It was what I\u2019d always dreamed of doing, a life plan that was somehow meant for me. My dad, a sportswriter for the Cleveland Plain Dealer<\/em>, and my mom, a homemaker, instilled in my three sisters, my brother and me a strong sense of faith.<\/p>\n We went to church as a family every Sunday. We said grace before meals and read stories from our collection of books on the lives of the saints. God was in everything that we did and we soaked it in. Then, when I was 12, my mother died suddenly of a brain aneurysm. Losing her was the hardest thing I\u2019d ever gone through, but at the same time it cemented my belief in everything I\u2019d been taught. Especially that life is a journey, and it\u2019s short, so we should live for God and do the best we can.<\/p>\n Now, though, eking out a living in Los Angeles, I was starting to doubt that. I mean, I was doing the best I could, and here I was still struggling after years of work. Where was my big break? And how would David and I ever support the family we\u2019d dreamed of if I didn\u2019t get a steady job?<\/p>\n One Sunday, a few weeks after I\u2019d moved, I drove around the city and prayed to God (okay, more like argued) about how I felt. If this is what I\u2019m supposed to be doing, why isn\u2019t there a single door opening? Why, Lord?! What are we doing wrong here?<\/em> There was no answer. No epiphany. Just silence.<\/p>\n Shortly afterward I heard about a mission trip to an orphanage in Mexico through the church we had started going to, First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood. The kids at the orphanage didn\u2019t have a lawn to play on, so volunteers were needed to go down there and lay some sod.<\/p>\n My parents had always taught us to help someone else whenever we were feeling sorry for ourselves\u2026and this was definitely one of those times! I called David and told him about it. \u201cI think this\u2019ll be good for us,\u201d I said. I had to admit, it would also be nice to have a few days when I didn\u2019t have to worry about finding work.<\/p>\n David and I packed up a van full of church members and off we went. A bumpy three-hour ride later, we arrived at the Sparrows Gate Orphanage, a collection of humble stucco buildings run by a couple who introduced themselves as Dean and Alba Tinney. \u201cLet\u2019s get to work, guys!\u201d they said nearly the second we got out of the van.<\/p>\n We were split into groups\u2014one to help repair broken sewage lines and another to dig into the dry ground to prepare it for the sod. It was my first real exposure to hard physical labor and to Third World living. I didn\u2019t speak Spanish and the kids didn\u2019t speak English, so during breaks we played ball together and just plain ran around, laughing. At night, the volunteers slept in little bunkers on cots. There was total technology deprivation\u2014no TV or radio or phone.<\/p>\n When the project was finished, we threw the kids a party to celebrate. I looked at all their bright, shining faces and felt connected to something much bigger than myself. I might have been only 150 miles from Los Angeles but I felt worlds away.<\/p>\n On the drive back I couldn\u2019t stop thinking about the trip. Something, inexplicably, had changed inside me. The feeling of remoteness from daily life, the physical labor and those joyful kids had brought me complete fulfillment\u2026and it was fulfillment in something that had nothing to do with me being a successful actress! In fact, it was the complete opposite. It was about being involved in something that wasn\u2019t about me. And to think, if I hadn\u2019t joined the church, I would\u2019ve missed the trip al\u00adtogether. Maybe God does know what he\u2019s doing after all<\/em>, I thought.<\/p>\n That night, I knelt down in that little back bedroom I called home and I prayed aloud. \u201cOkay, Lord,\u201d I said. \u201cI\u2019m sorry for arguing with you before. You can have this whole acting thing. I\u2019ve been hanging on to it till it has practically become an idol. I will walk away from it if it\u2019s not what you have in store for me. I will do whatever you want me to do, but you have to make it really, really clear.\u201d<\/p>\n As I spoke it hit me that in all my years of praying and going to church, this was the first time that I had relinquished complete control of my life to God.<\/p>\n Not long after, I landed a six-episode stint on thirtysomething<\/em>, a guest appearance on Matlock<\/em>, and more audi\u00adtions than ever before\u2014all without an agent or a manager. And you know what? If I didn\u2019t get a part, I wasn\u2019t devastated. I didn\u2019t torture myself about it. It didn\u2019t seem like the end of the world, because I knew that God had it under control.<\/p>\n Remember how I said I longed for a family too? The following year, 1990, David and I got married. Three years later we had our first son, Sam. Three more boys followed: John, Joseph and Daniel. And then it finally came\u2014my big break on Everybody Loves Raymond<\/em>. I was able to bring the boys to work with me, something I know was a huge blessing from God, since a lot of moms don\u2019t have that option.<\/p>\n