Helen Batson married a wonderful man, Barry Batson. Before they married, her husband asked her if she could move into his family's building on the West Side of Chicago because his mother was wheelchair bound, and his father needed help with her until he retired. Helen had always lived on the South Side, but she happily agreed, and they spent the first five-plus years of the marriage living on West Adams Street in Chicago.

After Barry's father retired, they moved into a home on the South Side where she still resides, and they had four children. Helen's mother was her primary babysitter, and when Helen would receive her little teaching check, in the early sixties, she always shared it with her mother.

One day, her mother turned to her and gave her the money back and said, "I can't use money, baby." Helen was so busy then that she didn't think about it at the time, but many years later, she did, and it became the subject of her first published book.