Who am I any more?

[Oneday]

Hello.
My daughter is 3 and a half. I work only 7 hours a week (currently). No career prior to childbirth as history of illness. Ex pointless and weird choice - (not pointless, clearly, in terms of sperm, but in every other respect). Expectations of career success and 'ordinary middle-class' aspiration. Posh private education, with all people I went to school with married to billionaires. Living in a (quite nice) council house with little one. No longer ill. No great plans as to career etc - never knew what I wanted to do. Now only want to be mildly interested and earn decently at some point.
I'm at a crossroads. I've lost my chutzpah. I don't go out - even if I have something arranged, invariably I cancel. Started the online dating thing, apologetic about my 'station' and bank balance. Couldn't really present myself without wanting to run away and apologise, or risk being construed as an anomaly.
Very lonely.
Drinking too much.
DD fine.
Don't know what to do.
This isn't clinical depression, more circumstance-schtuck. I don't fit social boxes. There are some nice people around here, but from very different backgrounds. Those from similar backgrounds don't live round here. I'm caught and sad and don't know what to do.

Thanks in anticipation. Don't even know what I'm asking for: but have nowhere else to go with this.

[wooga]

Hi Oneday,I don't want you unanswered but someone will be along with good advice-they're really helpful on here.
Do you get to see many people in your job or through your dd?
Can make things easier if adults to talk to.

[wooga]

Don't let your different backgrounds hold you back,decent people aren't bothered about that-friends don't need to have identical lifestyles.

[Oneday]

Wooga - thank you - I know decent people aren't bothered about backgrounds, and I have made friends with some people round here. But there are some things that only someone from a similar place could understand - I'm not at all denigrating anyone from any background. In some ways, (lack of) money is money, but in other ways, they are oceans apart. This is not about class or snobbery, more expectations ingrained through whatever sort of past education and expectation.
Thank you.

[wooga]

I know what you mean about expectations.
Do you see your family,are they around for you?

[Oneday]

My dad and stepmother are 3 hours away (they drive, I don't). Very supportive but with lives full of outrageously successful people. So I'm made to feel like a failure. Mum local but eccentric and selfish and undermining.
So Dad and stepmother 'around for me' but tough given they surround themselves with people (equally) successful, wealthy..blah blah blah. In comparison I am an horrific failure. Apart from breeding this lovely little girl, I've done nothing to my credit. Feel rubbish.

[wooga]

You're definitely not a failure-like you said, you're stuck at the crossroads-need to find where to go from here.
Your little girl is 'lovely'-that's to your credit.

[Oneday]

Sorry, missed your earlier questions. Don't see anyone through work apart from one solitary health visitor manager, really. And with seven hours a week it's hardly going to change my life. Do I look for more badly paid work, sacrificing time with my daughter, given she's in school in a year and a half and the time would be 'more usefully spent' with her, so gaining, potentially, more feelings of self-worth, or hold tight til she's at school, then continue down mind-numbing admin roles as can't think of alternative? Why don't I have more adventure? Why don't I want to become a sky-diving secretary cum personal trainer cum bungee-jumping Miss UK?

[wooga]

Don't compare yourself to the 'successful' people,think about what YOU want for you and your dd.

[wooga]

Also, ref the drinking-I have cut down because I was finding myself wanting more and more and it was making me feel depressed the day after,a vicious circle-easy to do when you're alone.

[Oneday]

Thank you. I just think " it". Then drink. It's not monstrous, but it's escalating. Sadly it's an escapism. Albeit not a 'real' one, or one that'll provide anything but illusion. Hmm. Thank you.

[AMAZINWOMAN]

I feel like this sometimes too. Im not ambitious and have no idea at all what i want to do or be. My kids are the priority-and my only reason for living.

Other people have goals-and mine is just to get through the day

[Oneday]

Amazinwoman - yes - I wish I had no goals. I do just get through the day. But my goals are far and away what is possible, because I don't see what I'm doing as any achievement at all. For that to be the case, I'd have to be the top of strange league tables and career charts: I aimed high, was expected to excel, got ill, expected vegetative state, got not much more. Am confused and isolated and feeling worthless and useless and stuck and a pariah. Most people with my education are earning £100k/annum. I'm so embarrassed and so lacking in self-confidence: everything is a comparison to what other people expected. Achievement prizes every year for 10 years, Oxbridge 'a definite' - I'm on benefits, a single mother....all too hard to contemplate in terms of stereotypes, or exceptions.

[snotbuster]

Could you go back to uni now and do a degree (or MA if you already have a BA)? I find studying fits really well with being a single parent with a little one - you get quite a bit of financial help as a parent and if you or DC are sick you can take a day off without it being a problem. I like being around the younger students and think I'll probably do much better than I would've if I'd studied when I was in my 20s.

I'm sure your family/friends understand that you've been ill and the effect that's had on your life. Sounds like you're being very hard on yourself and thinking that everyone else is judging you too - maybe they're not?

[goingbonkers]

Try to forget about labels and stereotypes, or what other people think you should be doing with your life. Your DD is an achievement in itself.. Be proud you're raising a happy DD all by yourself.

I have a 'nothing' job 16hours a wk but it brings in some money and gets me some adult company for 2 days a week. I don't think at 3.5 (same age as my DD) she will miss out if you worked a few more hours. You will also be entitled to Wking Tax Cred etc so your bank bal may be more healthy. Is she getting her free sessions at a playgroup so she can socialise and you can have some 'me time'? If not, consider it.

I sometimes feel I am the odd one out in my family as sisters did it the 'right' way - got married, a house, some financial stability and then had babies. I got pregnant by a violant maniac and ended up a single mum with no roof over my head!! I understand how it feels to be a disappointment but my DD brings so much happiness to all my family and fortunately they have all been very supportive.

I too have never had a burning ambition to be anything career wise. I am intelligent and have succeeded in all studies I have done but nothing has ever inspired me. I am now looking in to an Open Uni degree, partly to give me something to work towards when DD starts school in sept 09 and partly to earn better money once I qualify. You said you have quals - what degree was it?

And please remember - it's bloody hard work bringing up a child by yourself! Don't punish yourself.

[goingbonkers]

Oh and make sure you do start going out when you get the chance. It will do you the world of good! Get dressed up and have some grown up time - it's important for anyones sanity!!! Good luck! xx

[spicemonster]

It sounds like you're being very hard on yourself. Not everyone who's bright and went to a good school is earning shedloads you know. But I know it can feel like that.

I would focus less (if you can) on what you have achieved, rather than a you that might have been. Can you change your job/increase your hours to do something where you could get more challenge? Or do something where you can meet people who are from a similar background? Museums, galleries?

[Scramble]

At the end of the day you can be what ever you want to be, (well within reason .

I was killing myself trying to get a job that fitted in with school hours then I realised my kids are a full time job and that there is nothing wrong with concentrating on them for now.

I do have a part time job, only a couple of 5 hr shifts a week. I am very lucky that I can pick and choos the shifts i can do, same job is funding a distance learning degree course . So for now that is plenty for me.

I am what I am and I will not apoligise for it. for too long I was living in my now exH's shadow, now I can see his shadow wasn't all that impressive and I if I do well on this course I will have a much better job and life than him if a few years time.

I never went out but my social life is expanding, I think because of my change in attitude, Ok it is mostly through work but that is because I am actually talking to peiple instead of hiding and almost apologising for being there. I have a shift tomorrow and I am looking forward to it. Lots of people to smile at, and a exH to look smug in front of (he is my direct boss).

So and and be remember your DD is something to be so proud of and a full time job regardless.

[littlewoman]

A lot of people on my estate thought I was too posh and wouldn't want to talk to them, at first. It is hard because you think they view you as 'snotty'. A smile is a smile in any language and any accent, though. I just smiled at everybody going and eventually they cracked lol. I hope you manage to overcome your loneliness. Life is too hard on your own.

[littlewoman]

Oh, also, Oneday, you worry too much about what other people think of you. Apologise for your own existence? I very much think not
Get out those 'I am the one and only', 'Search for the hero inside yourself' songs and celebrate the fabulousness of a woman who is raising a child independently, and who has several decades more, before retirement, to fit in a world-changing career. Think BIG ... the world is yours, and everything in it.