To think single parents are amazing

[Moorcroft]

I’ve just been reading a thread about the fair division of household chores vs full time/part time work for couples. I became a single parent when DC were 9 and 10. After exH left, I had 100% responsibility for 2 DC 50/52 weeks a year (he did manage to take them on holiday, but never had them overnight or for more than a few hours at a time the rest of the year), house and garden maintenance, household admin, chauffeuring DC to activities and facilitating their social life (very rural so no public transport) and a FT job. It was exhausting, but I kept going because there wasn’t another option. Mine are grown up now, but I know there are 1000s of single parents doing the same without anyone to take up the slack.

Oh and thanks OP, I needed this thread this morning x

I'm a single mum to a 4 year old and a 2 year old. Ex asshole was an abusive prick and also slept with someone else in my bed whilst our then 3 week old (now 2 year old) was fighting sepsis in hospital. We split when he was 10 weeks and haven't seen him since January 2017. I do absolutely everything on my own but we survive.

purpletigers

I'm one of those single mothers. I forgot to ask my h if he intended to speak to me like a piece of shit immediately after I'd given birth and favour his computer games over his children.

Oh, and keep me short of money and sleep. Stupid woman that I am.

I don't have much time for the ignorance of anti-single-parent types. They're often cowardly bullies looking for easy targets to kick

^^ This in spades but they may possibly get their come uppance as they do not know what's going to happen to them

I'm a lone parent to DD's 4 and 8 and have been since pregnant with DD2 due to husband dying.

I work full time and we have a great life. I'm a fucking marvel.

It's not just the parenting skills, it's having to do everything with little support and less money and not being able to get out on your own pretty much ever (if like me you have little support from the other parent) and having no one else there to buffer the day to day stress or to be the one picking up the frigging world book day costume.

Shit. There are a LOT of dead beat dads around. How can they be so shitty to their kids?

Respect to the single parents out there.

I have a severely disabled son and know a couple of super women who deal with this alone.

Both myself and my mum are single mums so clearly the kind @purpletigers was referring to...

Mum became a single working mum when dad died at 45 (clearly not rigorous enough in her selection process) leaving her with 3 kids (7,12, 14) and a mortgage.

I became a single mum via ivf so definitely the architect of my own position - which I chose as the alternative to childlessness havng seen a brilliant example of a working single mum.

I have a senior professional role requiring huge commitment but still ensure clubs, childcare etc work.

Yes it's hard (but then many others also have challenges) and the juggling is huge but my son is 9, happy, healthy and looking forward to the school holidays where I will also be looking after his triplet cousins on my own to give DB& DSIL a well deserved break.

We don't need or want medals but a modicum of respect never hurt anyone. We feel the judgement.

I don’t , however, have a lot of sympathy for someone who ends up a single parent because they’ve decided to have a child very quickly into a new relationship tbh

I was a single mum for years and have met many others. I honesty don't know anyone who fits this description! We were all women who'd got married to someone we knew very well, had children, and then things went wrong. Mostly, the husband had been a cheat. With every LTB, a single mother is born.

A lot of the woes of single mothers are very much self inflicted and could be avoided if they were more selective in choosing who they procreated with .

This is such a Daily Mail attitude and it's just not true.

What infuriated me about the attitude towards single mums, is that it's so unfair. Single parents are the ones who STAYED.

Mostly I do admire single parents . I don’t , however, have a lot of sympathy for someone who ends up a single parent because they’ve decided to have a child very quickly into a new relationship tbh . A lot of the woes of single mothers are very much self inflicted and could be avoided if they were more selective in choosing who they procreated with

I actually agree with this to an extent. If you have a kid early in a relationship, chances are you will break up and not have a close bond with EX and EX with kids. So how can we be surprised it’s hard. Same if you go ahead and have a kid when the father has been clear he will not be involved or has been a massive dick.

I guess it sucks to hear but it’s true. Pretty sure parents who cohabit without getting married or before getting married split up at higher rates.

There are a lot of widows on this thread that is also true.

On this site everyone is so so quick to spout LTB yep and that made me a single Mother

Not unreasonable it's a little condescending though.

Before anyone jumps down my neck, I’m not judging single parents. Raising children all by yourself when it’s meant to traditionally be done by two people, makes it twice as hard and I get that.

Klendraa - it makes not a jot of difference.

People approach relationships according to the kind of upbringing they had. If you grew up in a situation where one of your parents was unfaithful or violent it increases the risk of falling into those circumstances yourself considerably.

It's not a conscious choice, it's down to the fact that to the primitive part of the brain what feels familiar feels 'safe' - even where it us in fact extremely unsafe. Until you've had a lot of counselling.

Very few people squeeze in years of therapy between adolescence and their first serious relationship. And by that stage, for most of us, it's too late.

Perhaps the national curriculum should include it as mandatory.

Same if you go ahead and have a kid when the father has been ... a massive dick.

I do fall into this category. He is my biggest regret.

I don’t , however, have a lot of sympathy for someone who ends up a single parent because they’ve decided to have a child very quickly into a new relationship tbh . A lot of the woes of single mothers are very much self inflicted and could be avoided if they were more selective in choosing who they procreated with

I agree far too many don't see children as a huge commitment, both financially and emotionally.

Lots decide it's a good idea to have them whilst dating a man they barely know, at a very early age so no career, with a new partner as they follow the mantra that to be a family you need to add a child by the step parent, to fix a relationship or keep a man etc. It's not hard to work out why it went wrong in a lot of cases.

Courts still very much favour mums, so I don't think it's a case of "we stayed" in a lot of cases but more than man couldn't get much residency.

I admire the widows who are left to deal with it all plus the loss of a spouse as I've seen first hand how hard that is. They are truly lone parents and have to do it all alone unless they enter a new relationship.

And thuse single mothers are successfully divided up into 'derserving' and 'undeserving'. Lovely.

I knew my abusive ex from 16 but my childhood was such that abusive behaviour was seen by my family of origin as normal. So every time i went to my mother for advice pre-kids (a period of 10 years) she would reassure me that it was ok - my dad also treated her that way, and she treated me that way, so it was nothing that couldn't be resolved. I'd put money on not being the only one on this thread who had this happen to them.

I'm 5 years on from him trying to suffocate me (known him 20 years remember) and my mother is still trying to tell me it's understandable/ justifiable/ forgivable/ didn't really happen.

I think those that judge really don't understand what it is to come from a background like that and how it affects/ skews choices.

I am a single mum to 4 I do it all alone as ex is absent (hasn't seen the kids in 2 years) and doesn't pay a penny, I feel very judged irl and looked down on. There's still a stigma to it ime

IceCreamAndCandyfloss — maybe take your judgemental bullshit elsewhere, eh?

So much bullshit being spouted isn't there Red

How about we judge the men for a change as you know sperm is required to procreate

I feel like I live in an alternate universe to some posters.

I can think of eight lone parents whom I know reasonably well, across three generations of family and friends, including myself. Two were widowed, one divorced ex for alcoholism, another for gambling, and two for domestic violence which hospitalised them. One was a man whose wife left him for someone else and abandoned children and house completely at the same time. The final couple simply divorced for their own reasons and the mother got sole term time residence because the father works overseas much of the time and can't provide a stable UK home.

The alcoholic, gambler and unfaithful wife all had ample opportunities to build a relationship with their kids but chose to walk away.

My experience is that the parents who stay are often a much softer, safer and easier target for critics than dysfunctional or violent parents who drop out of their children's lives. It would be harder and more dangerous to challenge and criticise the latter.

My ex gets to walk around pretending he has no children . He actively tells people he doesn't have children so he doesn't get any judgement.

I know people have been saying for a while that there are more people with shitty Daily Mail attitudes on mumsnet than there used to be, but I'm suddenly noticing a lot more in the last week. It's a shame.

Being a parent whether alone or with a partner is a challenging task and those who do it well should be quietly proud of themselves. The key is quietly. Publicly proclaiming oneself praiseworthy or some kind of hero is just cringeworthy. As challenging as it might be, millions of people manage it so it's hardly an achievement worthy of public recognition.