'I'm basically a single parent in the week'

[sittingonacornflake]

I'm a lone parent of a 15mo and I'm in quite a lot of different Facebook support groups for little ones such as gentle parenting, breastfeeding, travel groups, Food related ones all sorts.

Something I see quite a lot which drives me mad is people posting a query or asking for advice and add in the caveat 'I'm basically a single parent in the week'. Usually because their DH works long hours out of the house. The most recent example of this was someone saying that their DH was out of the house working Monday - Friday 7am -6pm so they were basically a single parent during the week.

I don't comment but AIBU to think this is just SO insensitive and couldn't be further from the truth.

You have a husband. Your child's father comes home every day. If your child is ill and you can't even have chance to make yourself a meal during the day it's ok because your husband will come home and can take over cuddling or whatever so you can get some food and a shower. If you're at the absolute end of your tether with exhaustion and just want 5 minutes to yourself you just have to wait for your husband to come home and you can do this!

Being on your own during the day with kids is exhausting and had work I'm not taking that away from anyone but it's simply nothing at all like being on your own ALL. THE. TIME.

Every single thing is on you - keeping the house clean, laundry done, food in their bellies, stimulating activities, love, everything. There is simply no comparison to someone doing this 24/7 and someone who parents on their own during the day 5 days a week.

I probably am BU. Now I'm typing this out. But a few nights of teething and hardly any sleep i just want to pull my hair out with tiredness and reading these posts just grinds my gears!

Rant over. Be gentle with me. I know I'm BU really. I've got it easier than most (despite that rant making it sound otherwise).

The same sort of people that say they know how I feel being widowed because they are divorced

I had this as a child. My parents are divorced/divorcing i know how you feel. I never see my dad it’s like he’s dead.

People like to empathise using percieved shared experience. That’s all.

I think as single parents we've all been there. I had a 'friend' who told me she knew how it was to be a single parent because her husband was ill all this week and she had to look after her 7 and 13 year old all on her own 'but it is harder for her than for me as she has 2 kids'. I just smile and say nothing.

I am probably guilty of this to an extent. My dh works away 3 nights a week (different nights depending on meetings) and I quote this as one of the reasons I don't work outside the home. If he wasn't around though I realise I would just have to get on with it. Life is definitely easier with me not working. I would find it exhausting going to work and being responsible for all the pick ups, childcare issues and keeping the house going too. So I cant imagine how difficult it must be to have that weight on your shoulders all the time.
I should say I did work when our eldest was a baby until he was 2 and it was fucking hard, if dh was away and ds got sick I had to miss work, my mum had been helping with childcare then my dad was seriously ill and I had to make new arrangements, my work were not very understanding despite me using holiday time to plug gaps for a couple of weeks while I got sorted. It was shit but I did have dh to help when he could and support me emotionally.

A lot of rich, married SAHP who get huge monthly allowances from their ‘absent’ partners say this, but in reality they are probably just as absent for their kids. Never met a rich married SAHP who didn’t have a nanny and didn’t use full wrap around childcare. Many prioritise clubs / kitty parties / socialising to their kids.

Yanbu, they aren’t the same at all

I've never said it because it's incredibly rude, but no relationship has the monopoly on being easy. Some of the other posters have the good point that when people say it, it might be because for them, it is the first step in considering become one - it certainly was for me.

There was an period when I was a sole earner with 3 small DCs and an ill and then severely depressed DH who was not able to manage childcare or do much around the house. I would sprint out of the office at 5, get kids, cook dinner, do bath and bed alone, check in on DH and hear a bit more about how his brain would never recover and the world was going to hell and we should never have had kids, then would do the chores and a couple more hours of work to finish at midnight and start again at 6am. On the weekends I would mostly be by myself with the kids.

My sister with a good relationship with her ex, generous support, tax credits and 3 nights alone per week kept telling me how exhausting her life was as a part time working mum of one 2 year old. Its not always so clear cut.

You are so right!
I'm a single parent to 4, three boys and one 2 year old girl. I work 2 days a week and study full time. I do all the cleaning, cooking, night walking, school runs, extra curricular activities most weekends, and you know the list goes on.
Being a parent to a child when you have a partner is easier. Unfortunately mine were abusive and now I'm doing it alone. One is still involved, but one day a week is nothing compare to all the time. I've never a night where I am child free. If I go out, I still don't come home to no children or a sleep in because I have a partner to share the load. I made a hard decision becoming single. But one for the best.

On this note I don’t agree with parents in a new relationship or marriage describing themselves as a single parent. Single parent to me means living alone. If you have a live in partner who shares bills etc how’s that going solo?

It's sad when women are discussing this and comparisons made over who has it worse and why. Everyone has their own struggles and each situation is different, and I think the big point that's missed is that it's usually men checking out, never engaging in the first place or just ignoring their responsibility (whether they are physically present in the household or not) for children they are 50% responsible for that are causing the issues raised. And the women whether technically the lone adult in the house or not, are the ones keeping it all going.
What still gets to me 15 years on is the stigma that I've always had to deal with, the assumptions made about me and DD because a man decided to ignore his responsibility. I'm made responsible sometimes for his decision, and that's what grinds the most, and I do doubt that women in a relationship, but still shouldering all the responsibility get that side of it. Sometimes it can be the straw that breaks the camels back so to speak and makes it all harder than it needs to be.
I consider myself very lucky that my DD and I have had unwavering support from my DM and DSis, they have picked up the slack when physically I couldn't - like choosing between earnings or attending a school event, a horrible situation to be in - but I'm so grateful that DD had someone to be there for her, didn't stop the guilt for me though, or some of the attitudes I encountered from others about my parenting or commitment to my job, sometimes I just wanted to scream that there's only one of me, and I can't time travel or split myself in half.
It does get better as they get older, but now I'm facing a new dilemma for me, as DD becomes independent, I'm spending more and more time alone, because my whole life has been around her, and as it should, that's changing, but I'm struggling to know where to start to 'reclaim' my life as it were, because I left so much behind. It's a wierd feeling, and sometimes I think it'd be nice to have someone to move on to the next stage with, but I guess as with everything, I'll find a way to adapt.
Some posts I read or ppl I know in RL really make me appreciate what I have because they are struggling so much, and that's not restricted to someone being a single parent or married or in a relationship, it's just their situation in life.
I do understand your frustration OP, but for the people saying it I think it's a way of expressing their situation, for others (and I've experienced this too) it's obviously their way of minimising yours, and that's not right whichever side of the fence you happen to find yourself.

Yanbu. Single parent here and it is so hard. I have 6 DC (complicated reasons) between 9 and 1. They are great kids and I am happy but even when they're all asleep (this happens occasionally) you don't have an off moment. I realise everyone has their own problems but some people need to have a bit of perspective.

Yanbu at all.

I have luckily never been a single parent (my mum was though and while she was on amicable terms with my dad, the financial burden was entirely hers, as were all of the hard bits of parenting).

My dp often works very long hours out of the house (50 hours + a week). So I do the vast vast majority of the parenting and making sure everyone is fed and the house doesn't fall down.

BUT it's still easier than being a single parent because if the shit really hit the fan and he absolutely needed to, he could step in.

He is also adult conversation when dc goes to bed, and financial burden is not mine alone either.

I don't have any stigma (apart from being unmarried but that has never been an issue) and I don't have to split myself a million ways.

And I don't have to deal with the emotional turmoil while keeping it together for the dc on my own.

Some people absolutely need to just get a bit of perspective. It's tough op you have my sympathy

🙄🙄 why be that resentful though? They're struggling... just because others struggle more doesn't invalidate their difficulty. So up yourself.

I don't know how single parents manage, I was on my own with DD for four months while DH was on the other side of the world for that time. She had just turned 5 and was at school, so that made it easier but having to think about everything on your own is hard. To have to do that all the time can't be easy.

You are definitely not being unreasonable. Can't believe they said that.

Yanbu. I was commenting on something about homeschooling and said I wouldn’t be able to do it because I am a lone parent to 4 (fully lone as ex is absent) and a married woman said although she is married she had no support homeschooling her daughter, I thought really are you comparing you married with one child and me a lone parent to 4!

I find threads like this quite irritating as the implication is that single parents always have it harder to the point where someone who isn't a single parent shouldn't even dare make any comparison to these mythical beings as it's so incredibly insulting to actual single parents.

The problem is nobody really knows who does and doesn't qualify as a single parent as there are so many factors that affect how much parenting responsibility a parent assumes that extend beyond whether the parents are still romantically involved. A functional co-parenting setup is in many ways the antithesis of the definition of single parenting however, many of my friends with this kind of arrangement still classify themselves as single parents and who am I to disagree? Conversely some families do basically function with one involved, engaged parent that keeps the show on the road whilst the other brings very little to the table. Do these parents not count as single parents because they still live with the other parent?

I also think another huge factor when raising children is family involvement and someone's wider support network. A single parent with a huge amount of family and friend support is completely different to a single parent who has to do everything on their own. Again, anecdotally I know a few women who are technically single parents but have more help from their own parents than a many partners would provide. I'm talking childcare, financial assistance, practical help etc. For most intents and purposes these women aren't actually "single" parents because they have had people from the wider family step up and undertake much of the role that the other parent would ordinarily do.

Hmmm.

A few years ago under a different username I had my arse handed to me in aibu for saying I felt like a lone parent during the week.

Now I suddenly am a lone parent, and overall my life is better. No more abusive spouse to tiptoe around. Relaxed DC and a chilled atmosphere. I'm sure my situation isn't the same as other people's, but so far being a single parent has been a huge improvement to the quality of my life. I was doing loads on my own anyway, only now I don't have to kowtow to an abusive bastard.

Yanbu I've felt many times I have no idea how I'd cope as a single parent and the days goes out after work till late (thankfully not too often) do feel like a long slog with no break.

I find threads like this quite irritating as the implication is that single parents always have it harder to the point where someone who isn't a single parent shouldn't even dare make any comparison to these mythical beings as it's so incredibly insulting to actual single parents

Why the need for comparison though? There’s so many other ways to suggest you’re struggling.

But then I have an involved ex so apparently am not a single parent.....or not single parent enough?

I get fed up with people who see me constantly in a negative light because of my circumstances. I am not unhappy. My life is hectic. It is not worse than anyone else's life because I am single

This in bucket loads! I’m
A single mum and I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. It’s physically hard work, emotionally hard, but I’m not carrying a dead weight behind me in the shape of some over grown unhouse trained toddler.

Fwiw I used to say ‘I feel like a single parent’ quite a lot, I think I was testing the waters, knew I have a lazy man in tow and wasn’t very happy.

I definitely feel like a single mother at times but not in the most literal sense, as my husband works from 5am to 8pm, only pausing for a bath and supper before starting again, but I KNOW it is not the same, and I would never pretend to imagine carry the load by myself with an absent father.

I know he can pick up the slack when I have really had enough. Having that safety net is not the same as managing single handedly 247.

So hats off to everyone who does it, parenting can be exhausting and doubly so if it is all on you.

If your child is ill and you can't even have chance to make yourself a meal during the day it's ok because your husband will come home and can take over cuddling or whatever so you can get some food and a shower. If you're at the absolute end of your tether with exhaustion and just want 5 minutes to yourself you just have to wait for your husband to come home and you can do this!

This never happens!!! Dh works long hours and returns after kids are sleeping. He would never just come home so I can get a rest or a shower during the week when I was alone (I now have an au pair to help) it was all me and I had to make due. Yes, I get him home during the weekends, but again it’s mainly me doing all the work. He will make pancakes for the kids one morning and take them to play ball in the park (which I’m usually w them). And will watch movie with them or have chats etc. But he does the fun stuff and I do the bathing etc. Some women have dh who are more hands on, but some really do have to do most of it alone during the week. I think you are being a little too sensitive. But yes I understand that having the support of another person during the weekends can make a difference.

It's certainly not a competition about who has it harder or who is single or lone parent enough whatever that means. On the one hand ex sees DC for 30 minutes a week at my house so I have no support from him but OTOH my DPs are amazingly supportive and I get bucket loads more support from them than potentially some women get from their partners.

My point is - why compare it? There is literally no need and parenting alone whilst your DH works long hours to provide an income for the family really, really isn't the same thing as doing the whole thing on your own, for so many reasons. It's hard I'm sure, but it's not remotely the same.

@JacquesHammer
*Why the need for comparison though? There’s so many other ways to suggest you’re struggling.

But then I have an involved ex so apparently am not a single parent.....or not single parent enough?*
Maybe they make the comparison as that is the best way they can think to express how alone they feel? Maybe they feel that they actually carry the whole burden of parenting on their own so it is a fair comparison to make?

I'm not saying it's always a valid comparison but neither are lots of fairly common comparisons that people wheel out. Considering there is disagreement on who actually qualifies as a single parent, it just all seems a bit meaningless anyway and a strange thing to get riled up about.

And I agree I am being too sensitive a week ago when I was getting stretches of 2-3 hours sleep between wake ups this wouldn't have got to me. But today it did.