To feel like I’ve lost my freedom and spontaneity for the next decade minimum

[overandoveragain26]

I’ve already posted in lone parents but no replies and I’ll be honest - I really need a whinge tonight, nothing else needed [ smile]

I love my children so much but … I want some time away, some proper time away, not a few snatched hours, a full day, preferably a weekend, where I don’t need to worry about dashing back, can explore somewhere new, can wander and be me and soak it all in.

And it isn’t realistic for it to happen. No family to help, it’s a huge massive ask for friends, and I just need to wait until they are old enough to be self sufficient but realistically that’s going to be a decade or more!

OP I absolutely understand you. I have no idea why anyone is giving you a hard time here! Or quibbling with how you feel.

You are a fully lone parent. I have friends in this position (for both bereavement and abandonment reasons) - and it's unbelievably tough.

Of course you are correct you have lost freedom and while many parents in couples are also pretty restricted, they can at least book in the odd weekend away or night off.

So, what I would say in practical terms is rather than focus on what is difficult is look really at whether there is anything you can do about this.

I have a husband who I am happy with so I am not in your position - however I Have SEN child with very high care needs and my husband has to work FT long hours so that I can work little/ part time to care for our child. I didn't choose this and sometimes I deeeply resent my life and what has happened to me.

I also though try to be zen! We all have our burdens - I am not comparing mine to yours, I think yours is bloody tough and as well as your burden you have your grief and loss to bear.

so - huge sympathies.

But - what you could do is small steps to consider what you could build up to in terms of freedom.

Regular playdates -where you often take other kids so that if you ever want a long day out - you can ask another mum to pick your kids up froms chool

Look on Koru Kids or similar - find after school nanny or babysitter.

iuse a babysitter more frequently than you need to build up a relationship?

Find a local mum who is great with kids whose kids are older now and is up for ad hoc childcare

I am not saying it's easy but - sometimes it helps to feel we have some control over our lives even when we have very little.

I cry tears of frustration and sadness at all I have lost because of the caring I have to do but - as I know reading your post everyone has different burdens to bear.

Single parenting is tough, more so when it is a bereavement or not a relief to get rid of the other parent. Sorry for your loss.

Ex couldn't have them solo until they were old enough to get food and drink and behave safely by themselves. You just take them with you and adjust your freedom to include them. It's not the same at all but the best you can do. It's really shit not being able to just pop out but get you all ready.

I hope you find something nice for you.

Firstly, I'm so sorry for your loss, that must be incredibly tough.

I can recall being miffed at the loss of spontaneity. I know you won't be able to imagine this, and it probably won't help you right now, but several years from now you will yearn for these days back in a way that you can't imagine.

I have a daughter who is 28 and she lives in New Zealand, so I never see her. I also have a son who is 29, who lives only half an hour away, but he's always too busy to see me (which I get). I lost my final parent last month, and found videos in his house of me and my children when they were little, and I watch them most nights, drinking too much wine and crying. I would pay THOUSANDS to just be able to go back for one day, to those times. I just didn't appreciate at the time how lovely everything was, because I was too busy to notice. My heart is aching, literally.

Not helpful Op, sorry. Easier days ahead I hope. xx

Child free actually. And when did I tell OP she shouldn’t have had children? I have said that parenting is hard, regardless of your relationship status. You need to improve your reading comprehension.

You can't be spontaneous when you have young children. Life just isn't that way until they are adults probably. Sorry to break that to you. We're all in it. 👍🏼

It’s hardly controversial to suggest parenting is a bloody sight harder doing it alone than it is in a relationship. And more difficult still when you are grieving the loss of your partner/children’s other parent.
A refusal to acknowledge that is just plain weird.

I really will repeat that I am finding a lot of these responses very upsetting. The endless picking at my age is suggesting that I shouldn’t be upset about losing a partner and that therefore my experience of parenting is going to be so much harder and lonelier and more stressful because ‘I had my twenties and thirties’ is just awful. I’m sure people will insist ‘they weren’t saying that’ but it does imply that I shouldn’t even be upset about it.

The peoplewtho think they are ‘just being kind’ - really!?

I stepped away from the thread as it was just awful tbh and I couldn’t believe how callous people were being, still can’t. Suck it up, really?

I agree that some posters on here, just want to ‘kick someone else’, appalling with all that you are going through. I don’t even hope it makes them feel better about themselves, they should be ashamed.

However, some of us do understand and have tried to make helpful suggestions around routine, help, freedoms.

Having been bereaved recently (my son) I am wondering if your feelings are, quite reasonably, a reaction in grief rather than this being about sole parenting.

I have completely lost my ability to be active, I don’t want to be involved in anything. I feel exhausted. I can’t be bothered. Everything is an effort. Some days I want to just hide in the duvet, others I just want to ‘run away’.

Of course, as sole parents we can’t run, hide or step down. But it is ok to recognise the effects of grief.

I get what you mean op and some of the replies have been bizarre. Since you’re a single parent by bereavement there’s not even the possibility that the other parent will at some point step up and help you out (as some fathers are prepared to have them more when they’re a bit older).

It’s really crap for you and I really remember that loss of spontaneity (although not a single parent) and I used to long for the days where needing a pint of milk meant taking just my purse and keys to the shop rather than a huge faff with a pram or a pushchair etc.

feel free to rant away and ignore the unkind replies. Only advice I have is make friends with other single mums ( my H was useless and they were my lifeline and I theirs). And don’t give up on scouts - I used to be a beaver leader and our group would take the whole group (beavers, cubs and scouts) away for a whole week camping. That would give you some guilt free time on your own - even though I know it’s a few years off yet.

Are you talking about my posts? I haven’t said it’s controversial, I’ve said parenting is hard, alone or with a partner. Not sure what you’re arguing about. Where have I not acknowledged this?

Also, OP didn’t mention the father of her children had died until her 4th post and the fact she’s a widow until her 8th post. The context would have been helpful.

@Jackiepumpkinhead parenting is hard, absolutely it is. But you can reasonably expect the odd break when you’re in a couple.

Imagine for a moment I had posted and said ‘I’m so tired, I want a lie in, I want a night off from doing baths and stories, I want to go to another city and explore it one Saturday’ - I wouldn’t get ‘suck it up buttercup’ replies; I’d get ‘where’s the dad, your partner should be stepping up, you should be getting equal amounts of free time.’

Of course, that isn’t a possibility for me and I do think it’s that people are missing - truthfully HOW they are missing it is really bizarre as it’s blindingly obvious, but they are, so rather than ‘Op, that’s really hard, it will get a lot easier though, I promise’ I’ve had ‘oh well, you had your thirties and twenties, it’s hard for us all you know’ sort of replied. And they have been upsetting, tbh, not because I think my situation is somehow unique - more that it’s made me feel I’m making a silly fuss about nothing and although I know that’s not the case, it did feel that way.

I’m sorry to be blunt but anyone replying to this thread with a husband or partner who is alive and present and trying to make out the situations are comparable is attention seeking and ridiculous.

Actually, I clearly said I had already posted in lone parents and I don’t think the reason someone is alone is especially important.

@AtFirstLight thank you. I think as much as parenting can bring joy it can also bring isolation and I am feeling that heavily at the moment.

Thanks too @AnneElliott . to be clear though I haven’t ’given up’ on Scouts, I’m just explaining it isn’t a ticket for a free weekend for a good number of years

I do understand where you’re coming from, OP and hope I didn’t upset you too much. But I do think you would have had more understanding if you’d explained about your full situation in your first post. I had a situation (nothing compared to yours) where I couldn’t be spontaneous, and had to make arrangements to do things, it was incredibly frustrating.

I do sympathise to a certain extent. Only to an extent, because for one I don't share your experiences, and for two, I agree with a PP that you are "letting the perfect be the enemy of the good" to an extent.

My big thing with parenthood is that I can't look forward to anything. It might be compromised by my friends - all mums - having to bail. Or my son being ill. Or ending up in a&e overnight again. So I've lost that joy of anticipation.

But frankly, saying "oh, it's 6h, not 8h, I couldn't enjoy myself in 6h" is cutting off your nose to spite your face.

It's ok to feel as you feel - for a while. But if you don't do anything about it, you will waste years of your life resenting a situation that you can't change. And you won't make the changes that you can control, which is even worse.

@Jackiepumpkinhead - I clearly said I had already posted in Lone Parents. I don’t actually think it matters if a woman (it usually is a woman) is abandoned or widowed in this particular scenario.

If you are telling me you only read my first post, you didn’t notice that I had already posted in Lone Parents and therefore am a lone parent (or that you did notice it but felt that a woman left by a man is deserving of criticism and harsh words) and therefore felt justified in making an unpleasant reply I’m afraid we aren’t going to agree.

But frankly, saying "oh, it's 6h, not 8h, I couldn't enjoy myself in 6h" is cutting off your nose to spite your face

No, @TheNinkyNonkyIsATardis , I haven’t said that, and why you want to twist my words like that I don’t know. But I shall try to explain.

So for example I went to a museum in Leeds once, when pregnant with my ds (and with DH.) I really enjoyed it but due to being heavily pregnant struggled to get round it. Leeds is about two hours from where I live, so even if I can guarantee the traffic is behaving itself (and anyone familiar with the M1 knows this isn’t a given) I get there around 11 and then have a rushed and harried two hours before having to shoot off again. In that instance yes, eight hours would make a difference.

There is a huge different between resenting a situation (I don’t) and feeling sad about a situation and what could have been (I do) but I’m sure you’ll tell me I’m wrong about that too.

I’m sorry for your loss op and it’s only normal you feel sad about rhe change, and sometimes feel overwhelmed or negative. Ir is a hugely devastating thing to happen.

can I ask how long ago your partner passed, it must be relatively recent, so I suspect you’re still grieving and adjusting to your new normality.

I don’t know you, but I strongly suspect you’re doing a wonderful job and with more time you will adjust and life will be good again, your children will bring you so much joy, x

Once you added that, people’s replies changed.

remember you already have had 20 adult years of freedom - that’s more than most on this forum

Yes this is what parenting is unfortunately when your children are small. If you're in your 40s you had decades of freedom before you had children so I think you just have to accept that until they're older, you won't have that kind of freedom

I actually think it is harder for those who have kids a bit later to adapt to the lack of freedom, having had two decades of complete freedom beforehand

It’s not really solely a lone parent problem - most parents lose that spontaneity and freedom when they have kids … I just suck it up, it won’t be forever

Its called parenthood

To be fair you waited till 40 to have kids so you had over 20 years of adult life to be free and spontaneous. You also must have predicted life would be this way for a while, it’s just motherhood for most people

I don’t want to sound harsh, but what did you expect parenting to be? I ask that genuinely, not trying to be snarky. I’m really sorry about the children’s dad but even having two parents, parenting is extremely hard work and exhausting (that was you)

I acknowledged the loss of her children’s father (that was also you; big of you. FYI both your posts were several hours after I explained that we’d suffered a loss.)

What did you think parenting entails if not being responsible for your children

And finally another one from you

I read all your drip feeding posts, and I am still baffled as to why parents/parent are surprised by how hard parenting is

So you read all my posts, the only ‘drip feed’ was it was death rather than abandonment, but you still think that it was OK to say that to me. And you think if I’d said from the start DH had died I wouldn’t have had the above replies except the ones above are all from after this post.

But why would those replies be OK if he’d walked out, or been sentenced to life imprisonment? They wouldn’t be, would they? They’d be just as cruel and callous and unkind.

I have to say there were a lot of very kind posts too and thank you. Unfortunately though you fixate on the horrible ones, it’s like they jump out and claw you somehow.

Well, we evidently differ in what we think is horrible as I’m afraid I do think they are absolutely fucking heartless.

And @Jackiepumpkinhead are you kidding me, empathy? You’ve shown not one shred of empathy, or decency, of kindness. Not one.

I don’t think it matters but you repeated that it did, that had I only explained in my OP, you would have responded differently, except that was clearly untrue as all your responses were a long time after mine.

What I want is for you to find some other thread, tbh. I don’t want to keep engaging here.

Although she’s said she’s bereaved which I think definitely means she needs empathy vs straight talking here. Even without a bereavement it’s ok to have feelings about the huge change of being a parent and then a single parent. But this for her won’t be just another decade.

I said you should have put everything in your first post, not 8 posts down! Threads are fast moving and posters are sometimes replying to other posters, they aren’t always reading the posts before that, or seeing the updates.

I’m not replying to you anymore, there’s lots of ‘horrible’ comments you can reply to.