define lone parent to me please.

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i'd like some clarification please. conversation n real life. friend says a lone parent is when the parents have eithersplit up, divorced, or one has died. but notif they are living apart for financial reasons.
i think that unless two parentsare there morning and night, at least five days a week, then the parent that is there is a loneparent.
specifically, the example is of a couple who simply dont get on, but are still living together. now he has to go work abroad, whilst she stays in th house with the kids. yes, he will be sending money back to her, but wont be coming to visit particularly often. i think this woman can be called a lone parent. my friend doesnt. who is right?

I belong to a lone parent group and had this discussion with them recently as I wanted clarification as to who the group was open too.

I gave the example of someone I know who has two children with her ex and a new baby with a new partner. Doesn't live with the new partner as such, he lives a couple of houses down the road and she see's him every day and are planning to move in together at some point once the join mortgage he has with his dad (who lives at same address) can be sorted out and his dad can move somewhere else.

For me she will always be lone parent to her older two, but I don't think of her as being a lone parent when it comes to her younger child. But they said she is a lone parent now, but once she moves in with new partner she will no longer be a lone parent to any of the children. They also said they considered her a lone parent to the youngest as she was not living with her partner even though she has all the support from him that a couple living together would have.

I said I didn't think that was how she saw the situation as dad saw his child daily, often they would stay at one or other house all together and she could rely on dad for financial support and to have child whenever she needed him too. They did family things together when he wasn't working at weekends etc, and child was only going to playschool 4 days out of 5 so dad could see more of her on his day off before she starts primary school. The reasons for remaining in separate houses was purely because of financial issues and they were expecting another baby in a couple of months time and planning a future together as a family.

So it is a tricky definition really. Their definition being someone who lives alone and only pays council tax for 1 person living at the residence. I don't entirely agree with it, but finding a better definition which fits most situations is not easy.

I do think there is a big difference between lone parents who are completely alone and get no breaks and their child never sees their other parent, and those who may be separated but children still have regular contact with the other parent (ie co-parenting but separated). Also family support can be invaluable and some parents who might be considered lone parents do not consider themselves as such because of the family support they have. It doesn't have to be the child's parent you live with to be a 'family' rather than a lone parent. It can be a new partner, other family members etc.

Like anything it is impossible to pigeon hole everyone by a simple definition. I consider myself a lone parent. I fall into the category that I live alone, get no support from my son's father, (he never sees him and never has), and get very little practicle help from anyone else. Every single decision, bill and arangement has to be made by myself. No-one else will pick up the pieces is I don't.

One of my biggest concerns at the moment is the fact I don't have a will. I know I should have one but I do not know who I would leave my ds to be cared for by if something happened to me. So that makes it tricky to sort out the details of a will! That brings it home for me just how alone I am.

Gilly

i am a lone parent, i think if you are the only person to make the decisions about your children then you are a lone parent.

I'm a lone parent, in that my dd's father doesn't live with us. He left us alone!! i bring our dd up alone.

I don't think there is one 'catch all' description.

This thread is v interesting.

My dh works away in Africa for 10 weeks then comes home for 2 weeks. For that 10 weeks i feel like a lone parent... I obviously do everything for both dcs. Dh rings everynight to speak to the eldest and helps with advice etc as much as he can, but i make all the decisions.

When he's home for 2 weeks the dcs still look to me for things... ie, walk past dad to ask if they can have some chocolate say.

you can be single without being a single or lone parent. ie you can be a single person with no parnter and Feel single without feeling that your children only have one useful parent.

Whether resident nopn-parents "count" towards not being "lone" rather depends on them I guess.

I'm not sure its very helpful trying to determine a generic definition of a lone parent. Some people feel more lone than others, in exactly the same situation depending on their childrne, their family and friedns their own feelings on the subject etc.

The difference being barnsleybelle that your dh is contributing financially to the household, he does come home even though you say the children look to you for everything practical, he is responsible for a large part of the financial contribution to beinging them up. Plus if anything ever happened to you everyone (including you?) would expect him to come back home and not only have the children, but he would legally be the one they were left with and then he would take on full responsibility for them.

Between you you have 'agreed' to a family situation where one of you takes on most of the every day stuff while the other is away working. I'm afraid I don't regard you as a lone parent, though you may have to deal with many of the aspects of life that a lone parent would and have a better understanding of what being a lone parent entails that's for certain.

I agree with Kew. There are many different constructions of lone parent really. I would have fitted the one in the OP last year, but would certainly not have considered myself as a lone parent. Most ofthe time anyway. Depended on the situation really. And the argument I was trying to make.

gillybean... you are right, dh is the main breadwinner and so for that reason i am not a lone parent.

I really hope noone thinks i regard my situation as the same as a mum who is totally alone. I'm certainly not by the way.. I have it easy compared to many of my friends.

I suppose what i should have said was, that some aspects of my day to day life are similar to those of a lone parent.

A parent with responsibility for the children, including sole financial responsibility, is a lone parent. I don't think you're reallu a lone parent if your husband works away - similarities can be drawn but if you can ring him up and say "My boiler's broken, we need a plumber" and he will pay for it, you aren't a lone parent.

Smugc....Absolutely right. And too, if eldest playing up then dh speaks to him on the phone etc..

I'm not a lone parent.... just alone a lot!!!

colditz says it just how i see it, my kids can't talk to their dad on the phone, i cant ask his advice about the kids or anything else, if anything happens to me the kids have nobody to fall back on.

Liffey - there was no order for maintenance...because I see it as my job to provide financially for my son and my ex, to coin a phrase `bit my arm off' in agreeing to it.

When it came to unimportant stuff like my son have a relationship however...well, there was no agreement whatsoever and I'm about to go to hearing number 5.

I'll probably draw flack for saying this - but I see a single parent like my ex in a very different light to one who's partner has abandoned them and the children. I have little sympathy for people who are single parents by choice and then put their own wishes ahead of their child's right to have two parents.