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weather is en extra shit for lps

162 replies

Unlikelyamazonian · 08/01/2010 16:34

Snow and ice makes lone parents feel crap about themselves. We have no one to enjoy blitz spirit with, the house is fucking freezing as can't afford to put heating on, no time to build a family fucking snowman. Eevryone else is off being a family with their bloody tin tray sledges and hot muffins.

We lps should get extra tax credits in weather like this just for existing.

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
BitOfFun · 08/01/2010 21:40

Are we reading the same thread, lindsaygii?

FlightAttendant · 08/01/2010 21:41

Lindsay please understand that nothing anyone is saying seems to be making much impact eitehr way. OP isn't interested in hearing anything apart from what she can use toa dd to ehr feeling that the world is against her and i believe she is aware of that on some level.

There is little we can do.

Mutt I agree with your first sentence, sounds like all boundaries completely out the window. I am a bit worried about her and her little boy tbh. I hope they are not on their own completely as if I were in this frame of mind I don't think I would feel safe as a parent.

Would be good if you could somehow reassure us you are both Ok UA

RumourOfAHurricane · 08/01/2010 21:43

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MrsMorgan · 08/01/2010 21:50

UA - Just wanted to say that I totally get where you are coming from.

I learnt a long time ago that you are only allowed to moan about things on here so many times, and then people expect you to shut the fuck up and get on with it like everything is suddenly fine.

Hope you feel a bit brighter soon x

ninah · 08/01/2010 22:15

did the pharmacist man really buy you VC shiney? keen ...

lindsaygii · 08/01/2010 22:15

UA, same from me too, I hope you feel better soon.

Ignore these fools who can't tell the difference between being kind and picking on people when they're down.

Personally, I already hated winter even before spending it stuck indoors on my own with a baby day and night. So it isn't much worse than it already was for me..

What really does my head in is getting up in the middle of the night in the freezing cold. Not enough to actually want a man about the place, but quite a lot!

GypsyMoth · 08/01/2010 22:19

cheer yourself up op,and take a look on the relationships boards......full of tales of straying,bored men....marital harmony
NOT at its best this time of year,too much time stuck in with the missus it seems!!

glad to be a lp.....i truly am!!

RumourOfAHurricane · 08/01/2010 22:21

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ninah · 08/01/2010 22:31

when will you have it? guiltily, with a glamourous successor? for just one of those evenings? Will you think of him as you drink it

bronze · 08/01/2010 22:38

I'm sorry you're feeling crap UA
I'm not a single parent so I hope people don't mind me posting here.
I just wanted to see if I coupe help the OP feel better

I think we have to remember that though some LPs have a shit time of it some don't as with all walks of life.

I was out collecting firewood too today UA did your fingers feel like they were going to snap off? It's fecking freezing and its enough to make anyone a bit down feel that much shitter

bronze · 08/01/2010 22:39

coupe? could

RumourOfAHurricane · 08/01/2010 22:51

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BitOfFun · 08/01/2010 22:53

I hope you didn't re-gift your bloody birthday present Shiney

Somewhere, a lonely pharmacist smells of strawberries...

RumourOfAHurricane · 08/01/2010 22:59

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BitOfFun · 08/01/2010 23:04
Grin
Niceguy2 · 08/01/2010 23:53

Sometimes I really don't understand women. We have a poster who is obviously feeling a bit shit about being alone, something I as a single parent can empathise totally with.

Then along come some non-LP's who start being bitchy and make at best totally insensitive, at worst comments designed to make OP feel worse about herself.

Are you lives really so dull that you have to come to a Lone Parents forum and kick someone when she's down? Or are you so self centred that the thought that you could offend never entered your tiny brains?

For those women, all I can say is that I genuinely hope you don't have to go through the heartache of a divorce, explaining to the kids why daddy doesn't live here anymore. Having to sell the house cos you can no longer afford it and moving the kids into a small terrace or heaven forbid a council house. Or why they can't have the latest toy because mummy has to pay the gas bill this month. Or not being able to afford to buy a bottle of wine, let alone champagne.

At the end of the day, you have a 1/2 chance of splitting up. So in my book no-one can afford to be smug.

JollyPirate · 09/01/2010 08:26

Hello UA

Hope today is better for you. Where do you live? I am in Essex and we have had a real dumping of snow overnight - enough to ensure I won't be driving anywhere today. Has there been much more where you are?

bronze · 09/01/2010 09:20

Niceguy how to generalise. I didnt think I gave the op a bashing at all. When I first opened the post I didnt notice it was in LP as it was in active convos and then when I did I didnt want to read and run as the op seemed so down and that always feels mean to me. I dont know why as she cant tell. and lone parent or not I regularly have to explain things like 'Or why they can't have the latest toy because mummy has to pay the gas bill this month. Or not being able to afford to buy a bottle of wine, let alone champagne.' except we dont have gas and I dont drink wine or champagne

Meglet · 09/01/2010 09:34

uurggh, I am fed up with it too. I love love love the snow but my pre-schoolers hate it and just cry if they go out in it. My garden is pristine as we can't go out in it to play, I can't leave them inside and go out as they will squabble within seconds of me starting to make a snowman. It's pissing me off too . I have an unused sledge in the garage that I want to play on too

My mum has at least been able to look after the children as nursery has been shut so I've managed to walk to the office this week. The car is thick with ice and snow and as its parked away from the house I can't go out there and sort it out and just leave the dc's inside supervised. I'm going to have to get one of my family round so I can spend some time out there cleaning the car, not that it can move in the snow mind you

On the bright side, one of my friends has 2 dc's the same age as mine and they hate the snow too so we're going over there later, its only a 10 min trudge in the snow so the double buggy will get us there.

Meglet · 09/01/2010 09:38

and a hug for UA.

BellsaRinging · 09/01/2010 09:42

Hi UA, hope you're feeling better. Today's the first day here there has been a fair amount of snow overnight (and I've been lucky to escape to work during the week). I totally understand how crap it must be to be in your position. It's very isolating being a single parent sometimes, and when the weather's like this I do think we can suffer from no-one to discuss things with-things like "what do we do", "is it safe to go out", "have we enough food" and so on. It's a real weight to have to make every decision yourself, and there are the added worries because you're even more cut off than you usually are. Can you get out and over to a friend's house? Or the library or somewhere there are other people? Or even to the Dr if you are feeling very bad?
Good luck with it all.

Niceguy2 · 09/01/2010 12:22

Actually Bronze, if you don't want me to generalise then I will say that you are not the problem here.

What got me annoyed was muppets like this lady:

"DH left the house at 6am to get to work. He will not be back til 10pm.

With my two boys I have built a snowman, made hot choc, made chocolate fairy cakes, watched a film, MNetted, cleaned the kitchen. Put the champagne on ice!

today I am an LP and have been all week,

Now, stop being self pitying and make a cake!"

Either she is incredibly stupid or the type that like to make herself feel better by kicking someone whilst they are down. I am the least sensitive of people and am often blunt. But what I do not do is take pleasure from other people's misery.

BitOfFun · 09/01/2010 14:04

That was clunkingly insensitive, I will concede. But that was one poster- damning the whole of mumsnet and the people who have tried to help by jollying the OP along a bit is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

The thing I like about MN is that there is a real variety of styles and approaches. It's a strength, not a weakness, and it doesn't always help people to encourage wallowing anyway. That's just my opinion, but it's as valid an approach as hand-holding, and you get both on here. People, including myself, spent time trying to help, and being dismissed by others who just happen to have a different style of doing things is pretty rude actually.

Unlikelyamazonian · 09/01/2010 15:44

Well I finally got out today. Skidded down the lane heart in mouth. It's a zoo out there. Supermaket shelves nigh on empty of things like bread and milk and massive massive queues for the checkout.

Feel better for re-joining the real world briefly though.

My first post was misconstrued. Again. I think I should stop writing on here because it is always interpreted as me having a bash at LPs.

And it never is.

I suppose each LP is in a different position or at a different stage at dealing with it. So, for instance, Shineon you say you have been an LP on and off for nine years. I have been one for 18 months. You are probably much more settled and happy with it now than I am. I am still struggling with it.

Some LPs have no fiends nearby, some have no family nearby, some have neither nearby, some have both. Some have ex-ps on the scene a lot to help out, others don't, others have grief from ex-ps and erratic visits etc.

Some work some don't, some work full time some part time. I am stating the obvious here I know but being a LP is different for eveyone and just as some married couples struggle more than others, so some LPs definitely have a harder time of it than others.

It is not whingeing. It is a hard and difficult truth. I think I do find it harder than others. What is wrong with getting angry and upset about it all sometimes?

I am sure you will have an answer to flame me with - something to do with my tone or whatever.

But I have found being housebound with a 2 year old very trying -- and frightening actually. I have not been able to go to work so have lost money. I have no family. I have some great friends but my closest and dearest live 100s of miles away. As you know my H abandoned us totally and went abroad and is not in touch at all. He does not pay any maintenance and his family too have cut us off completely and ae nowhee near where we live anyway. Yes, these last two things are good in many respects...I don't have to deal with any shit from any of them. But it would have been better if Ex-h was helping to support us and was in my son's life, had him to stay for some nights etc.

I work five mornings a week cleaning until half two then pick up my son and bring him home. He sleeps, I wake him, make his tea and then we play/watch tv until it is bed-time.

I am no spring chicken and find it all knackering.

I do feel envious of couples and families on the tv news out sledging with their children or making snowmen etc. I get cross and feel crap because I feel I am not giving my son a decent family existence and I feel a terrible loss I suppose because I never wanted my H to run away - let alone run away to have sex with Thai prostitutes.

Ds is nuts about 'men' - he clings onto the childminder's husband and is starting to say 'daddy' and will eventually ask me about him.
I feel angry with my ex H for denying me so many things - a marriage, more children, a father for my son, a happy few years with a longed-for baby before he starts school instead of working all the time to keep a roof over our heads.

I am terrified of breaking a leg as I have no bloody idea who would help look after ds...so I wouldn't go sledging anyway.

I am much more afraid to take risks in my life in case I am unable to take care of him - so afraid of crashing the car, afraid of getting cancer, afraid afraid afraid.

Anger is born out of fear I think. The snow, the bitter cold and being iced in and scared of the heating bill, not being able to work, not having any family to speak to blah blah has made all the wories worse.

I expect and hope that this is normal. I don't think 18 months is that long to be an LP after being with ex-h for 7 years and have him disappear suddenly.

But what the fuck do I know? I will cheer up again and things will seem better again. I have booked a holiday even. But this last week has been ghastly and made me want to be married and dinking bubbly, sledging with my husband and our little boy and coming home to hot muffins.

OP posts:
GypsyMoth · 09/01/2010 15:49

its bloody tough,you have my sympathy. i'm in pretty much same position as you,though i do have a boyfriend. but even he lives and works 50 miles away,so not seen him for soo long.

alot of what you say rings true with me too. i have 5 dc as a lp,but i rely alot on the older ones to help....which they do.

am no spring chicken either!

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