Active discussions

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

Please or to access all these features

Talk
Lone parents

Use our Single Parent forum to speak to other parents raising a child alone.

Original poster

Single mothers... well done for not being in jail ;)

35 replies

meltedchocolate · 26/01/2010 22:24

Chatting to someone, say I need to go to bed because I will be sleep deprived. Their response..

'At least your not in jail.'

'Haha, yeah..'
'Wait hang on, what?'

'Well most single mums I know in your area are stabbing people or in jail..' (I live in a quiet, nice area)

Then i think... what single mums does this person know HERE? probably barely any, so probably more of an attack if you ask me... He has never even seen me with my son!

Why do we get such bad press?? The only other single mum I know of from around here is lovely and wonderful with her kids.

So we do things slightly differently?? We have to! There is only one of us to do it all! It is so much harder with only one it is hard to desribe!

I don't get it... I really don't. Becoming a single parent made no difference to me in the sense that I still have the same love, care and responsibilities to my son that I had before.. the only thing it changes is that I am doing it ALL myself! Why does that mean I am going to become a nut and end in jail or be a terrible parent? I don't want to sound up my own backside but I KNOW I am a great mother! I will not allow my child to become a thug as it seems is expected of me.. He will have discipline and morals/ prnciples as well as a fun childhood I hope. Why do some people try to make a job that is already so much harder even harder than that?!

as you were..

OP posts:
Are your children’s vaccines up to date?
Set a reminder
justsue · 26/01/2010 22:27

Well I have been a single parent for 15 years have DD1 OF 24 years and a DD2 of 16 years and have never been in jail, would never want to, have worked to support them and they are stable thank you very much

Original poster
meltedchocolate · 26/01/2010 22:29

You go justsue!

Sorry I hadn't realise the other 'stigma' thread was there before posting

OP posts:
GypsyMoth · 26/01/2010 22:29

this is not something i have ever encountered....am lone parent of 5 and have been for quite a while now. i havent found stigma's or anything.

GypsyMoth · 26/01/2010 22:30

the ex has been to prison since i ran away from him!!! does that count,by association?

elastamum · 26/01/2010 22:31

Poor you!! Perhaps you should have stabbed him with a biro My DS1 was watching the news the other day and looked up and asked 'do you get money from the government to look after us?' He is at a private school and I am a management consultant, but the popular view is that we must be on benefits

LadyBiscuit · 26/01/2010 22:31

I've never been in jail. I'm a very boring single mother

Original poster
meltedchocolate · 26/01/2010 22:33

Tiffany. I have been on my own for 7 -8 months and already have a few times (may be to do with that I am a younger mum too)

I am young yes, and having a child young was perhaps unwise but he is here now and my age makes no difference to me. When I am with my son I am ageless, I am not young, I am a mum. I do everything a 30 year old would, nothing more, nothing less. I do not go out partying or dress up in tarty clothes or anything that I seemed to get automatically labeled with.

OP posts:
Original poster
meltedchocolate · 26/01/2010 22:36

I will give them that fact that I am on benefits but that is becasue my husband walked out on me and his job and so my income. However I DO want and actively look for a job! I dont want to stay on benefits forever! I could think of nothing more boring! I am studying just now too.

OP posts:
justsue · 26/01/2010 22:50

Meltedchocolate: Like I said I have brought my own kids up (no horror story ex had a affair), I did have a nightmare with DDS 24 who acted like he was 4 for a while but they have always had a stable upbringing even if childminders brought them up (thank god on my knees for childminders, I thank god every day that they are not stereotyped and are just normal people. There are single people in this world that are dealt shit to deal with and sometimes the kids suffer. I take no offence at anyone

justsue · 26/01/2010 22:53

and to add I have just been made redundant and have to apply for jobseekers how degrading is that when they say u can have £64.00 per week. I actually said to her what would you like me to do with the £64.00 you are going to give me
rob a bank!!!!!!

itshappenedagain · 26/01/2010 23:20

i think there is a stigma attached to single parents...but would it be differnt if you were with someone who worked away all the time and your kids were fucked up? no!
i think ofr most people it is just what they have heard...and some are very suprised ( pleasantly) that i bring my DS up alone.
just sue...im currently on benifits too, its shite but wont be forever, graduated last july havent been able to find work since!

also (feel free to judge everyone else in the world seems to have done,) but i am pregnant again...only this time to someone i trusted...and yes contraception was used! so i am one of the ones that everyone...even other lone parents will sterotype...sorry rant over.

serajen · 27/01/2010 10:27

Thank goodness for single mums, we should be applauded, we're doing the right thing unlike the dads who have walked away

ShinyAndNew · 27/01/2010 10:32

Dd1's 'father' told me that if I chose to bring up 'that' without him, as opposed to give up everything that is mine and marry the twat or abort (they were my only options apparently) then there would be no need for him to initiate contact as he would meet her later in his professional capacity as a prohibation officer

missorinoco · 27/01/2010 10:45

That (comment made to the OP) has to be one of the most ridiculous comments I have heard. Presumably they should also be glad they are not in jail, as inmates appear to be made up of every aspect of society.

The only good answer I can think of is someone else's "Oh do fuck off".

Don't get the point of stigma to single mums. Presumably comes from the likes of the Daily Mail, makes them feel better about their own unsatisfactory lives to pick holes in someone else's.

Original poster
meltedchocolate · 27/01/2010 12:41

Shiny.... I dont even know what to say... my mouth fell open!

Miss - agreed!

OP posts:
FeelingOld · 27/01/2010 13:32

The only stigma i have come across is the usual one like others have said of you must be on benefits. I just tell them, 'Err actually i work 45 hours a week thank you to support me and my kids with no help from their dad so actually i am quite proud of myself for that'.

That shuts em up!!

But OP as for those comments made to you they are just stupid, all the lone parents i know (not just mums but dads also) are all very normal people who are working damn hard to work and bring up their kids and they are doing a bloody good job!!

Unlikelyamazonian · 27/01/2010 13:36

Maybe they are all stabbing people and in jail because they were so flippin bloody fed up with doing it all on their jacksie with feck all help from the feckless twatty fathers that they finally got bloody angry for an hour and went round 'his' house brandishing a pinny and the paring knife they just used to cut up the millionth apple for 'his' children and to shout 'YOU BLOODY LOSER TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR CHILDREN YOU SELFISH WASTE OF SPACE'....

then went home and made a pasta bake, read Thomas stories and watched Iggle Piggle for an hour, then bathed the dcs, gave them warm milk and made sure their rooms were toasty warm, kissed them night night and sat down with a nice cup of tea, only to find the police on her doorstep and bingo, ten mins later she was banged up in a police cell for harrassment of twat ex or some such?

Unlikelyamazonian · 27/01/2010 13:37

I am on benefits. The main benefit is that the shitbg idiot father is no longer around the make me feel suicidal.

Original poster
meltedchocolate · 27/01/2010 14:23

Yes I am too but that doesnt mean i want to beon them or plan to spounge for the rest of my days

OP posts:
LurcioLovesFrankie · 27/01/2010 14:47

Nope, never been to jail

HanBanan · 28/01/2010 09:39

amazonian your paring knife scenario made me laugh so much I almost weed myself. And I am going to use your 'I am on benefits...' line whenever I can in future. Infact now I'm just waiting, hoping that someone will make a comment.....

Actually I'm not on benefits, I live in Spain (expat land tho, which is like a giant rotting housing estate in the sun full of drunks and the occasional holiday maker) and have no entitlement to them. People like to turn a blind eye out here. Most single parents disappear back to the UK with tail between legs. Shortly, I will probably have to do the same. It's too bloody hard without any benefit support.

People like to look down on us to feel like they are better. We must have something wrong with us if our partners left. But this can happen to anyone....maybe it will happen to them....I do hope so!

And there are so many of us because society today seems to find it acceptable that blokes and the occasional woman can be so bone idle and lazy that they can easily walk away from their family.

They don't have to look after their kids because they know either the single mum/dad is going to work themselves to the bone through pride or they are going to get a little help from the tax payer (because they are human and need it) to compensate for their ex absent parent's sheer utter laziness. But they don't get stigmatised in the press, do they?

mummygirl · 29/01/2010 14:12

I don't get it OP, what is it you're confused about? It's common knowedge that if a woman has a child out of wedlock or is later separated, the criminal inside her awakens and she goes round at night stabbing people...

Unlikelyamazonian · 29/01/2010 17:19

I often get up in the night and go round stabbing potatoes with small baby-sock-darning pins.

Does this count? Should I be in prison?

I think they have Wii in prison cells now

Mongolia · 29/01/2010 17:47

Oh well, I had a very married woman complaining because I invited another child. along as hers, to play with DS.

Her: You should have informed me you were planning to invite that child along!
Me:?
Her: A child who doesn't know how to relate as he is a SINGLE child.
Me: So is DS
Her: A child without a father!
Me: He has a father
Her: I mean a child without a father presence
Me: what are we getting at?
Her: His mother is a SINGLE mum!
Me: S o a m I

Blardy woman, nasty and bitchy as they could be, but the worst part is the one she doesn't realise, her children's father is mostly away so the kids have no father presence anyway. And to be honest, IMO not much about a mother either, as she spends long periods away of the country as well... I think DS is considerably luckier with his single mum than her children with their absent parents.

Unlikelyamazonian · 29/01/2010 18:24

What size small knife for bananas frying pan did you use?

Are you in prison?

Do they have Wii as in my dreams?