Single vs Together

There are a lot of things that make being a parent difficult, Wondering if you as a parent are making the correct choices, giving them the right amount of love, teaching them the things they need in order to be functioning people within society, giving the right amount of discipline and teaching them that for every action there is a reaction. These thoughts of doubt may not always be conscious, but at different points throughout a day, or week, or month, or year, at some point you will question whether what you just did or said was correct and will it have benefited or harmed your child. See whether you are in a two parent household or a one parent household we all still have those thoughts. It is not the thoughts themselves that can be crippling, as we all have them and it is a choice whether we make them fleeting or dwell on them, but what is crippling is not having anyone to talk to about it. As a single parent I don't have the luxury of asking a partner what they think of what just happened and how I reacted. There is only me, so if I mess up it's because of me, and only me. Now the silver lining is that if the children need therapy I can blame the father hahahaha but seriously, there is nobody there to bounce ideas off, nobody there for me to get support from, nobody there for me to say "was that too much, not enough, valid, whatever".

Now of course there are loads of things that make me question the decisions I make or look at how I handled a situation and I have spent many nights crying or crying in the shower because I'm tired,like really mentally and physically tired or felt like I took something too far, or didn't do enough, or was that too harsh or not harsh enough. Of course I would love to have shared the responsibility of raising two people with someone, I mean they do say a problem shared is a problem solved. So maybe two brains would have made it easier to raise them and make important decisions together. Now that doesn't mean I think couples should stay together if it is not working, I think two parents can raise a child together and make decisions together without being in a relationship. It is a conscious decision that two people make when they decide to be mature enough to do that. I know it is not easy, but co-parenting is feasible. I mean anything is feasible as long as you work at it and when it comes to being a parent it should never be a choice about whether you turn up for work, you cant opt in and out or request duvet days, this is a 24 hour job with no holidays. The job advertisement should state "ONLY SERIOUS APPLICANTS NEED APPLY" because this is not something anyone should undertake lightly given the magnitude of the task ahead. So just because a relationship between the two parents breaks down does not mean that with the end of the relationship comes an end to parenting. If raising children can be shared and you can support each other then it will not only be somewhat easier but also greatly benefits the child. Maturity is the key and how can we hope to teach our babies how to be mature adults if we are unable to be that example. That decision to co-parent was taken away from me to an extent so I had no choice but to put on my big girl pants and I have to be honest it is hard knowing that you and only you are responsible for every decision and every lesson and every hurt and every joy and every everything.

Please do not misunderstand me, there are huge benefits to being a single parent, I alone get a lot of love, but in return for that unconditional love I have a lot of pain, loneliness, self-doubt, guilt, pressure, need for perfection and criticism.

Being a single parent does not mean that I am both mother and father. Of course I endeavour to provide my children with everything they would have had if they came from a two parent family, but it is physically impossible for me to be two people, all I can do is try my best to provide enough love, discipline, teaching, talking, hugging, shouting, cleaning, tidying, washing, complaining, lessons and everything else that would naturally come from two, in one person. But I am just mum, I don't know what to teach them so that they can be men, I don't know myself. I can only do what is within my capabilities and hope that I have done enough for them to be caring, confident, self-assured, respectful human beings who go out into the world and do their best, just as I have done. But some days I am so tired that I wish there was someone else to share this experience with, you don't know the mental, physical and emotional exhaustion associated with being a parent until you are one, but there are levels to this and it all intensifies when you are alone. I have never had the luxury of saying "Go and ask your dad", and believe me there are times when I wish those five words could have come out of my mouth. Sometimes I used to play a game with the boys and tell them that I had changed my name and would only answer them if they guessed right, it was just a game but it also served another purpose, as cruel as it sounds it was my way of at least having 10 minutes without hearing "Mum, mum, mum".

Undoubtedly, there are rewards for being a parent, the rewards of unlimited amounts of unconditional love may seem even better as a single parent, but at what cost to my children and me???