We all have days in our lives that we never forget. Milestone moments, for example, like the day we get our license, graduate high school, have a baby or buy our first home. For me, the day I left my marriage is one of those days.

Not a random Friday

I remember the date, the song playing as I drove away, and even what my neighbor was wearing as he mowed his lawn, waving to me as if it were just a regular Friday. To him, it probably was. For me, it was the day I was physically leaving my (soon to be ex) husband, and our matrimonial home, after 8 years of marriage and 20 years together. I was sad, scared, and starting over.  

I had been packing up for weeks. Our life together being compartmentalized, some things staying and some things going. The biggest pieces, the kids, were going with me. On this day, the only thing left to do was wait for the movers and say goodbye.

The TV stand

I remember looking around the empty living room and feeling lonely. I hated the idea of my husband coming home to an empty room, as I had taken the furniture. So, I went down to the basement to bring up the glass TV stand to set up for the new TV I knew he’d get. It had 3 glass shelves and was heavier than what felt like my whole body, but I was adamant about setting it up for him. And I had to do it alone. I didn’t want help. Not from the movers, or from my father. It was heavy, but it was on me to set this stand up.

It took 4 trips to the basement, but I managed to set the stand up, in the corner of the room. I was sweating and aching all over. How I didn’t hurt myself is beyond me, but I needed that stand to be there as if it would somehow fill the void of the kids and I being gone.

Saying Goodbye

I took a moment to myself to say goodbye to each room in the house, a reel of memories flashing before my eyes as I left each room. No music, just silence. Our bedroom was the last room, and I couldn’t help but have one last cry in the ensuite bathroom that had seen so many of my tears before.

While in the bedroom, I left my husband a note, along with a picture of us from when we were younger and his wedding band. It was a goodbye, of sorts.

Helping me move by holding me up

Although we had hired movers, my parents came to help with the move as well. However, their assistance was more emotional than physical. For as long as I live, I will never forget the moment the movers arrived to transport me and all my belongings from my old life to my new one.

I had just left the bedroom and was wiping my face from tears when I heard the moving truck pull up. My oldest son (age 7 at the time) appeared, out of nowhere, and said ‘Mommy! The movers are here!’. His excitement proved that he really didn’t quite understand what was happening.

I stopped in my tracks, leaned against the hallway wall and lost my breath. My legs decided they could no longer carry my weight, so they started failing me. And I let out a sob so loud, it didn’t sound human.

My Dad, who also seemed to come out of nowhere, literally held me up, body and bones. He was my legs for me that day. I could hear his voice reassuring me that things would be ok, but the words weren’t resonating. He was my rock at that moment, because physically and mentally, I couldn’t move. I was empty. I felt like the tv stand.

That moment with my father was very symbolic. He was doing what a parent does, protecting me, helping me and carrying me through a very hard time.

My son saw the whole thing and asked if I was ok. That’s what snapped me out of my fog and brought me back into my own body. I knew I had to be strong for him, like my dad was for me. As hard as it was, and this was only the beginning, I had to stand on my own two feet, so my sons could stand on theirs.

Moving forward

We left that afternoon, set out on a 3-hour drive, back to a place I called ‘home’. A place where family and friends were waiting. Pink sang to me as I pulled out of the driveway with my mother in the passenger seat and the kids in the back. I gripped the steering wheel so tight, adamant not to loosen my grip, out of fear that I’d lose control.

I had the wheel. It was my turn to drive.

Looking back

I wish I could say the road from that day 6 years ago to today wasn’t a rocky one. For me, divorce was very much a grieving process, and you must go through each step to get to the next.  My counsellor explained how I was essentially grieving a living person, a future that was lost.

But I did it. And I can’t help but hear Pink’s words from that dreadful moving day, which now seem rather fitting now, years later, when she says, “I AM HERE”, adding ‘I’ve already seen the bottom, so there’s nothing to fear’.

I have been a single mom for 6 years. My kids were 4.5 and 7 years old when I separated from their father. At that time, I remember thinking “I can’t do this alone”. But here I am.

We all know that it takes a village to raise a family. The reason why a mother is without a village is irrelevant, the fact that she mothers without one makes her a superwoman. She works hard at finding a new village; people to call on for help, because she’ll need it.

Raising kiddos, in general, is universally challenging. Raising kiddos alone is somewhat even more taxing- mentally, emotionally and physically.  There is no sense sugar coating it. It involves stress, pressure and guilt. There’s little time to yourself, making the infamous self-care nearly impossible.

The struggles of single motherhood that I highlight in this blog pertain to single parenting full time, not co-parenting (which I know comes with its challenges, as well). I am just writing from experience as the primary parent, no shared custody.  The 24/7 mama bear.

Oh, the stress! How in the world can I be in two places at once? I can’t, of course, but both my sons play sports so there is often an overlap. While I would hate for one child to miss out on something, sometimes it is unavoidable. The good news is, I have learned to ASK FOR HELP. In my married life, I got used to living hours away (by car or plane) from any type of support system. In doing so, I set an unrealistic expectation of myself to be able to handle everything on my own. It’s not possible. So now, when someone in my village offers to help, I graciously say YES.

I have read about how there is a negative connotation associated with being a single mom. Feelings of being considered underprivileged (compared to married moms), as well as someone struggling to keep it all together appear to be common. Personally, I haven’t experienced any overt judgment (at least to my face), but I can tell you one thing, I am not short on pride when it comes to being a single mom. I play dual roles in my household daily and it is HARD AS HELL. Yet, I show up every single day. The truth is, I have good boys (I don’t mean perfect, I mean good humans) and the BIG part I played in that is not something that can be taken away from me. I own that shit. So yes, judge away.  

This struggle will keep you up at night. It’s the one that truly separates the married moms who often ‘feel like single moms’ to the real single mothers. Life is expensive for everyone, but even with a good income, single mothers often worry and may spend less freely than dual income homes. I would suggest single mama’s start a budget and stick to it, the best they can. Oh, and don’t bother trying to keep up with the Jones’, either.  Instead, worry about teaching your kids the value of money and how they can’t always get something simply because they want it. They’ll be better off for it.

As much as I love my boys’ sweet faces, sometimes I don’t want to see them for a few minutes (or hours) at a time. The truth is, I give myself time outs just for privacy. Thankfully, my kids are of the age now where I can run out for an hour or so and leave them home alone. It feels like FREEDOM, I tell you. I run, not walk, to the car.  Prior to this, I literally couldn’t go to the mailbox without them. I had to ask someone to watch them if I wanted to leave my front door. If I did leave the house without them, I would often have to factor in the cost of a babysitter. Is a $20 drop in Zumba class really worth $40-$50 for 60 minutes. Please circle back to struggle #3.

Mom guilt should be illegal. As if moms don’t have enough to do but feel guilty about everything. When my boys are with their father, I promise myself I will enjoy the break and not feel guilty about it. But it’s easier said than done.  I feel guilty for having fun without them or watching a movie they wanted to see. And then, of course, there are times when I don’t feel guilty (about enjoying my ME time) and then I feel guilty for not feeling guilty? It’s tiring being in our heads.

This sucks, pure and simple. Missing holidays is hard (except for Halloween, Meh). It’s only been the past 3 years where my ex-husband and I started alternating Christmases.  It feels so different to be kid- free during Christmas. There’s no magic, to me anyways. As relaxing and socially freeing as it can feel around the holidays, it hurts my heart. Especially when you see pics of smiling happy kids on social media. You can celebrate on another day of course, but it doesn’t feel the same.

People will tell you you’re ‘lucky’ to get a break from your kids. But not all single mom’s feel lucky when their child is with the other parent. It’s stressful giving up control, and sometimes contact.  You never know a single mom’s situation. While yes, it’s good time to have time to re-charge and to not have to take care of anyone but yourself, but it isn’t without its stress when your children aren’t physically with you.

Being a single mom is a never-ending game of Tag. And you’re always it! I have to keep up on the housework, homework, appointments, sports, work full time, make important decisions, discipline and provide guidance and provide emotional support etc. Oh and try to have a social life (hahaha), incorporate self care and exercise! I also have a boyfriend, so I want to make that relationship a priority as well. Did I mention there is no time to get sick? And when the kids get sick, I have to stay home with them (thank goodness for hybrid work arrangements). It’s a fun game, tag.

Being a single mom can make you feel very isolated and lonely, which takes a toll on your mental well-being. At the end of the day, it’s nice to kick your feet up and talk about how good, or bad, the day was with someone who lived the day along with you. When you don’t have that, it’s tough. Sometimes that connection, as a parent, makes you feel less overwhelmed. However, make your own connections outside of a partner! Reach out to other single mom’s through online single mom groups on Facebook, for example. It’s a place to vent or share exciting news! I promise, you’ll be supported. I personally attended a divorce/separation support group when my separation was fresh. Being around people who can relate to your struggles makes you feel, well, less alone.

Single moms are independent. We have no choice but to be! However, when it comes to some responsibilities, I don’t care to participate (but have no choice). For example, shoveling. I live in Canada, so we get snow pretty much 6 months of the year. Shoveling will be the bane of my existence. When a neighbor comes to help with a snowblower, I cry. Literally. I also buy gift cards as both a thank you and positive reinforcement. The same applies to car maintenance, or toilets. I don’t want anything to do with dealing with this stuff. But I have to be an adult, and I have to pull up my big girl (non-granny) panties and deal with it like the single mama bear that I am. AKA I call my boyfriend, my dad, or my brother (parts of my village). I delegate the tasks like a mother F-ing boss.

Who wants the world to know their personal business? NO ONE (says the blogger who is sharing intimate details of her life with strangers). I had been with my ex-husband for 20 years. More than half my life (at the time of separation). When we separated, and then divorced, removing my wedding ring felt like I was announcing to the world that I was now alone. My marriage had ‘failed’ (more on that thought later). It was a huge adjustment, and I was nervous, maybe even embarrassed. In my mind, it was a ‘single mom’ sign on my back. Then I had to decide if I wanted to keep my married surname or return to my maiden name.

You’ll never know the weight of this decision unless you have to make it. I didn’t want to have a different last name than my kids. I was afraid that they wouldn’t want that either. When entertaining the idea (after my divorce), my youngest son (8 at the time) asked if changing my name would mean I would no longer be his mom. *insert knife directly into my chest*.  Long story short (sort of), I did end up reverting to my maiden name because after all that had happened, that is who I felt I was. I felt it would help me move on, instead of holding on. I still don’t love having a different last name than my kids, but I don’t regret the decision.

For many reasons, I struggle with this movie. Mostly as a divorcee moreso than as a single mom. Watch it, you’ll understand. Bring tissues.

As single mom’s, our love life takes a back seat to our kids. We are also a package deal, so if someone wants to be with me, they must love my children too. But when you feel ready to date, it’s not an easy feat. There are so many implications and so many things to consider. So much so, I will have to write a separate post on it. I have so many dating stories to tell. Stay tuned.

There may be struggles with being a single parent, but there are also rewards. Many of them.  I don’t miss a thing! In fact, I have a front row seat to every moment of my son’s lives. I don’t miss a concert, a ball game, a parent teacher interview, birthday party or doctor’s appointment. They know that more than anyone else on this earth, that I am their biggest fan and always there. I know them the best.

I am, as I said before, a safe place for my boys. Their home. And I wouldn’t change that for the world.

Christmas 2022, I gave my counsellor a pencil for Christmas. While it accompanied a journal, the main part of the gift was a pencil. I know to you it may sound silly, but it was not. In fact, for a short period of time, while adjusting to life after divorce, I walked around with a pencil in my purse. I had no intentions of using it. It was symbolic, as my counsellor had explained. And I needed a constant reminder of that, so I carried it with me.

I remember, a couple of years prior, sitting on her couch, crying. The stereotypical therapy session, right? I owe this woman 20 boxes of tissues, I am sure of it. This session wasn’t long after I separated from my spouse, after 8 years of marriage and 20 years together. I remember saying “this wasn’t my plan for life”. She took out a pencil and said, “Do you know why pencils have erasers?”  I said, “to erase mistakes”. She simply said “No, but plans change” and went on to explain that plans are fluent. We often get a chance for a do over. This was one of those chances.

It made complete sense, and I cried harder. Maybe because at the time I didn’t want things to change because I was so lonely and scared to death. I was coming to terms with my divorce, trying to keep myself together, while caring for my kids, who also felt like they were falling apart.

I’ve always been resistant to change. I never handled it well. While I know that good things can come from change, I’m very much a creature of habit so anything new, anything that disrupts the equilibrium of life, is terrifying in my mind.

Yet there I was, a 37 year old woman who had been with her spouse for literally more than half of her life, in unchartered territory. Alone. Two kids in tow. One income. No house. Broken.

While I don’t like referring to myself as ‘broken’ back then, but when I was unable to get off the bathroom floor from crying, there is no other way to describe how I felt other than broken.  My life, my heart, my family, my emotions, all shattered in pieces on the bathroom floor. No amount of glue could put them back together, I thought. I felt.

Something my counsellor said during that session resonated with me. Broken implies damaged beyond repair. I changed my thinking and saw myself as shattered, but someday my pieces would go back together, just in a different way. I would be slightly different than I was before, but no less beautiful. She said I’d be stronger. I liked that idea.

It’s been 6 years since that session. While I feel there are still pieces that need tighter glue to stay in place, I am back together. Not without scars, flaws or carrying around pieces of myself that still carry the weight of the past so heavily. But I’m in one piece. My counsellor was right……. I am different. I am most definitely stronger. Bathroom floors are strictly for cleaning these days.

I recently discovered a song by Kelly Clarkson called ‘Broken and beautiful’. When I play it, I sing it loud and proud, especially when she says “I know I’m superwoman. I know I’m strong. I know I’ve got this cause I’ve had it all along.  I’m phenomenal. I’m enough. I don’t need you to tell me who to be”.

Kelly sings “I’m broken and it’s beautiful”. However, when I sing it, I say “I’m reconstructed and it’s beautiful’. For some reason, it doesn’t have the same effect. Perhaps that’s why she’s the professional sing/songwriter. I’ll just stick to my blog.

I am a full-time single mom. Which means, I am ‘ON’ 24/7. I do get a break of sorts every month or two when they spend time with their dad. But I’m the primary parent. It’s really fun and not at all exhausting. Ha!

My kiddos recently spent a week with their Dad while I travelled out of town. Where they are with me full time, a week was a long time to be apart. The evening I got home, my oldest son was cuddling me. He was wrapped around me in a hug in his bed, with his head resting on my lap. He said to me ‘you’re so warm’.  I thought he meant my skin, so I touched my hand. It didn’t feel warm to me.

Then he said words that will forever ring in my ears. “You’re like home to me. My safe place. You’re warm’.

It took everything in me not to cry. I simply said ‘awwwww, thank you, love’. But what I wanted to say was ‘thank you’. Thank you, my child, for giving me, your mother, the most beautiful compliment you could have ever given me.

You see, a few years ago, after separating from his Dad, my young son was a hurt, sad and even a little bit angry. For a couple years, we navigated torrential waters. He’d often hurl negative words at me, and while I would try to let them bounce off me, they cut me deep. My counsellor would say that he said these things for one reason only: because he knew that I was his safe place and no matter what he said, I wasn’t going anywhere. It didn’t make it right, and it didn’t make it hurt any less, but knowing why he was saying them, made me love him harder.

So I listened to him lash out. I watched the tantrums. While I could have handled things much differently, many would have, but instead I chose to hold on tight and love him through it.

It worked.

It took some time, but there are no more negative words being spat out of hurt and anger. In fact, today, if he says anything remotely disrespectful to me, he apologizes and hugs me.

That night, on my bed, he finally vocalized accepting what was always right there in front of him all along. Me.

It’s me.

I’m warm.

I’m safe.

When I was younger, I didn’t know what I wanted to be when I grew up. Career wise, adventure wise, or even family wise, I didn’t have it all mapped out. Now here I am, middle aged (ouch, that stings a little), and I still don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.

Twenty-year-old me never would have thought that 42-year-old me would be a divorced, single mother. That, for sure, wasn’t part of the plan. Not on the day I married my high school sweetheart, and not on the days I held my babies in my arms for the first time.

I wasn’t even sure I wanted kids, to be honest. I wasn’t ‘born to be a mom’. Growing up, I didn’t like kids, I hated babysitting, and I most certainly did not want to touch any pregnant bellies to feel any alien baby kicks. Hard pass. Nonetheless, here I am, 3 pregnancies and 2 babies later.  

I never imagined I’d be the ‘1’ in the 1 in 4 women who miscarry statistic.

I most certainly didn’t envision myself suffering from post partem depression. Or be crippled with anxiety, having my own mind turning me into someone I didn’t recognize. How about Premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD) or my most recent diagnosis of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)? As if my mental health needed more salt.

Before I even hit ‘middle age’, my life was very different than what I would have pictured for myself. I found myself introduced to the world of online dating after a 20-year relationship (more on that later), eventually finding a prince among the frogs. Quite literally, I started my life over from the ground up; leaving a small 2 bedroom basement apartment and buying a house for me and my two young sons. #PROUD. Oh and of course, I purchased my own Costco membership! Nothing makes you feel more like an adult than a Costco membership, not even divorce (ha!).

It would be rude of me to forget the physical changes that have accompanied middle age.  Wrinkles, for example, cellulite, perimenopause symptoms, and the inability to lose 5lbs with ease, like I could so many years ago when I wanted to fit into a dress for Friday night (when I could stay awake past 10pm).

Everything changed as I approached middle age. Life was making plans for me, it seemed, whether I liked it or not. Sometimes, I can’t help but feel like I am just along for the ride.

Join me for the ride as I talk about all the things that brought me to where I am today. And where I am going.

Be sure to buckle up. This is a safe place.