Often when I say I’m a single parent I get met with ‘oh that must be really hard for you’ and ‘doing it all on your own’ well yes, it is hard being a parent on your own, but possibly not why you’d think.

I’d like to say I didn’t set out to be a single parent, I was engaged to who I thought was the man of my dreams and we were starting our family together, but things didn’t work out and here I am. 

Now people often think it’s hard because you have to do all the parenting tasks by yourself, cooking, cleaning, washing up, bedtimes, bath times, mealtimes, but honestly, most mums will say that they end up stuck doing those tasks whilst dad is at work so to be honest in that respect I see it as no different to a ‘normal’ family. Maybe they get an extra bit of help at bath/bedtime, and maybe dad gets up early one day of the weekend to give mum a lie in, I said maybe! But honestly all of those things have now become every day to me, it’s not there that I miss having someone to do this with.

When I have had a rubbish day and Jackson’s kicked off or not eaten the meal I’d slaved over, I sit on the sofa and I’d love to turn to someone else and have a rant, a grumble, have someone to reassure me that dinner was lovely, or that it sounds like Jackson was just in a mood today and you’re not a rubbish mum because he kicked off. 

When we go out somewhere to have someone to share those moments with, when Jackson squeals at a seagull or runs along a beach, kisses a goat or jumps into my arms, I see it all alone, I can’t look to someone else with that ‘oh wow did he just do that’ look because there’s no one there and out of all of this, the loneliness and the long days, that’s the bit that sucks the most, that I don’t have someone to marvel at (and grumble about) this little human with me.