Single Mom's Are Not A Stain

Moments ago, I got off the phone with my son. It was a difficult phone call, to be sure, and I was crying. 

I didn't cry to make him feel bad or upset him. I was crying because nearly 23 years of pent up hurt, anxiety and shame were exposed.

He had messaged me to ask if I had done the proud mom bit when he was born. I tried to compose a message a few times in response but was having trouble finding the words. 

So I called him.

His distant cousin is a single mama with a 3 month old baby. He has been seeing posts about how much she loves her tiny human. The way he framed the question was something along the lines of  "How do I help her so that her kiddo doesn't turn out as fucked up as me?".

Ouch.

When I gave life to my son, I was alone. I had physical support, but zero consistent emotional support.

Women that make a choice to parent a child that they helped create, no matter the circumstances of the child's creation, are belittled, judged, shamed, ridiculed, laughed at, dragged through the mud, gossiped about. All of the negativity that can be mustered is shoved at her without much thought to how it will affect her moving forward.

I asked my son to consider the following...

How is it the B&L and J&A feel so compelled to judge me when not a single one of them have had to face parenting on their own? Truly alone, no emotional support, no cheering section that most couples get, nothing.

Being a single mother is HARD!!! We often do not have the skills to better our situation be it from experience or school or whatever. So we have to utilize the welfare system. Which adds to judging and shaming, causing us to doubt ourselves and our abilities even further.

We become responsible for providing for a tiny human, but lack the resources to do so in manner that the general public finds acceptable. So we find our own resources and do the best we can.

Are we perfect? Nope. 

Do we make mistakes? Yep.

Do we keep trying to do better? I did.

And yet, the guidelines have become so strict that we are often left in the middle, making too much money to qualify for assistance, but not enough to actually start improving our circumstances. When I found out I was pregnant with my son, I was working for the family ranch. The insurance company wouldn't add me as pregnancy is a "preexisting" condition. I applied for Medicaid. I made to much money to qualify. So I had to take a pay cut to be eligible for healthcare. 

And that was just the beginning. Over the last 23 years, I have experienced more horrors like this example than most people realize. It feels like we are doomed from the beginning because we "made our bed, now we have to lie in it." 

The shaming and exploitation has been epic at times and I am truly astounded by the memories that are flooding my brain.

A little kindness, a little compassion, a little empathy can make all the difference in the world for a single mama. It lights up our darkness, even if just for a moment. It helps us see a glimpse of something better.

If more people could cast aside the proclivity to judge without having walked those exact steps, the world would become brighter and more manageable for everyone.