Individuals become the only parents for different reasons. Death, abandonment, and incarceration may cause this to happen. Other times single men and women choose to become parents through pregnancy, adoption, the use of a surrogate, or intrauterine insemination. There are other instances when biological relatives like grandparents and older siblings become only parents as well.
I get it and understand because I have a backstory.
I became a single and only parent by choice. My decision came when I decided to adopt my daughter when she was two months old. At the time that I decided to become an only parent, I was a successful school administrator and university adjunct professor. My desire to enrich the life of an orphaned child and my desire to become a mother led me to the path of parenting. Reflecting on my life, I can honestly say that being the mother of my 16-year-old daughter has been the greatest joy of my life. Nothing that I have ever experienced that I classify as wonderful has compared to the blessing of being a mother.
Who We Are
To know us is to appreciate us.
We are mothers, fathers, grandparents, and other family members. Our gender is female, male, and non-binary. And our gender identity is uniquely ours. He, she, you, me, we, us, I, it, them, him, her, them, his, their, our, its, hers, and they are some of the pronouns that describe us. We are the legal guardians of our children.
Age has no bounds with us. We are younger parents, older parents, and parents in-between.
We are not defined by a specific economic disposition or our specific racial composition because we are all of these things.
Our overall description is nondescript because we are exclusively who we are. Creative, frugal, traditional, religious, fun-loving, broken, flamboyant, playful, introspective, loud, poor, whole, resourceful, and well-educated mirrors who we are and so much more.
We are the only parent that our children have. We encompass everything because we do everything alone. And these are among the things that we do:
- provide safety and security in the form of shelter, food, and clothing
- comfort and heal
- teach right from wrong
- motivate and inspire
- educate and instill a love of learning
- build, rebuild, and restore
- plan for tomorrow while embracing today at the same time
- sacrifice
- work hard
- celebrate
- laugh and cry
- have hope, faith, and believe
- grow weary and rejuvenate
Regardless of our individualized state of being or our depth of consciousness about our self-worth, we possess one common thread that makes us the same.
What We Need
As an only parent, it sometimes feels as though we exist alone in the middle of an all-consuming turbulent ocean. The surge of emotion that accompanies this feeling, can make us feel like we are sinking into an abyss of devastation and isolation. All we need during this time is a lifeline.
Sometimes an only parent simply needs help.
Whether as close to us as family or friends or as distant as acquaintances or neighbors, we need the people that surround us in our lives to realize that being the only parent to our children is harder than mere words can express.
No matter how dedicated and capable we are and no matter how we appear to be fine parents who have it all together, a little assistance would matter to us.
Just ask us what we need. Ask us how you can be of help to us. Be willing to be there for us. Offer your time. Be prepared to lend a hand where we need it without expecting to be paid for every little deed you perform. Be available to spend quality time enriching the lives of our children, too, because they benefit from your positive influence.
Don’t forget about us as we parent alone.
If you believe in the African proverb that reads
“it takes a whole village to raise a child”,
meet our exclusive need by helping us.
Thank you for reading this heartfelt story. If you know only parents, be willing to be there for them.
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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.
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From The Good Men Project on Medium
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