The Strength of a Single Heart

It is often said that parenting is the hardest, most rewarding, and most important job that a person can undertake. All of that has been true for me, but I posit that there is one job even harder: single parenting. I had an opportunity to reflect on my time as a single parent yesterday, and recall just how grueling it was. I also had a moment or two to appreciate how those years helped me tune in to my deepest wells of strength and resilience, and how I learned that I am so much stronger than I ever knew.

From an emotional standpoint, I became a single mom about halfway through my first husband’s illness. I can recall vividly the moment at which I understood that, whether or not he survived the cancer, I was going to be the sole provider and caregiver for our family. The weight of that responsibility was great, and the loneliness profound. Extended family and our beautifully intricate network of friends bustled around us in those last months to make sure that we had a casserole in the freezer, a ride to radiation, or enough string cheese for the kids’ lunches. While I was so touched by everyone’s efforts, there was no way to counter the sense of impending doom. It was a time when we experienced overwhelming generosity and crushing despair from one moment to the next.

After Peter passed, it was the silence that was the most bitter pill to swallow. Much is written in the widowed community about the days that come after the initial shock begins to let up. The dark gives way to normalcy for others while you as the widow(er) are left to your own devices with your broken heart. Everywhere you turn, you are reminded that you once had a partner, and now you do not. The sight of that bowl on the high shelf that he used to reach for you now moves you to tears. The cozy spot by the window where she curled up and read to your children now feels cold and isolating.

As a widowed parent, these triggers aren’t only metaphorical gut punches. They are calls to rise to the occasion when all you want to do is collapse. You can’t just leave the dishes for someone else to do because there is no one else to do them. You can’t take an afternoon off from homework with your kids, or dinner prep (or take out), or getting them to school in the morning, or bath time, or reading stories, paying the electric bill, or, or, or…It’s all on you. The action figures in the toilet. The busted boilers in the dead of winter. Each boo-boo, each load of laundry, every single middle-of-the-night spontaneous expression of the latest school-borne stomach bug on the hallway floor.  It’s all you, baby. And guess who has to get up the next morning on two hours of sleep and do it all again? That’s right, you are the lucky winner!

God forbid one kid has an event at school at the same time as another! On those days I often wished I was an engineer so I could come up with a way to perfect bi-locating. (A note to the entrepreneurial-minded: that technology would make a MINT!)

Businessman being pulled — Image by © CJ Burton/Corbis

Then there are those extra special times that make widowed parenting feel like the vortex of terror. Father’s Day (or Mother’s Day) are among the most brutal. One year I inserted myself  into  a Father’s Day celebration at my twins’ school. Dads in suits to my left, dads in uniforms to my right, dads who I saw often at school and dads who I had never seen before. All the Dads. There I was, smile plastered on, doing my damnedest to fill a void that I could not possibly fill – sticking out like a giant, rather pathetic reminder of our loss. To this day I am not sure if that was the right call. But the alternative was for no one to show up at all, and to my mind that was not an option.

Even the smallest hiccups can feel like battles in an endless war. Yet single parents, widowed or otherwise, have a pretty remarkable ability to tap into their inner superhero and get sh*t done. It’s true that the loneliness was sometimes too much for me to bear, but during those years I also learned how to prioritize in ways I never had before. I figured out how to identify people who were worth our energy, and let go of those who were not a good fit. I stuffed my pride and practiced asking for help. Over time, I discovered that I could  get a helluva a lot accomplished, and that I could push through stuff I never thought myself capable of before. I began to understand what it was to rely on me, and that, with all of the messiness and missteps, I am the kind of person that I would want to hang around. I learned to live with myself and to be content in that life.

My oldest and me on a “date night” a year or so into single parenting.

 Miraculously, Tom and I met only a few short years after Peter’s passing, though it seemed like an eternity while I was in it.  He came into our family as a whirlwind of hope and optimism, poised to team up with us to create the life that we have all dreamed about – a life of safety, stability, and love. Whenever I start edging into aggravation with his idiosyncrasies, or playing my martyr violin to the tune of “I am the only woman in a house of high-octane, chest-thumping, ready-for-action males and all I want is a bathtub and a rom-com,” it doesn’t take long for me to remember how good I have it.  I am in fact ridiculously spoiled.

Those years on my own made me a better partner and a better parent. I know how to stand in my own power, how to assert my needs, and how to advocate for my kids. Single parents get all this because they absolutely must. The buck stops with them. Just as with any parent worth her/his salt, single parents will figure out what they need to do in order to do right by their children, and they do it tirelessly all day. They are their own teammates. They are among the fiercest, most resourceful, most steadfast people out there. At least that has been true in my experience.

When the truck came yesterday to dump an epic amount of mulch in our yard, I was the only one healthy enough (60% of us were struck down by illness this week) or focused enough (hello, ADHD) to get it from the driveway to the garden. That ol’ violin started up again; for a few minutes I let it turn into a Concerto of Pity and Whining (I can’t believe I have to do this all by myself…it’s too hot…my body hurts…why is it always me??? Blah blah blah).

My boy, King of the Mulch Mountain

But I remembered how much harder it used to be. I thought about my own mom who became single in my teen years, and how she made it work despite a, shall we say, less than compliant daughter. I thought about the many single parents who I love and how they are rockin’ it. I remembered that those years without a partner made me strong and capable, and how silly it is to take that for granted. Talk about a first world problem! So I spent the better part of a sunny Saturday communing with the birds and schlepping that pile of dirt, bucket by bucket, into its proper place. Don’t tell my husband, but I actually loved every minute of it.

My years of single parenthood were definitive for my kids and me. While we struggled with fear and anxiety (and often still do), we also knew that no matter what we have each others’ backs. There are so many single parents out there who are going it alone, and who contend with challenges that I cannot even imagine. As difficult as it was for me, there are a multitude of others who are faced with much more than I ever was. Still they get up every morning, tuck their kids in each night, all the while never revealing their shiny iron-clad costumes under their mild mannered work wardrobes. Truly heroic.

Single moms are often a footnote in articles about parenting, and single dads typically don’t even get so much as an asterisk at the bottom of the page. In this season of renewal, reach out to one of these amazing folks. She or he is part of shaping the upcoming generation and equipping it with some serious know-how, grit, and perseverance. Find out ways that you can help her or him, because s/he likely won’t ask. Help him or her to feel seen. If you have the chance, offer a dinner, a trip to the store, a ride to school or activity, or perhaps a friendly cup of coffee after a long day. For me, those small offerings of support were often the difference between hope and despair. Not only will you help make that parent’s day a little better, but you will be example her/his children of kindness and community. And that’s on all of us.