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Single Parents

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Clarissa

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It annoys me when divorced people refer to themselves as single mother/father. We need a way to distinguish between people who are actually raising their children alone (i.e., real single parents) and co-parenting divorcees. “A single father” who takes his kids out every other Sunday is not the same as an actual single father, raising the children alone.

There’s this guy at work who markets himself as “a single father of five”, and everyone feels compassionate, letting him slide on many of his obligations. Then it turns out that the kids haven’t lived with him since the divorce. I’m overjoyed to be able to help anybody raising a child on their own because it’s extremely hard. But I don’t want to be milked for compassion under false pretenses.

19 responses to “Single Parents”

  1. methylethyl Avatar
    methylethyl

    The difficulty is, “single father” = noncustodial parent is the default. Everyone just assumes it. I know this because I know more than one divorced dad with sole custody: truly single fathers. They get out in the dating market and very quickly find that there are quite a lot of women willing to date a “single dad” but once they find out he’s actually a fulltime sole-custody dad: nope. I can’t quite figure out if it’s because the women in question are OK with being a second wife, but not OK with being a stepmom… OR if they see that situation and are thinking longterm strategically: If we have a kid and then divorce, I might not get custody/child support. A mystery. Before all that, I would have thought women would be happier to just not have an ex in the picture. But that is not the case.

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    1. Avatar
      Anonymous

      It might just be that it is difficult to date someone with a kid full time. They have to pick up, be at home and totally available for their kid all the time, which makes going out difficult. With split custody they have days or weeks where they do not have child care responsibilities, so it is a lot easier to plan dates.

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      1. methylethyl Avatar
        methylethyl

        OK. Now explain the sex differential on that.

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        1. Clarissa Avatar
          Clarissa

          Like that story of my close friend whose husband kicked her out because she dared not to abort and he said he never wanted children. Then he picked up a divorcee with six kids and raised them all heroically.

          Liked by 1 person

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        2. Avatar
          Anonymous

          Women have an easier time arranging kid free blocks of time due to their larger social network and have to spend less time and energy on planning dates due to it being the man’s responsibility.

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          1. Clarissa Avatar
            Clarissa

            Yes, but on the other hand men have moms who usually take over the raising of the children in these situations.

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            1. Avatar
              Anonymous

              True but I don’t know any woman who’d like to have that close a relationship to her mother in law.

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              1. methylethyl Avatar
                methylethyl

                And yet, the alternative is a long-term usually acrimonious relationship with the hostile ex. Women seem to universally prefer that.

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              2. Clarissa Avatar
                Clarissa

                It’s really weird. It’s one of those things where I feel an unbridgeable gap between myself and other people.

                Liked by 1 person

              3. methylethyl Avatar
                methylethyl

                I think this must be one of those cognitive dissonance things: it doesn’t make sense because the stated rules do not match the actual rules.

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    2. Clarissa Avatar
      Clarissa

      I don’t get it either. On a simple, practical level, when there is a mother in the picture, what is your role? How do you find your place in the arrangement? You can’t parent the children. Nothing that you say or decide can override what the mother wants, and rightfully so.

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      1. methylethyl Avatar
        methylethyl

        Mysteries of the universe. Men are far more tolerant of parenting other people’s children than women are. Probably some hormonal/evolutionary reason for that.

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        1. methylethyl Avatar
          methylethyl

          ~possibly excepting related children, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

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        2. Clarissa Avatar
          Clarissa

          Yes, if a man is really into a woman, he bonds to her children. It’s weird. I’m female, so I’ll never understand it.

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          1. Avatar
            Anonymous

            I think there is a bit more to it than just that.

            There seems to be a split in generations here for America, and I say America as I don’t want to speak for other nations.

            The Boomers and a fair number of older Gen-X seem to have no issue marrying women who had already been married and divorced. They also seem to be perpetually surprised when they in turn get cheated on and then in turn divorced. (Yes it also happens in the other direction, but I’m focusing on the men in this comment.)

            The younger Gen-X, Millennials, and Gen-Z are very similar to how the Greatest and Silent Generations were. That being if a women has a kid by another man and she is not a widow. She is not worth marrying. Sleeping with yes as unfortunately promiscuity is still rife amongst my nation. But marriage outside of a truly outstanding woman is simply not going to happen.

            Basically what your seeing is that the different generations have different prerogatives in matchmaking choices. You have the now passed Greatest and Silent Generations in which you did not marry a woman who slept around. You have the Boomers and upper Gen-X who soaked in the Abomination that was the Free Love Movement, and to this day still preach such wickedness.

            Then you have the lower Gen-X and Millennials who watched divorce culture rip through the country and said No. Lastly you have Gen-Z who currently only 1/3 are even dating, as they are even more strict. In that if a woman sleeps around she is not fit to date, much less marry.

            Now all that being said, these are general points of view. Obviously a full cohort of a generation has a lot of people who do not exactly fit the mold. Take Boomers for instance. About four of every five of them fit the model of Boomer, but that one in every five are some of the best people you will ever know.

            Half the Millennials are based and want our country and people to prosper. The other half drank the cool-aid and would be perfectly willing to kill the other half because being white is evil.

            And on and on and on.

            So my point of view is this. The vast majority once the Boomers die of American men wouldn’t even consider dating a woman with a child by another man.

            However if a woman really was special, that guy would latch on and do his absolute best. Which is likely what you and Methylethyl have observed.

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            1. Clarissa Avatar
              Clarissa

              I think Millennials are the worst generation, to be honest. Zoomers are so much better. This is, of course, based entirely on my observations in the classroom.

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          2. oldcowboy3 Avatar
            oldcowboy3

            Well, Kid. l am a mere male, and an old one at that. But I suspect that if wives did not expect to automatically get their children, the family home, as well as a significant percent of all other assets, including the husband’s future earnings as alimony and child support, the divorce rate would drop like a f’ing stone. Just my far too many measurements, what do you think ;-D

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            1. Clarissa Avatar
              Clarissa

              On the other hand, my husband picked us up from the airport after a week-long trip to Canada with a huge bouquet of roses. I was the only woman at the airport greeted this way.

              People should put more effort into it.

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              1. oldcowboy3 Avatar
                oldcowboy3

                Well Kid, it always did take two to tangle ;-D

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A conservative literary critic and college professor

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