Single Motherhood Can Be a Comedy of Disasters

There is a certain glamour to being a single parent; or rather, a perceived glamour. On daytime talk shows such as The Oprah Winfrey Show and The Tyra Banks Show, there have been whole episodes dedicated to talking teenagers as young as thirteen out of having babies, because they think it's like having a Barbie doll, only that talks back. What they forget is that it also cries, pees, poops and refuses to sleep all night... and that's just for starters. I talked to some single parents who acquainted me with how it really is down there in the trenches.

There is a general agreement that having a child is one of the single greatest things a human being can do, and certainly being a parent is one of the most difficult yet rewarding jobs on earth. It can also make one prematurely grey, go completely mad or want to run down the street stark naked, screaming your lungs out. Angeline* is a single parent who had her child while still living with her parents, and attending college at the same time. She had to wake up at 5am to be on the road by 6am so as to arrive at school on time. Also, since the baby also woke up at 5am, hungry and wet, she had to be up anyway to clean and feed; while brushing her teeth, dressing one handed and making sure her books were all packed- there is a reason why women are born multitaskers. God forbid that the baby feels sick at night. Then it's walking up and down rocking the child, trying to get it to keep quiet and stop screaming in her ear. Meanwhile, fielding complaints from the household to keep it down. All she could do is apologise and lie through her teeth that she'll get the baby quiet 'in a minute'. At least if she was living with the father, she could give him a glare should he complain about the noise, and inform him that it's his baby too!

House helps are a nightmare when there is a baby involved. Many won't stay for more than three months at a time, unless one is very lucky. The single parent has it twice as bad; Wanjiku* told us about how she went through six house helps in the space of three months. They seemed to go from bad to worse, with the first eating her out of house and home, so much so that her food budget doubled while the girl was around. Considering that her household was operating on a single income, and babies being the money pits they are in any case, she found that she had to let the help go. No sooner was she out than the neighbours were coming round to congratulate her on getting rid of the house help because apparently she was busy wooing the estate watchman using her food. It is said that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach, and Wanjiku was finding that she paid for the privilege of facilitating others' romance. Of course it would have helped if her neighbours were a bit more forthcoming earlier - might have saved her a lot of money... the next house help managed to top that one by having a miscarriage on her sitting room floor, in front of her bemused child. Poor Wanjiku got a call from her neighbours to get home as soon as she could... and with visions of the house burned down with her child inside she dashed home to find a puddle of blood on her floor and her three year old child sitting on the stoop having a conversation with the doctor who luckily worked next door and had come to the rescue. To add insult to injury, the house help wanted her to pay for the doctor's bill. Clearly, this lady had Wanjiku confused with her husband, who Wanjiku promptly sent her to, urging them to sort their own problems out, she having had quite enough.

Dating and single parenthood don't mix. The logistics alone are mind boggling. The baby is home waiting with bated breath for its parent to come, the boss wants to squeeze every last ounce of productivity from the parent in the meantime; between exhaustion, time deficit and parenting - dating gets left by the wayside. Should the parent by chance come across someone who is willing to put up with all these shenanigans, then there is the problem of how to gel one's relationship with one's child. At one point should one introduce one's boyfriend or girlfriend to one's child? Karen*, who has a ten year old boy, has never introduced him to any of her boyfriends, who in any case never last very long because she can't spend the night over at their places, or stay out all night or hang out during the weekend. Furthermore, she does not like to invite them over because her son is old enough to understand what is going on, and like Caesar's wife, she prefers to appear above reproach. Anna-Lynne* on the other hand, tends to go to the other extreme, leaving her twin children for long periods with the house help. She has been known to disappear for entire weekends, or come home from the club with some random guy who she proceeds to 'host' for the weekend. The children take it all in their stride apparently, but at three years old, the boy still poops in his underwear. It's a delicate balancing act, requiring the skills of a circus acrobat and a seasoned politician to successfully negotiate.

Of course the biggest issue comes about when the child itself wants to know the whereabouts of the other parent. Many times, both parents may be present in the child's life, in that the child has met the other parent with whom he or she does not live, but other times, the other parent is simply completely absent, or sadly, dead. Dealing with this issue is something every aspiring single parent must be ready for. Ajuma's* four year old daughter had her appendix removed and while recuperating, she asked her mother where her father was. Ajuma showed her a photograph of him but the child seemed not to comprehend or connect the face in the photograph to her question. So Ajuma bit the bullet and called him; to his credit, he showed up, if only briefly, to be introduced to his child. From the child's reaction, Ajuma could see how much this meeting meant to her daughter, and decided that if she had to completely tie him to the fencepost, her child's father would be there for his child, as long as the child wanted him. Claire* ran into her seven year old daughter's aunt on the street, and asked her to inform her brother that his child was asking after him. The issue with Claire was that it was she who had chased the man away in the first place. Now she was asking him to come back and see his child. At the time of going to print, he had not yet gone. Unfortunately, the casualty is the child is it not? A big hand of applause to anyone who has successfully brought up a child. Much respect if you did it alone.



Comments

Popular Posts