Why it’s sometimes easier to raise a child alone than with a parent

We grew up listening to fairy tales that usually end with a happy ending, and always with a marriage. Although we are never told what happens after marriage, the feeling we get is that happiness continues forever. But this does not always happen in reality. Not every marriage is a happy one, which is why many people choose to be alone.

O awesome.club knows many stories like the protagonist of today’s post. Most likely, some readers will identify with the story we are about to tell.

My name is Elena, I’m 34 years old, I’m a mother of one daughter and I’m divorced. Not because my husband left me, but because I wanted to.

My mother always told me, “All women must marry at least once.” I believed in her, mainly because my mother is married and because I am the fruit of this relationship.

In my surroundings, a married woman is automatically placed as a successful woman and has the most important thing in life: a husband. Single moms are often given the disrespectful nickname “one-night stand”: a woman who is not able to be with a single man, a woman who has had a child and is not married. In other words, a woman who, for many people, is a disgrace.

As a teenager, I felt quite lost because I didn’t feel like my parents really loved each other or were happy. Children are difficult to deceive. I could see that they were happy, but as close people, as relatives, not as lovers who showed love for each other.

However, when I was 30, I got married. However, the long-awaited satisfaction of being married and having fulfilled a very important stage in my life as a woman, for some reason, did not come true. I felt like I was going the wrong way.

This tortured me so much that a few months after the wedding I started to get depressed. When I look back I realize that nothing made me happy, I was constantly sad, I didn’t care what I looked like, I wanted to cry all the time and I always spent a lot of time looking at the wall, lost in my thoughts. I wondered why I was going through this if I was doing everything “right”.

About 4 years later I decided to get a divorce. Not because I was depressed—I was pretty much over the depression. This happened after the birth of my daughter. I understood that my husband was not ready for the responsibility of caring for a child. Our spheres of action were divided: I was in charge of absolutely all the decisions related to the baby, because “you are the mother, you know what has to be done”. The father’s role was limited to earning money. A rather strange division of roles.

I was tired and my husband insisted he was against nannies. He said that taking care of a child was possible and even easy. The only help I had was when he came home from work, when I took the opportunity to shower and do some housework. He said our daughter needed to grow up with me, so he completely ruled out the option for me to go back to work.

One time, my husband had a business trip and my daughter and I were alone. I suddenly realized that all I had to do was not a problem. For some reason, I felt like I had less work around the house and I wasn’t tired or frustrated doing everything myself. The strange thing was that without him I felt freer.

No, I didn’t take his bags out of the house or throw his clothes out the window. But I asked myself the following question: do I live with him because I love him or for other reasons?

He spent little time with our daughter and I took care of absolutely all the functions. What did I need a husband for? To fix the car? I knew a good mechanic and my husband didn’t take care of it, he was always working. Clean the apartment? Not even before he helped me with the housework. Make the dinner? I didn’t know how to cook. wash clothes? He needed my help to start the machine. Change the toy battery?

Have sex? Honestly, after a few years of marriage the desire changes and often diminishes. When we dive headfirst into routine, no one brings you flowers. Nobody struggles, because the two people are too used to each other. Little by little and discreetly, we distanced ourselves and started to have different interests.

Although the feminist movement is stronger, the world still belongs to men. They have more job opportunities, get promoted faster, and earn more. In some ways, women are seen as less trustworthy, because they take maternity leave or have to go out in the middle of the day to care for their children. In this sense, women are more vulnerable than men.

Therefore, many women marry and have children. However, when I thought about the reasons I was with my husband, I got divorced.

And here I am: a woman alone. Not alone, with my daughter. Nothing changed in the day-to-day activities and I continued to take care of everything. Morally, everything became easier and I stopped needing to get a second opinion. Now my daughter spends days with her father, all according to the law. It is important to note that today they spend more time together than before.

Money? I know how to win. But of course today I have bigger limitations. The only difficulty is that I don’t feel like I can count on a man for help. But of course that help isn’t always—or was—real. Now, I rely only on myself. It doesn’t give me peace of mind, but I simply had to learn to deal with this new situation.

To society I am a single mother. But not as a woman who hasn’t been able to keep her husband at home, but as a wolf who just doesn’t fit the herd’s laws.

People who know me little look at me with pity. But I don’t want pity; the choice was mine. You don’t have to give me your children’s old clothes, I have money to buy everything necessary for my daughter.

Patriarchy is changing and may be heading towards its deflation. Now, society can no longer ignore, let alone humiliate, a single mother. Many people try, but I know how to protect myself. Today, I feel much more of a woman than when I was married.

Obviously, I don’t hate men. I like them. And I’m ready to live a healthier relationship. But for me, the best way to live is free union. I’m not saying it’s the best way for everyone, I’m just saying that it’s the most comfortable option for me. Unfortunately, this point of view is not accepted by many societies. Therefore, sooner or later people always have to face the following question: should they or should they not live together? In my opinion, this is not necessary.

Perhaps this may seem selfish. However, being honest with yourself and not betraying anyone’s trust is the best a mother can teach her child.

What is your opinion on this woman’s decision? Do you agree with their arguments?