When you’re a single parent, you always feel like there’s a piece of your life missing.  You wake up alone, you go to bed alone.  You maintain your home alone, you take of your child alone.  Alone becomes a part of your daily routine.  One day your child asks for daddy, the missing piece of the puzzle in their mind. How do you handle their question?  

We end up as single parents for many reasons, death, poor choices, abandonment or immaturity either on our part or our partner’s. It can be a devastating experience being left to raise your child alone or choosing to raise your child alone because you know you’re better off. Whatever the reason, it requires stamina and endurance when you find yourself alone.  It also requires you to think before you speak to your child/children on daddy’s or mommy’s whereabouts. I read a post from a blogger who said she told her child you don’t have a daddy. That response affected me deeply.  It affected me deeply because I felt her pain.  I understood where she was coming from, but I wondered if she really understood what she just told her child. 


I want to share how I handled the situation with my daughter with the single moms out there. The first thing that I decided was that I would never speak negatively of my daughter’s father in her presence.  Now I would let that SOB have it during phone conversations or when I was speaking to a friend, but never in my daughter’s presence.  What good would that do?  I made a decision to not project my anger or pain onto my child.  When you tell you child that they don’t have a dad that’s exactly what you’re doing.  Regardless of how we feel about the absent father, our child didn’t get here by a stork.  They were conceived, so they do have a dad.  He’s simply MIA.    


I decided to tell my child that dad wasn’t here when she asked where he was.  A simple “he’s not here” often did the trick at least temporarily.  I would explain that it was just the two of us and we would be just fine. I also told her that he loved her, because he did and does.  He wasn’t in a position to show it at the time.  I don’t know if it eased her fear or pain of not having him in her life, but I knew it was better than telling her that he didn’t exist. I also thought it was best for me to leave the door open for him to reappear. People do grow up and have a change of heart. I thought it would confuse her even more if he decided to be a part of her life down the road and I had told her he didn’t exist. I didn’t want her to think negatively of me because I had lied to her or look back and realize that I was an angry, bitter person because he wasn’t there. As single mothers, we don’t want things to backfire. We must accept our situation and move forward with a positive attitude.   


As she got older, I explained my relationship with her dad. Through it all, I never spoke negative of him.  I explained that things just didn’t work out between us. We went our separate ways and I didn’t regret it. I reinforced that she was the best thing that ever happened to me and the years that he had missed was his loss.  I wanted her to form her own opinion.  I knew one day their path would cross and he did exactly what I thought he would do, he came back into the picture when she was 15.  This is why I believe that as single mothers, we should never tell our children that they don’t have a dad.  How do you explain to your child that you’ve lied to them if they do resurface? Daddy made you do it?    
  
As my daughter got older, I eventually build a relationship with his mom, aunts and cousins. My daughter became close to his family members too; however, she flipped the script.  She dismissed him.  She choose not to have a relationship with him, he ended up on the outside looking in. Isn’t it amazing how things work out.  She continued her education, married her college sweetheart and had 2 beautiful children while he suffered because he was not a part of it. I think it’s important to be honest with our children and allow them to make their choices and form their own opinions when they get old enough to fully comprehend the situation. Either they will work it out or they will continue to go their separate ways.  


Just as important, letting go of the anger and bitterness of a failed relationship frees you to see things clearly and it allows you to become a great mother. Don’t spend time wondering why they don’t want to be a part of their child’s life.  Don’t spend time wondering why they didn’t love you.  It is what it is. Life deals us a hand of cards and we must play them.  There will be times when we will have a winning hand and other times we will have to fold. Lay that bad hand on the table and wish them well.  


God places us in the positions that we need to be in.  It takes time to figure things out, but you must have a clear head so you can see where you need to be.  He could have placed you in your position to be a leader for other single mothers, so be the best single mother that you can be. He could have placed you in your position to strengthen you for another use in this life; I don’t know.  I do know that negativity is an obstacle and it will make your journey difficult if you don’t get rid of it.  You must rise above your situation ladies, rise above it.   


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