Consistency and Choices

Divorce shatters a child's sense of safety. During and after the divorce it is vitally important to keep routines and and lifestyle the same as long as humanly possible. Make a commitment to live in the same house and maintain the same working or at home status as your children adjust to the divorce.

As a newly single parent it is easy to let things slide beacause you are grieving and exhausted. However such choices add to your child's insecuritites. Keep daily routines of meals, activities and bedtimes the same. Your household rules should remain consistent. Structure helps make both children and adults feel more secure in painful situations.

Regardless of the circumstances, your children didn't choose this divorce and thus often feel helpless and out of control. Look for opportunities where their input can positively impact the family. Allowing them to choose dinner, which movie to rent or what outfit to wear will help strenghten their personal power.

Most importantly trust you will all be fine and love them and yourself unconditionally.

The Airplane Theory

Remember children do not need to live in the same household with both parents to happy and well adjusted. However they do need to have at least one healthy and happy parent who believes their child is the absolute best.

Commit to be that person for your child by first taking care of yourself.

This is the airline theory: Put your oxygen mask on first so you won't pass out while trying to help your child.

Seek professional help in a coach or therapist. Pump yourself up with with good nutrition, exercise, meditation, laughter, play and a network of supportive friends.

Your personal happiness and health is the mirror of your child's well-being.

Blessings,
Virginia

Safe Vulnerabilty

As the youngest of ten, the baby, my siblings were constantly trying to do things for me. My repeated response was always a vehement,"I can do it myself!'

Thirty something years later, a newly single mom, I began repeating the same words with a vengeance. Initially the words were a mask of courage that served me well. As time went on, however, my headstrong determination to do everything all by myself started to work against me. Small household mishaps brought me to tears screaming to the universe, "I can't do this all by myself!"

Such outbursts lead to the natural conclusion,"Then don't. Just ask for help."

Ask for help? Me, Ms. Super, I Can Do it Myself, Single Momma ask for help? Not happening!

In being CEO of my family, I lost my ability to be the least bit vulnerable. Showing any sign of vulnerability frightened me. My fear was that the smallest bit of letting go would have the entire house of cards fall down. Yet the truth remained, my mantra, "I can do it by myself" was starting to hurt me and thus my children.

Before I could actually ask for help I had to remember what vulnerability felt like. I had to find places and times where I was able to let my 24/7 parenting guard down and relax in that space of not being and doing everything. Once I found it and made it a practice to be there whenever I could, I slowly began asking others to help me. Each time it gets easier and easier. And each time I am humbled by the generosity of the human spirit.

Where is your place of safe vulnerability? For some it is with their parents, or when their children go with their father, or when a friend comes to visit.

For me, to this day, whenever I am in the passenger's seat of a car I melt a bit and a few layers of the super do it all momma peel away.

Change Your Mind

The image of a single mother, even in this day and age, is usually laced with negativity. At the start of my journey as a single mother, I was riddled with fear that stemmed from the many statistics on the plight of single mothers and their children. My fear became a brick wall looming in front of me that was impossible to go through. The more I thought of my 'broken' family, permanently scarring my children, the threat 0f poverty,and my vulnerablity the wall got thicker and thicker.

So I changed my mind. Changing my thoughts brick by brick knocked the wall down.

*We weren't broken. We were building something new and stronger.

*We weren't poor. I was creatively handling finances.

*My children weren't scarred. They were happy and well adjusted.

*I wasn't weak and vulnerable. I was a pioneer woman courageously taking my family across unchartered terrain.

Make your thoughts about single motherhood positive. In the words of Wayne Dyer, "Change Your Thoughts. Change Your Life"