The life of a single mother is like a roller coaster, with its highs and lows, but no matter what, moms always have to stay on the go. For a single mother, balancing work and family isn’t always easy. Running the household, running after her career and then running after her kids can take a real toll sometimes – but the kids make it all worth it for these super ladies.
With the increase in single-mother families, the government should take constructive measures to help them ease their workload. According to a U.S. Census conducted in 2010, there are approximately 11.7 million single parent families in the country, from which 10.3 million families are run by single mothers.
The Marathon Begins
A typical day of a single mother will start with preparing her kids for school or daycare by preparing their breakfast, helping them get dressed and making them eat their breakfast. During this time, she dresses up for work, drinks her coffee to charge herself for the morning and sets off to work, after dropping her kids at the bus stop or their school.
Between 8:30 to 9:00 in the morning she arrives at work and buries her head under the load of files and numbers. Oblivious to the fact that over 50% of single mothers make less than $25,000 per year, she diligently does her work, multitasking all the way. During the lunch hour, you will find the single mom sitting with a bunch of colleagues, munching away at her sandwich. This is the most socializing she will do during the entire week.
As the clock strikes five, she shuts down her computer and rushes out of her office building. For most of us, the work ends by this time of day, but for a single mom, the job is only half done. She rushes to the daycare to pick up her kids, while her older child may be at the neighbor’s or in an after school activity class. After picking them up, she grabs her groceries from the store. After all, taking care of the household is also her responsibility, like other single moms who make up 85% of the 11.7 million single-parent households.
By the time she reaches home, it’s time to make dinner. She whips up food for her kids, easy breezy recipes that don’t take up that much time. Our marathon mom is joined by other mothers, 29.7% of whom work part-time and 48.8% full-time.
Now, it’s family time. Helping kids with homework or bonding with them over a family movie does the trick. Working from daybreak through night, single moms don’t have much time to spend with their kids. They can manage to spend only 11.8 hours a week with their kids on average; which is three to five times less hours than mothers who have a partner!
It’s bedtime for the kids. After tucking them in and kissing them good night, the single mom has some time for herself, most of which is typically spent planning the next day, week, or even month.
After all that is done and over with a new day begins for the Super Mom!
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Phoebe Johnson is a mom with two bright kids. Her work revolves around different styles of parenting. Her most recent focus lies with single parents and their struggles. Readers can find a lot of her work on CareTeen.com. She can be reached at pheobejohnson035@gmail.com.
The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the blog contributor’s. Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer or provider. Writers may have conflicts of interest, and their opinions are their own.