What Single Parenting Looks Like When No One’s Watching
The Myth of Balance
Single parenting with a full-time job means there’s always something slipping through the cracks.
There’s the laundry that lives in the dryer like it’s paying rent, and the recycling that forms a small art installation by the door because I haven’t had time to walk it outside.
What feels like failure is really just the side effect of doing too much without a safety net.
It’s the cost of being the one everyone relies on, even when no one sees it.
Everything Is a Coordination Game
This isn’t the kind of parenting that gets a commercial or a sentimental montage.
It’s the kind where planning a three-day work trip requires military-grade coordination: meds, meals, dog care, backups for the backups, and a very long mental checklist.
The Mental Load (and Then Some)
This week, I had to:
- Arrange meds, food, and backup plans for both my child and my dog
- Make sure everyone else had what they needed, while I packed for a work trip I didn’t really have the energy to attend
- Text back and forth with my ex to sort out logistics, which somehow always ends up more complicated and needlessly high drama than it should be
- Field school emails, therapist updates, and medical reminders before 9 a.m.
- Review financials and budget out the month so I can cover the vet bill, the co-pay, and maybe still afford groceries
- Pretend everything was fine, even though it wasn’t
What I couldn’t do—what I wanted more than anything—was stay home with my son.
He’s still recovering from a seizure less than two weeks ago. He just wanted to be with me, and I with him.
But with layoffs at my company and the economy in crisis, I had no choice.
Systems Help—But They Don’t Fix Everything
And it’s not just about the logistics. It’s about the ache of being away from the one person who needs you most.
It’s the guilt that lingers even when everything technically got done.
It’s the feeling of being split into parts—employee, parent, problem-solver, caretaker—and knowing none of those parts ever get your full self.
I’ve built systems that help me stay upright—weekly planning, shared calendars, a budget that (mostly) runs itself—but they don’t erase the weight of everything I’m managing.
They just keep the wheels turning when I’m running on fumes.
You make it work, but it costs you.
The emotional labor of holding it together while quietly unraveling is real.
And no one can realistically schedule recovery time for that, because life just lines up the next round of tasks like clockwork.
What Parenting Really Looks Like
Here’s what parenting looks like for me:
- Answering work emails while simultaneously thinking about the emails I have to write to my son’s school about his seizure-related absences this week
- “Meal prep” that consists of dragging leftovers to the front of the fridge and hoping someone eats them
- Guilt that doesn’t take weekends off
There’s this fantasy version of parenthood where things are calm, scheduled, and everyone leaves the house on time, hydrated, and emotionally stable.
I don’t live there. Maybe you don’t, either.
The Version I Live In
I live in the version where I show up tired, do it anyway, and try not to lose myself in the process.
Last night, while getting ready for a work dinner, I caught my reflection and realized I’d completely stepped off the skincare train and had a wreck on my hands. (Somehow it didn’t look as bad in my own bathroom mirror.)
My face now tells it as it is: I’ve been prioritizing everything and everyone else, and it shows.
I live in the version where I measure my success by whether my kid feels safe, fed, and loved—not by whether I crossed everything off the list.
You’re Doing More Than You Think
If someone else were doing what I’m doing—with the energy, support, and reality I have—I wouldn’t call them failing. I’d call them amazing.
So even though I’m not quite ready to call myself amazing, I’m trying to at least be decent to myself.
Sometimes, that means not letting my ex bulldoze over boundaries I’ve worked hard to build.
Sometimes, it’s letting DoorDash be dinner and calling it a win.
Most of the time, it means taking things one day at a time and reminding myself that I won’t always be this stretched, this needed, this tired.
And these years—right now—matter just as much as the ones to follow.
Take a minute to do something kind for yourself tonight.
I’m going to knit a few rows on the sweater I’ve been “working on” since last spring, and give my back a break so I can be halfway functional tomorrow.
Keep Reading
If you’re in the thick of it too, you might like this one next: Harnessing the Power of Positive Affirmations for Personal Growth. It’s low-pressure, practical, and rooted in the same spirit as this post.
Or browse the full Mindset & Motivation section for more thoughts that meet you where you are.