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I wish parents showed any interest in asking about having spent the last 280+ days alone coming into a family-centric holiday as they do telling me over and over about remote school.
I GET IT. It is covered everywhere. You can stop explaining.
I GET IT. It is covered everywhere. You can stop explaining.
It’s like they assume my life is just going along as normal because I don’t have kids. Like I’m still living my 20s out like most of us did without kids.
Newsflash - being alone this long is not the same as a parent’s life but with the kid stresses removed.
Newsflash - being alone this long is not the same as a parent’s life but with the kid stresses removed.
I’ve been really floored by the lack of compassion for being alone this long and during this time.
It’s also incredibly hard to be a shoulder for those struggling with a life I would have given anything to experience.
It’s also incredibly hard to be a shoulder for those struggling with a life I would have given anything to experience.
Parents & couples, you have no concept of what it is like to never have had children and a partner as a grown 40-something woman.
There are also very few of you who are curious about this experience...no one asks what it is like. All they say is “aren’t you lucky”.
There are also very few of you who are curious about this experience...no one asks what it is like. All they say is “aren’t you lucky”.
Or they imply it with all the frustrations they are dealing with.
Am I lucky to spend Thanksgiving alone? To make every decision every day? To buy myself presents because I don’t have a partner to get me anything? To get gifts for family who never acknowledge them?
Am I lucky to spend Thanksgiving alone? To make every decision every day? To buy myself presents because I don’t have a partner to get me anything? To get gifts for family who never acknowledge them?
I’m figuring out how to make Christmas a day where I’m not waking up to silence and isolation. I’m figuring out how to carefully curate who to talk to so I don’t feel left out of the human experience by witnessing others living with loved ones.
I’m figuring it out. But it’s hard
I’m figuring it out. But it’s hard
And if I don’t do it, no one will. I don’t have a safety net, a partner in crime to fall back on. I have loneliness and a really shitty day if I don’t plan ahead for every one of these holidays.
Do you know what it’s like to go 300 days without a hug? A touch from a loved one?
Do you know what it’s like to go 300 days without a hug? A touch from a loved one?
I know that moment will come, I’ll be sitting alone on the couch, time will have gotten away from me and I will have fallen out of the structure I created to avoid the sadness. And I’ll get a glimpse of a family outside, or hear children playing, and the starkness will settle.
And I’ll sit in it as I have done since March. I’ll endure it alone. I’ll push through and get up and take care of myself once more. I will rely on me, because there isn’t anyone else. I will change my own perspective and pick myself up. As I’ve done every gd day.
And nobody will see it. No one witnesses it. No other person knows. Did it happen? Did I survive another dark night of the soul? Does it matter to anyone but me? Do I matter if I’m enduring this alone?
...but homeschooling!
...but homeschooling!
