When love costs too much

The emotional and financial constraints of finding love as a single parent can be daunting

PEOPLE NEVER know the time nor the place they might meet a potential partner. But for the lovelorn, sometimes the odds of it happening seem exasperatingly slim.

Dating can be fraught for the young, carefree and single – when you are a lone parent, it brings additional practical and emotional challenges.

That much-given advice to singletons to “get out more” is of little use if you are the sole carer of your offspring and on a limited budget – a night out is likely to cost at least €40 for babysitting alone. If you are lucky enough to “click” with somebody, there are the dilemmas of when to introduce them at home and how to develop the relationship in the meantime.

It is not right for parents to be rushed into a new relationship after separation if they are not ready, says the director of One Family, Karen Kiernan. “They may want to take time with their family, the shape and size it is.”

One Family’s main concern is how to help children adjust to changing family situations, and it offers advice on the best way to introduce a new partner.

Getting out and socialising is difficult, she adds, for all lone parents who have sole custody of their children, but it is more often the mothers who are in that position.

“I think in this day and age it is particularly difficult for women anyway,” says Ann-Marie Fleming (29), who lives in Rochestown, Co Cork. She believes that city life exacerbates the problem.

“There are no dances, no people lining up against walls, no people knowing each other in their local area. I put a lot of my being single down to living in a city. My parents live in rural Kilkenny and everybody is going out with somebody locally.”

Although she is the sole carer of her eight-year-old daughter Zoe, she has never found that to be off-putting to men. However, she acknowledges that the fact that she is upfront about having a daughter probably filters out those who want to avoid that complication.

She has had only one serious relationship since the birth of Zoe, whose father is not around. It lasted about a year and Ann-Marie was distraught when it ended.

“Luckily for me, Zoe was only a baby and she would not remember the tears I went through, which was good, and I think I learned a lesson from that.”

She would be very cautious about introducing a boyfriend too soon. One guy wanted to take her and Zoe out to lunch on their second date, but she doesn’t want men coming in and out of her daughter’s life.

“I would be saying a few months, until I knew I was serious and I knew that they were serious about me, before making that step.”

She has been on four dates through the online dating site PlentyofFish, “none of which was successful”. The fourth man she would have been prepared to see again but he changed his mind.

After initial contact through e-mailing, she prefers Facebook as a second step, rather than texting – “you have a bigger range of photos and you get a better feel for somebody’s personality”.

However, even when things are going well in on-screen contact, and that progresses to phoning, meeting up in real life can still be very different.

You go to the effort of finally getting a babysitter, she says, and, 20 minutes into the date, you’re thinking, “This is a complete waste of both our times. I could have gone out with the girls and had a great night out.”

As a lone parent, she does not have the time nor the money to be “wasting” on a succession of dead-end dates. And she restricts her online choices to those who live locally.

“I don’t see there is any point in trying to connect with somebody who is in Galway or somewhere like that; if a guy lived next door to me, it would still be difficult to date him!”

It is not only the question of babysitting but also privacy issues in your own home once you meet somebody that make dating particularly difficult for lone parents.

“When it starts going to an intimate level, you have got a child in the house,” she points out.

“You can’t have somebody staying over – you have to introduce them and you certainly don’t want to be introducing somebody into your family life for a good few months.”

In a normal relationship, somebody might come over and watch a DVD after a few dates or stay overnight and you would go out together the next day, whereas she would have to “boot them out – and that is not exactly comfortable for them, when they have to up and leave”, she says.

She believes there are men out there looking for women to settle down with and, not yet into her 30s, she has time on her side.

“Some days, I do not have the time nor the energy for the drama that goes with relationships,” she says. Yet she would love to have the companionship – “if your child does something funny and you turn and smile at your partner, you both get to share that moment.

“Those are the kind of things I would like to have in my home; to have that kind of atmosphere, to have more children, to go through a pregnancy with somebody by your side and to share the birth.”

She knows it might sound hypocritical, but she would be very wary about dating a man who already has a child.

“I think it is completely different for men to date women with children than it is for women to date men with children,” she explains.

“If I started going out with a guy now, he wouldn’t have to worry about some sort of eejit ex who turns up and makes life difficult for everybody, because my ex just isn’t in the picture.”

Whereas if she was dating a man who had children, she believes “women get very territorial with their children”.

However, she adds, the ideals you look for in a potential partner are one thing: “If I met the love of my life tomorrow, I wouldn’t care what baggage he came with. I wouldn’t care what he looked like – it all goes out the window.

“You really don’t care if it is the person you do want to be with – I have just had too long to think about it!”

Aisling Davis, who lives in south Dublin, has also not seen any sign of dates being put off by the fact that she already has two children, aged under five. On the contrary, she has been surprised at just how keen they are to “play daddy”.

“Men my age, in their mid-30s, carry their own baggage, whether that is children, divorces, separations or messy relationships,” she says. “You find a lot of men of this age are ready to meet your children on date two.”

It is well intentioned, she acknowledges, but just too soon. “I seem to be the one who is never ready to do that so quickly.”

She wonders why they are so eager – “Are they looking for a ready-made family or are they looking for me?”

Equally, she would not consider introducing somebody as a boyfriend to her children unless she felt it was going somewhere.

“I have always given myself a time limit – if it lasts nine months to a year, then it is worth thinking about.”

Davis was six months pregnant with her second child when her long-term relationship with their father broke up. It is only in the past year or so that she has had any interest in starting a new relationship.

Yet, because she is so busy as a childcare worker, studying at night and caring for her own children, time for socialisation is very limited. “It is very hard to find somebody who would have any interest in seeing you once a week.”

She does not regard dating websites as an option in trying to meet people. “I would be too worried to use websites to be honest – not when there are kids involved.”

Instead, she has been on various blind dates with the help of friends. However, she says, it is difficult to find somebody just looking for a date, with the thought that maybe something will develop – rather than a man looking for a ready-made family or a one-night stand.

“I am not desperately hunting for a partner,” she stresses. “If the right man comes along, he will be as casual and easy-going about it as I will be.”

In the early days when she met somebody, she would be immediately thinking “Would he make good daddy material?” Now, she says, her aspirations have become “more normal” and she just considers, “Would he make good social material – [to] lose myself for a little while and get out of the nappy changing?”

She uses precious free time to catch up with close friends, or maybe go out and meet new people. But cost is a big factor. You are looking at the guts of €50 for a night out – before you have stepped out the door, she points out.

“You calculate your food, your drinks, your taxi home – it is €100 for a blind date. You are thinking, ‘I hope this is fun . . .’

“I have been on a few and they have all been a great laugh; little has come of it. But it is all in the spirit of getting out, trying to recapture some kind of social situation.”

There is no doubt, she says, as a lone parent of young children, “you lose your entire social life”.

Having experienced these difficulties first-hand, she started organising long weekend getaways for other separated parents. Activities are organised for the children and parents take turns to supervise.

So far she has spread the word through parenting websites and One Family, but she is hoping to establish it more formally in the near future.

“I wanted to go on holidays and I find it very daunting to take two kids around on my own. This way, they are entertained all day and you have the chance to talk to people – otherwise you are sitting on your own in the evening time.

“It is a lovely way to meet people in the same situation,” she adds, “and have people to go out with.”

‘I DON’T DWELL ON IT TOO MUCH, BUT SITTING AT HOME ALONE ON A FRIDAY NIGHT IS BORING!’

As a lone parent with financial pressures, Sinéad Kavanagh (40) feels she has no option but to use internet dating sites for meeting new people. Getting a babysitter for a weekly night class is out of the question.

But internet dating brings its own problems. For instance, if a man has to travel some distance to meet up, there can very soon be an expectation of accommodation for the night.

She has considered saving up to try an introduction agency, “but that is a lot of money for somebody in my position to spend if it doesn’t work”. She doesn’t know anybody personally for whom it has been successful.

“It is very, very difficult. At this stage I don’t need anybody, but I want to have a partner and I don’t see why I can’t have one.”

The relationship with the father of her six-year-old daughter, Aliçia, broke up when she was three months pregnant. “She had been planned and we were living together and when I became pregnant, I think reality hit.”

She had to leave her full-time job in Dublin once Aliçia arrived, as it was not feasible to be commuting from her Co Meath home.

Initially, she was keen to meet somebody who her daughter would then always know as dad. “Yes, I wanted a partner, but I wanted a daddy as well.”

But she had little time for socialising. She went back to college to study complementary health therapies – and set up a home practice, Roots Holistic Therapies, as a reflexologist when Aliçia was 18 months old. She supplements this with work as a children’s entertainer, under the name “Crazy Daizy and Ickle Daizy Too!”

In retrospect she realises that, until recently, she was not ready for a new relationship. “It is only this year that I have got to the point where, unbeknownst to myself prior to this, that I think I could trust somebody again.”

She does not want a casual fling. “I am interested in meeting somebody who would like to be around on a Sunday morning after a Saturday night.”

Although she is not married, she is “not really single either”, she says, because she has a child and has to prioritise. “I don’t have the luxury of overnight sitters very often and I am certainly not bringing some stranger back to my house.”

She went through a phase where she tried to get out every second Thursday or Friday night. But now it is more the occasional “blow out”.

“If I am paying for a sitter and paying €30 to go out to the movies, I might as well pay €60 and stay out for the night and go for a meal and go dancing – leave at eight in the evening, come back at four in the morning. I will have to use that recharge to last me the next three or four months.”

These rare nights out are usually with girlfriends – “and they’re all married or certainly partnered – and guys don’t approach a load of women”.

Although she has been busy with courses and voluntary work and goes to the gym in the mornings, it’s mostly women she encounters.

“It’s very difficult. I don’t dwell on it too much, but sitting at home alone on a Friday night is boring!”

It is easier if you have the money to go out more, she suggests, and thereby increase your chances of meeting a potential partner.

And, of course, it is not all about her. Aliçia wishes dearly to be a big sister. “That one I’m stuck on,” says Sinéad. “That is one I can’t just click my fingers and make happen.”

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