Yes, dating can be hard. Speaking as a 37 year old, I think it’s definitely harder as you get older as we all have commitments and grown up lives that keep us busy. Also, some of us have what can be ‘lovingly’ described as baggage. Well, I guess we all collect baggage as we travel through life but the term can often be used to describe our children when you’re a single parent.
My son is definitely not baggage, he’s my everything. With this in mind and taking my health into account, I answered my ex husband’s rather patronising suggestion that I could have a relationship like the one he and his current girlfriend have, if I wanted, with my post ‘Why I don’t want what you have’. I’d love to hear what you think and how you feel if you are in a similar situation.
Kate, who writes at WitWitWoo has recently decided to bite the bullet, turn the computer off, and go out for drinks. It’s time to rebuild her confidence as although it might not come across this way, it took a knock after her relationship broke down.
The next two posts are a bit special and give a really interesting insight that you don’t normally see. They are written by different bloggers, on different blogs, but are about a shared experience.
One date, two bloggers, two opinions. What happened?
Mandy Charlton has a fabulous section on her blog about her 3 month Skype dating adventure with ‘Mr France’. I have really enjoyed reading about their developing friendship and then the time came for them to finally meet. Imagine my surprise when it was revealed that I actually knew who Mr France was – a fellow blogger!
She recounts the evening in ‘When Bloggers Date, a First Date in London with Martyn’ and then in a fascinating turn of events, Martyn, who blogs at ‘Inside Martyn’s thoughts’ also shared his thoughts on the night, in ‘I went on a date’. I don’t know where things will go from here from them in a dating sense, but they both need to feel proud of themselves for taking the leap, letting themselves be vulnerable and putting themselves out there.
Ellamental Mama made me laugh with her descriptions of some of the (not so) desirables that she’s been lucky enough (?!) to attract or interact with. Oh, the struggle is real. Internet dating is really hard work. She questions how these couples that have met and married via internet dating actually make it happen. Well. I married a guy that I met on a dating website. We had a child and were going to live happily ever after…..but here I am as the BritMums Single Parent Round-up editor, so we all know how that turned out…….
Whether you are a single parent or not, how do people actually meet in this day and age? Unless you have the time, money and inclination to trawl the bars, start new hobbies or hang out in coffee shops in the hope of bumping into a fellow regular, as all our featured bloggers have found, internet dating is your best bet.
There are lots of websites out there and more and more apps are being released, making it hard to keep up.
The Single Swan who blogs anonymously under the name ‘pen’ has written about 5 different dating apps. Tinder I knew about and she introduced me to Bumble in one of her previous blog posts, but the other 3 are new to me. Maybe ‘the one’ is waiting for us on one of them?
They don’t have to be ‘the one’ forever, they could just the ‘the one’ for now. As long as you’re safe and you’re protecting yourself and your family, go out and have fun and maybe, just maybe, you’ll find what you’re looking for.
Single parenting is hard but you can do it, whether you have a love interest or not. You’ve got this.
Take care,
Hannah
About Hannah Spannah
Hannah is a (now) happily single parent to her young son, Bear. They have a little cottage in semi rural North Yorkshire and share it with a demanding yellow Labrador, a cat, 2 guinea pigs and 3 fish. She began writing when her health took a turn for the worse and Hannah writes about parenting and most aspects of life. She faces many a co-parenting challenge but hopes that her blog, hannahspannah.co.uk shows a positive view of life as a disabled single mum. Cake is her food of choice and she spends most of winter covered in mud thanks to the dog and child.