Q: How to do parenting, when you are a single parent ?
A: Being strict, VS not too strict, how to find this delicate balance?
A: Sending kids to boarding school, to be more disiplined VS keeping them at home, to show them LOVE...till

any thoughts?

Buy a crystal ball.....if you find one, tell me....I am not a single parent, but I do need one....oh, my!

That is not easy. I think one will need some sort of support network to manage that (e.g., family, good friends, nanny and community).

You do it the same way as when there is a partner, except you make all the decisions.
Re: strict. There is no "delicate balance", you do what you can, what you can live with. You should be able to explain to yourself clearly why you set restrictions and then be able to to the child if ever asked.
Re: Boarding School. Mine is in a tough private school and comes home every night- thus receiving both "discipline" and "love" as you put it.

Silly Story: *Once when angry, I threatened to send Mlle L-P to boarding school... "what's that?". After I explained, "it sounds great! When I can start?". Yeah, my long-saved-for-that-special-you-are-driving-me-insane-moment ultimate threat did not have the effect that I had so wished. She kicked my butt on that one

I used to feel that single parents had it really tough, having been one myself, working studying mortgage with no family to babysit. Then I met women who had kids but husbands were away for long period travelling/traveling for work. I think they had it worse. At least I didn't have to share control with someone who was rarely there and didn't understand what was going on. I imagine those women being asked to share in decision making about their husband's daily work!

i agree with j.l-p and think you should do the same as a single parent as you would if your spouse was around. yes you have more decisions to make, but from growing up in a single parent home, i as a child, looked for my male role models elsewhere and never expected my mam to be a father. i was happy she was herself and did the best she could and i both love and respect her for it.

Well. I used to try to go out with a single mum, and I've understood it was really difficult for her to deal with the fact to grow a kid without the father.

(and I don't talk about the tripe life of working, caring about the kid, and the houseworks, so guys, please, help your wife as much as you can, and even more)

The kid was really nice and even started to copy some of my behaviours. (was really funny)

It's really important, I think, that the children have access to male and female presence. If it's not the parents, it will be somebody else, but they need that to construct themselves.

i think it's really hard to say what's more difficult when it comes to parenting.
there are people who have support and means and all that who have tough times getting it together parenting and then there are people who have limited resources and are on their own and they do great jobs- so level of difficulty could be a difficult thing to measure.

that being said, having been a single parent for a long stretch of time, at a young age and without a lot of money be/c i was also a student- it made for a lot of creative parenting. discipline was quite easy with my son, and thankfully still is, love- discipline-affection-discipline and on and on. i think the hardest part for me was having very little money to survive on, trying to finish my degree and get everything done and still spend time with my son. but being in nyc it wasn't so bad because there was always things to do for free and i had a great group of friends that were used to having him over and around.

that being said, boarding school???? never an option and honestly for me it couldn't be. when my son goes to visit costa rica each year for 2 weeks or more i start to miss him too much and so sending him away to school would be difficult. but, he's not yet a teenager!

Thanks for all the inputs

@j.l-p, @ladylou, I totally agree with you, that being single parent ( esp for woman) at least she has the right to make her own decisions and no need to cook and clean for the guy. A kind of good trade off? But how can a single parent to show both disipline and love at same time? When i was kid, usually mum was "nice" and dad was the "strict" one, there were certain balances in the role play... ( well, in fact, mine own mum was never nice.. but never mind )

@ Bertrand, may I ask then why you broke up with her? Too many trips to school for picking up the kids?

@amaraya, Thanks for the sharing. I just wonder how did you balance the professional/student life and taking care of your son? I mean logistically? Swiss school system ( public school) as far as i learnt is that if you work full time, it seems impossible to take care of the kid. Not to even mention that kids need some other activities. Who will send them to musical class, who goes to pick them up from a sport competition? ... My nephew is in US, as far as I know that they can stay after school till 6pm, for various activities, but in CH, this seems impossible. Plus, recently one of my friend here told me that she is going to work even less when her kid goes to primary school, as she will have to sit with her every night to study together. and it seems quite common in CH?

I've been a single parent now for around 8 years and it's great. Sure, you have to be the strict one from time to time but you get all of the benefits of watching them grow up.

The only advice I can give you is to take some time for yourself. You are not a super-hero and you will need to have time to wind down with friends. That's not easy if you are working (I know this, I work 120%) but you need to be able to have fun too. And you should not feel guilty in any way.

There will be challenges and there will be hard times, but you will be a stronger person for it. Have fun when you can and your kid will love you anyway because you will be more relaxed as result.

Good luck.

Well, actually, it was fine before I ask her out......

Next time a girl takes me at her parents house and make the presentations, I will not believe things can go the way I hope.....

She was the last trigger my anxious depression needed....

Discipline is made with love, otherwise it is cruelty. The rare times I have had to discipline has been for a reason; it was never done frivolously.

There are no roles to play or to fall into... I have to be everything!

I believe this is something that also a double parents household deals with.

with my husban we are both caring and both discipline, we do not each have a role, it just depends who is caring for our daughter and what is happening.

i.e. if she is messing at the table she will get told of by both of us

So I think you need to balance that always and make your child understand that of course you love them no matter what but sometimes you simply do not like what they are doing.

Easier said than done though but that is for another topic

Ciao
K

thankfully i didn't have to go thru the logistics here in switzerland. it's much more complicated because of the time they are home for lunch, half days on wednesdays and so on. for me, as a student, my son was too young for kindergarten and so i sent him to a day care that was on campus, which was excellent but quite expensive for me. when i wasn't studying i was working, usually watching other people's kids to pay for his daycare.

in terms of discipline and love- you can't have one (in a healthy way) without the other. for me there were times i felt bad setting limits all the time- but it made both of our lives much easier to do so- and most parents know after you set the limits and stick to it, there's not much argument about it.