Do you have what it takes to be a single mother?

DAR ES SALAAM: WHEN Jane Mattes, a psychotherapist, was caring for her infant son in 1981, she realized she didn’t have a support system.

“No one fully understands how hard it is to care for an infant until you are doing it,” she says.

She believed then, as she does now, that a support system is essential for single mothers raising a child of any age. Finding help was her impetus for forming

Single Mothers by Choice (SMC), a community that supports women who don’t have a partner and choose to have a child, knowing they will be parenting alone. Jane was decades ahead of her time.

Then and now The prevailing thinking has long been that children need a mom and dad—and siblings—to thrive. What was once the traditional family with a mom and dad and two kids is fading fast. But in decades prior, even in the 1990s, it felt and was revolutionary to choose to be a single mother.

Attitudes about single mothers have changed dramatically, and the research shows no significant adverse effects on the children. In short, children without siblings and two parents and kids who grow up in single-parent homes do equally well developmentally.

One reason for the good outcomes is that most single mothers go to great lengths to become parents. “Being wanted is one of the key factors in development,” Mattes told me. She notes, “The children of single mothers do much better than expected.” The science confirms what Mattes sees.

Young children whose mothers made the choice to be solo parents were quite similar to those raised by partnered parents.

After looking at 51 single mothers and 52 coupled heterosexual parents with children ages 4 to 9, conceived by donor insemination in both groups, the researchers report that “the only difference was lower mother-child conflict in the solo mother families.”

According to the study, which was published in the Journal of Family Psychology, “The findings suggest that solo motherhood, in itself, does not result in psychological problems for children.” When researchers compared older, middle schoolage children of single mothers with the children of heterosexually partnered couples, the findings were equally positive.

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The children ranged in age from 8 to 10 and, as in the study with younger children, were donor-conceived. The authors write, “There were no differences in maternal mental health, the quality of mother-child relationships, or children’s emotional and behavioral problems between family types.”

Their findings suggest “the presence of two parents—or a male parent—is not essential for children to flourish, and add to the growing body of evidence that family structure is less influential in children’s adjustment than the quality of family relationships.”

Single mothers by choice

Most of the women who formed the early Single Mothers by Choice community are similar to members today. According to Mattes and Kat Curtin, the current head of the organization, their members tend to be well-educated and have careers, and thus can support a child.

The group today skews older and younger and is much more diverse, but their reasons for joining remain the same: to find support, connection, and community with others who are also single mothers by choice, or SMCs.

Members are at all stages of their journey, including those who are “thinking,” “trying,” “pregnant,” and “parenting,” and can find can find active private discussions 24/7. There is a member only private forum to help you find just about any information you need: from donor insemination to planning, parenting infants to college-age young adults—and dating.

What does it take to be a single mother?

In the last few years, two friends of mine, both in their early 40s, chose to be single mothers, joining this growing group of women now numbering in the millions. I marvel at how well my friends adapted to the many changes and challenges they have faced. Like so many other single mothers, they are stopping at one.

That is a decision many single mothers by choice make, Curtin says, “because of the high emotional and practical cost of fertility treatments as well as the time, energy, and expense needed to raise children.” During our conversations, I asked Mattes and Curtin what it takes to raise a child on your own, and why and how so many women are doing just that. Here are some highlights:

• Desire: The most important thing is the desire to take care of a human being.

• Determination: “It’s natural to have some ambivalence about a huge life change like motherhood, but it’s a question of how much ambivalence,” notes Jane. “This is not for the very ambivalent.” Kat Curtin’s path to motherhood took her on a rocky, twisting journey from donor sperm and four intrauterine insemination (IUI) procedures, to two rounds of in vitro fertilization, two miscarriages, and a great deal of loss.

Ultimately, eight years after she first started thinking about embarking on her path to motherhood, her daughter (now age 6) was born via surrogacy using her remaining frozen embryos. She recalls getting the birth certificate and flying across the country to bring her two-week-old infant home. That’s desire and determination.

• Resilience: The ability to tackle the hurdles that arise is key for any and every parent. Successful single moms persevere and stay the course in the face of life’s ups and downs and the myriads of challenges families face.

• A Solid Support System: You can do this as a single mother, but you can’t do it alone. You need a community that connects you with people who Do you have what it takes to be a single mother?

have gone through it—be it finding a donor to IVF options or infertility ups and downs. Sometimes the support system is family members, but even beyond the emotional and physical help, there are advantages to having other single mothers in your circle.

These connections help you through your whole journey with resources and advice. For example, being with other mothers who made the same choice she did, one friend says, “My child will know that there are other families like ours without a dad.”