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I’m a single mother of what doctors and insurance companies cheerfully call an “advanced maternal age,” which makes me sound like an appliance with an expired warranty. In reality, I’m a 42-year-old woman with a toddler who is having—against all cultural expectations—a genuinely good time.
There’s a particular pleasure to being an older single mother* that goes largely undiscussed. Women are sold single-mother extremes: the exhausted martyr, the cautionary tale, or the immoral welfare queen—the latter, historically weaponized against Black single mothers in particular. As a group, single moms are supposed to feel shame and embarrassment. But what I feel is something else entirely: joy.
Before my daughter, I’d already lived several lives in several cities. I’d been (briefly) married. I’d been to therapy. I had a career, a passport, a mortgage. By the time I became an unmarried mother at 39, I was fully directing my own life.
While newly pregnant, I had a long talk with my then-boyfriend about how I did not want to be a single mom. The agreed expectation was that after our baby arrived and everyone was settled and healthy, he and I would get engaged. I was scared to mother without a husband. I didn’t think I could do it alone. I didn’t want the stigma.
A few months after our daughter was born, however, it was clear the engagment wasn’t happening. Even in my postpartum haze—which included being laid off from my job shortly after returning from maternity leave—I was sure that I didn’t want my daughter to grow up with the version of her mom romantically attached to her dad. Single motherhood was the better parenting choice. So, just before my 40th birthday, I officially became an unemployed, single mom with an infant.
Of course, there was stress and fear and sadness in those early days. But after a few weeks, my focus shifted from grief for the fantasy family I wouldn’t have to the scaffolded network of dependable relationships I’d already spent four decades building—a solid structure of grandparents, grown siblings with their own kids, life-long friends, former colleagues, neighbors, and other mothers. People I trusted.
From there, motherhood, on my own, started to feel less like misfortune and more like creative control. I could enjoy parenting without negotiating my identity, time, and wellbeing inside a romantic partnership. In my house, when I’m with my daughter, the vibe is… calm. Really calm. Decades of taking care of myself taught me to put systems in place that I know work. The house reflects me and my daughters’ thresholds—for mess, for noise, for emotion, for stimulation, for fun. There is no low-grade domestic tension humming beneath the day; I set the tone.
The parenting work is constant, of course. I worry about money and the future, but so do partnered parents. Daycare pick-up times and costs aren’t open to compromise. But when the labor and responsibility are fully mine, it feels different. I’m not keeping score. I’m not wondering if I’m doing enough. I’m simply doing it. And I like doing it.
I like knowing that if my daughter needs something, I’ll find a solution. I like meal-prepping on Sunday afternoons while she helps from her perch on a toddler tower. I like taking her to the beach and on bike rides and to story hour. I like hearing her observations and unfiltered thoughts. Before she turned two, we visited friends in Italy and the whole international trip was a breeze—even navigating Rome’s airport by myself with a toddler and no stroller. Every stage she’s gone through has been my favorite stage. I’m not sure I would have been a capable single mother in my 20s or early 30s. But at 42, I’m unflappable. I don’t spiral when my daughter has a meltdown. Her moods don’t trigger mine. The decades and past mistakes have taught me to regulate my own feelings so I can help her with hers.
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