Mom discovers the true joy of solo parenting after parting ways with her husband

Solo parenting requires immense effort and resilience, but for some, it can be less challenging than co-parenting with a partner who doesn't share the same outlook on life. Kerala Taylor, an award-winning writer and entrepreneur, discovered this when she parted ways with her husband. Through her experience, she found solo parenting to be a liberating journey, as she shared with Your Tango. Taylor explained that her unpaid labor in the marriage was often taken for granted, ultimately leading to their separation and her decision to parent on her own.

She talked about how, in the past decade, she and her husband have had to "navigate hundreds of decisions" that they were not "always prepared to navigate," adding that she often used to find themselves on different pages. She shared how the last straw that broke the camel's back was a simple argument about the dishes, but it made her realize how she could not be doing this anymore. "The day before I asked my husband for some time apart, we argued about the dishes. Is there anything more cliché?" she wrote.

Despite feeling a sense of "dread" when she thought about raising her kids alone, she understood that her new life was exactly what she needed. "When a coworker asked me how things were going that summer, I told him, 'They're easier and harder.' Easier because with my husband gone, three fewer relationships in the household could potentially devolve into conflict. And as an introvert who frequently felt flooded by the chaos of our home, I relished my solo time after the kids went to bed," she shared, adding that the only thing that made it hard was the fact that she had to bath, comb and get her kids dressed all by herself. 

She then added that with her husband gone from her life, she discovered she was far better at solo parenting than co-parenting. "I don't have to balance the attention I pay to my kids with the attention I pay to my husband," she wrote. She said that eliminating the need to think about her husband's reaction had made her a "less anxious, more conscious and a fun-loving" mother, leading her to new treasures of her new life.

"I'll treasure the warm summer mornings, the roll of sweat droplets down the small of my back and the slant of the evening sun through lush, leafy trees. I'll administer bandaids and kiss foreheads and as children scurry in and out of the house, I'll shout, 'Close the front door!' In the evening, I'll do The Griddy while I cook and my son will tell me I'm doing it wrong. My daughter will make guacamole or assemble a salad and I'll misuse Gen Z slang to try to make her smile," she said. Also, she added that her new life was indeed fun, with the simple tasks as doing the dishes never escalating to "complex and symbolic emotional battle."