by Diane Burnside

Created on: January 18, 2009

In the years since single parent families have become the norm rather than the exception, a fair number of families have had to redefine what it means to be "Complete."
Is a "Complete family" a family that consists of a mother, a father and a certain number of children?Or, is a family complete when the child is receiving the lessons s/he would receive,in all likelihood if there were two parents on the scene?

In an ideal world a child would have one parent to teach them nurture, to encourage them and reassure them when things got tough, and another to push them to drive them to be all they can be. To supply the discipline rules and the structure.
In an ideal world "conscious" parents would compliment and even teach each other and these energies combined would produce a balanced well rounded child that would grow up in a balanced, well rounded way.
This is not an ideal world however, much of life we sleep walk through and we can become fairly depressed when our marriage breaks up and we are suddenly faced with the daunting task of raising our children alone.
The first step in becoming a "Complete" single parent family is to realize that you were given all that you will need to do this.
If you are old enough to have children you were likely raised by two parents yourself and therefore were given a nurturing example and a disciplinary example of parent hood. Maybe you were from a single parent family yourself in which case you already know that, "Family" = who loves you.
Or perhaps you were an orphan in which case you know that anyone who would love you and care for you is a complete family.
One way or another the way you grew up gave you tools you can use in the interest of becoming complete as a single parent family unit.
Although at this juncture I really must suggest that if you have been sleep walking through your life, If you have been on automatic pilot in any way that it is now time to wake up.In order to be complete when you're doing the job on your own is to bring your awareness and your creativity to the job
The days when you could use the "Wait till your father gets home!" form of discipline or sit down with the paper after work and let someone else deal with the dinner situation are over. Not only will you be the one who is in charge of discipline but you will need to be creative, there is no one size fits all punishment and children are masters of finding new ways to challenge you.
If you have always relied on your partner to handle dinner you going to have to figure out something beyond pizza and cola. Nutrition is a viable concern for a single parent. A child is developing all their chemistry if they are lacking some vital nutrient you could have problems ranging from psychosis to scurvy.
Every parent comes to the job with a certain skill set, and it will be up to the parent to decide what they bring in abundance, what they can develop more of and what they are woefully lacking and need to delegate.And realize these things may change:
During the years I was battling C.F.S. it was my children's favorite auntie that carved the pumpkin dressed them up and took them "Trick or Treating"(The gift of illness is in making sure you learn to delegate.) Yes, I wished it was me that was able to give that to my children and I simply couldn't deliver. So I made sure they got what they needed from some other source. This is Key: we are not meant to be all things to other people, not even our children. If that were the case we wouldn't need teachers.
As parents we want what's best for our child if we can't deliver it ourselves we can find someone who can,and when we do that person has just become part of our "Complete family" ( I bet you'll never look at your Dentist the same way!)

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