Being a mom is not
an easy task. It is even more challenging if you are a single mom. I have a
friend who is a single mom. Her name is Lorrie. She arived in Canada last July
as a permanent resident. She was two months pregnant when she arrived here. She
didn't know what life she would be having or how she would start her new life in
Canada knowing that she was pregnant. She stayed at her aunt's place. It was not
easy for her to search for a job. After a month of searching she found a decent part-time job as floor
associate in Walmart. A few months later she was
hired as a food service worker in a hospital. She worked hard so that she
could buy stuff for her
coming baby. She worked two part-time jobs and worked night and day just to earn
the money.
In
February 2010 at nine o'clock in the evening she gave birth to an 8lb, 52.5 cm baby boy. She was so
happy when she saw her first baby. She was a mom now. From that day the struggle
of being a single mom started.
Two months after giving birth she went back to
work because she didn't receive any help from the
government since her hours of work didn't met the requirements to get an employment insurance. It
was not easy for her to leave her son at a very young age to the babysitter.
Good thing her sister helped her take care of her baby when she went to work.
Her routine everyday was dropping off
and picking up her son at the babysitter, going to work and
after work taking care of her son.
Months later she
got a permanent full-time position in the hospital. She worked a full-time job
and a part-time job. Sometimes she worked 12 hours a day just to sustain their
basic needs. It was hard for her to be away from her son for long hours but she
couldn't do anything about it
because she was the only one making money for them to live on. The first year of
her stay in Canada was full of struggles.
After a year her
son still couldn't speak that much. He would only use gestures to communicate.
She brought him to a community clinic for vaccination one day and the
nurse asked her if her son was talking much. She told the nurse that he was not
talking as much as other kids of the same age. So the nurse give her advised on
what to do and she decided to send her son to a speech therapist. This was
another challenge for her since no one could bring her son to therapy. So she
decided to trade all her shifts just
to make the days of her son's therapy.
Every time the
season changed her son would get sick
and have a high fever. He was prone to seizures so everytime he got a high fever
he would have seizure. He could only take Tylenol for medication because he was
allergic to Advil. So that was another challenge for her, not to let her son's
fever go too high. Her son would had an ear infection
and had to be hospitalized for five days with
pneumonia. It was then she decided to quit her other part-time job so that she
could spend more time looking after him. She decided not to take any overtime so
that she could spend her days off with her son, who was everything to
her.
I felt sorry for
her seeing the struggle she is having. One day, I finally decided to help her. I
asked my husband if it was okay if we would help Lorrie. We were
married for ten years and didn't have any children. On September of 2012 we decided
to move into a duplex together with Lorrie to help her take care of her son.
When she went to work early in the morning I would be the one who babysat her son.
When she came home after work we would hand him back. If she worked late she would leave her son at the
babysitter. We would treat her as our younger sister and her son as our little
nephew. So far this situation is helping her. My husband and I are very happy to
see them every day.
Right now, her son
is a three-year-old boy. He is
very energetic and very active. She let him join some activities this summer and
brings him to his therapies and doctor's appointments. She is now used to their
daily routine. Being a single mom is a challenging role. I am very proud of my
friend Lorrie because she is brave enough to face the storm by herself.
I know that there will be more trials that she will be facing later but I
think she can manage them. But there's one thing that she is afraid of, the day
her son ask "Who is my dad?" "Where
is my dad?"
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