You can tell how much someone loves themselves by how quickly they remove themselves from situations that don’t serve them. I always say this: people know what they’re doing. So when someone shows you who they are, please believe them. Disrespect and abuse rarely start loud. Most times, it starts small. Subtle. Easy to excuse. People test you ,to see what you’ll tolerate, what you’ll explain away, what you’ll swallow in the name of peace. The moment they realise you have boundaries, that you won’t accept rubbish, that you’re willing to walk away… they retreat. Not because they’ve changed. But because they know you’re not the one.

Sometimes not knowing where to begin is actually the best place to start. I’ve learned that the moment you admit “I don’t know what comes next” is often the moment you stop lying to yourself. It’s the point where you finally drop the pressure to have everything figured out and allow yourself to be human. For me, beginning again didn’t come with a clear plan or confidence. It came with exhaustion, honesty, and a quiet realization that staying where I was would cost me more than trying something new. The most important thing wasn’t knowing the steps. It was wanting something better for my life. Wanting peace. Wanting growth. Wanting to feel like myself again. Beginning again doesn’t start with answers , it starts with courage. With choosing yourself even when the path is unclear. And somehow, once you take that first uncertain step, the way begins to reveal itself.

Sometimes the question answers itself. It’s not that the system failed single mothers , failure implies there was genuine intent to protect us in the first place. Most systems were designed around a “complete” family model: two parents, steady income, unpaid female labor, and silence when things get hard. Single mothers disrupt that design. They expose the lie that care work is free, that resilience should replace support, that women should “cope” instead of be protected. So when the cracks show , housing, childcare, healthcare, legal systems , it’s not a malfunction. It’s the system behaving exactly as it was built to. And yet… single mothers survive anyway. Not because the system carried them, but because they learned to carry themselves ,and their children in a world that keeps asking them to prove they deserve help. That awareness you’re touching? That’s not bitterness. That’s clarity.

I remember that as a fresh graduate, I was convinced my main priority in life was marriage. That was the focus. And I did it. Then it started, the rat race. First, marriage. Then childbirth. And suddenly, people began to watch my womb. You have one child and, while you’re still healing, you’re told: “No, better to finish having all your children while you’re still young. That way, you secure your place in your husband’s house.” When the children come, the narrative shifts again. Why are you talking about making money? What are you looking for? Shouldn’t your husband and children be enough? Aren’t they the most important thing? Focus on building your family. Lose the baby weight so that you can keep your home. It goes on. And on. It never stops. One day, you wake up to a painful realisation: your best years were spent serving other human beings, and now, in your fifties, you can no longer remember what your own dreams were made of. This conditioning. This manipulation. It happens quietly, inside the mind. And the hardest work of all is left to the woman: to recondition her own mind. Set your boundaries. Raise your standards. Reject self-sabotage. Only then can you be truly free.

There’s a name for it ,parentification. It happens when a child is forced to carry emotional or practical responsibilities far beyond their age. A child who should be learning, playing, and growing suddenly becomes: - the peacekeeper in the home - the emotional support for a stressed parent - the “mini adult” who never gets to rest - the one absorbing tensions they did not create Parentification is not love. It’s a role reversal that places heavy emotional stress on young shoulders that are not yet strong enough. Children thrive when they are protected, guided, and allowed to be children. They struggle when they are forced to solve adult problems, manage adult emotions, or carry the weight of a home. As parents, guardians, and a community, we must ask: Are we giving our children space to be children? Or are we asking them to heal wounds they didn’t create? A healthy home is one where adults take responsibility, and children are allowed to grow — not carry burdens. Let’s do better. For their sake. For our future.