Everything Girl

The word “sacrifice” is never neutral. It is a word laden with the weight of spiritual principles, historical examples and archetypes, and part of the human condition is that we do not escape the ways in which we will be called to it. You will be called to sacrifice something of extreme value, one way or the other. And when you are called to it, you can find that you do indeed possess what you need, deep inside yourself, to rise to it.

We are, of course, especially familiar with the sacrifice that comes with being a wife and a mother. Four years ago I was an at-home mother living with my husband and two children in an 800 square-foot cabin on the east coast of Vancouver Island. At that time, my children were ten years old and eight years old, respectively, and I had invested the entire previous decade exclusively dedicated to nurturing them while their father worked. We married in our very early twenties, and my husband and I had spent the subsequent thirteen years trying desperately to lay track. Shortly before our 14th wedding anniversary - three years ago - we finally ran out of steam, and the marriage finally derailed.

“You will be called to sacrifice something of extreme value, one way or the other. And when you are called to it, you can find that you do indeed possess what you need, deep inside yourself, to rise to it.”

Because we experienced a relatively amicable divorce, I was able to peaceably communicate with my children’s father in regards to their needs - keeping in mind the financial and emotional resources available to each individual parent. For a year and a half after my ex-husband and I separated, I lived with my children as a working single parent in my hometown of Toronto, Ontario, where I had relocated for the benefit of a support network of sorts as well as increased employment opportunities. Their father continued to maintain his home and employment on Vancouver Island, where we had been raising our children, but he often expressed his anguish at the geographic distance between his location and where the children were. Because their father had a stable home and income – admittedly superior to my own - I weighed the situation and decided to ask the children if they wished to return to Vancouver Island. While visiting him over the summer holidays, they decided that they wanted to “go home”…in spite of my belief and wish that I, in and of myself, am their home.

This was an unspeakably heartbreaking choice that was made with the needs of all considered and it was a decision that I agonized over from May to December of 2006. Perhaps it goes without saying that it was one of the hardest choices I have ever made in my entire life – but here I am, saying it regardless. It certainly was far more difficult than separating from my husband – and as broken as the marriage was, it was not at all easy to separate. In a sense, separating from my husband was about me once again declaring my ownership of my Self – which I had abdicated in a million tiny ways in the dysfunction of our marriage - but sending my children back to be with their father required that I willingly sacrifice my and much of the basis of my identity. Who was I going to “be” if I was not “doing”? What was my name if I didn’t hear “Mom!” on a daily basis?

According to Statistics Canada, studies showed that women’s incomes remain less than 60% of men’s (Statistics Canada, 1995; 2000), and that 56% of lone parent families headed by women are living under the poverty line, compared with 23% of those lone parent families headed by men.
Furthermore, a National Population Health Survey revealed that 43% of women who have undergone a marital break up (divorce or separation) had a substantial decrease in household income, while only 15% of separated or divorced men had a financial decline.

“Who was I going to “be” if I was not “doing”? What was my name if I didn’t hear “Mom!” on a daily basis?”

While facing the financial and emotional devastation of marital dissolution, a woman who chooses to be a non-custodial parent experiences a varying levels of alienation, regardless of the continually changing gender roles that modern women experience.

It is common for most people to react with an edge of suspicion when first informed that the mother has chosen to allow her children to remain in primary care of their father. Often, there is an assumption that the woman has a substance abuse issue, abuses her children, is emotionally unstable, or otherwise unwell or unfit. While there are certainly instances where this is accurate, it is unfair to assume that this is the case, simply by default. It is widely accepted that the father is non-custodial, and furthermore, the parenting ability of the father is not immediately called into question. Divorce rates show that in 2006, there were 1,414,060 single-parent families in Canada — or approximately 15.9% of all families. Of the lone-parent families, 1,132,290 were headed by the mother - and one must safely assume that there are a variety of circumstances that lead to these statistics that do not include abandonment or divorce.

A situation that is almost impossible to measure is the wrenching experience of the non-custodial mother being significantly removed from her children due to geographic location. Because of increased mobility, relocation for increased employment opportunities, or the need to maintain residence where there is a strong support network, non-custodial mothers occasionally find themselves parenting long-distance.

On December 29, 2006, I took Leah and Daniel to the airport to fly from Toronto back to their previous home in on the other side of the country. I had made plans to relocate to Montréal, in the neighbouring province of Québec, to pursue work and education immediately after their departure. At the time, I had hoped and believed that I would see them again over the spring or summer holidays, but as it turned out, I did not see my children until December 28, 2007 – only one day less than a full year since I sent them to their father. If I had known that it would be that long…I am uncertain that I would have found the strength to let them go. But letting them go when I did meant that I was forced to say that, in the aftermath of separation and divorce, their father was more materially equipped to care for them. And if I am brutally honest, and without shame, I must admit that at that time, he was also more emotionally equipped. I was empty.

In the year and a half that has passed, I have vacillated between heavy despair and a tentative hope that I have correctly made difficult choices in order to create a long-lasting, stable solution for continual difficulties that repeated for over a decade. I aim to set an example of strength and independence in a way that I did not demonstrate in the midst of a dysfunctional and tumultuous marriage. I have established a stable home and reliable means of employment, purged toxic relationships from my daily life and have had the opportunity to develop a loving, healthy relationship with a man who is my best friend and my emotional and intellectual equal. I have faced financial instability and discouragement as a woman re-entering the work force after being a homemaker for over 10 years in a new city with a different culture and language.

“It is worth it because the choices I made, though unspeakably difficult, were the best ones to make with what was available to me at the time.”

I find myself in a set of circumstances that are simultaneously overwhelming and exhilarating. I am both exasperated by the experience of swimming against the cultural current of the nurturing mother, empty nest syndrome, and how women must define their worth by our parenting, the state of our home, our body image as well as our performance at work and financial net worth.

I ask myself every day and every night if my choices were correct and worth the trouble and the risk, and I find myself immediately and consistently answering that question in the affirmative. Yes. It is worth it because the choices I made, though unspeakably difficult, were the best ones to make with what was available to me at the time. I am giving my children more of me, and in the long run, a better Me. I have faith that the choices I have made and will continue to make day-by-day will yield great results in the long run. Some have called it selfish – and some will call it selfish – but that’s a sacrifice I am willing to make, for my kids - and for me.

Renée Letros is mother to a teenage daughter and a just-about-to-be-teenage son. She lives in Montréal, Canada, with her best friend, partner and Love, Warren, in an idyllic tree-lined neighborhood surrounded by parks, cafés, bakeries, churches, and an open-air market. She focuses her writing mainly on non-fictional explorations of relationships with lovers, family, friends, co-workers, and community and culture

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