Sex and the Single Parent

Key Points

• Portraying single parents, especially single moms, in a more multifaceted way in media and society is important.
• Single parents face socioeconomic struggles including financial constraints and time limitations.
• Single parents should incorporate self-care into their lives, including participating in support groups and therapy.

In the 2014 film "The Secret Sex Life of a Single Mom," a Lifetime movie based on a memoir by Delaine Moore, the protagonist, a mother of two divorces her emotionally abusive husband and, thanks to a dating website, finds sexual empowerment when she enters a relationship with a BDSM-style dominant-submissive dynamic. As her relationship evolves, Delaine's "dom" instructs her to be confident and in control of her sexuality.

"Trying to show parents, especially single parents, that they are more than just parents is an important thing to do," said Christine Conradt, a screenwriter who worked on the film. "It's also critical to acknowledge that parenting is difficult for anyone, even if you have a partner. There are some very unique problems that they have to overcome in parenting. Oftentimes, single parents depicted on television can be seen as selfish if they're doing anything for themselves that isn't also for their children."

This same assumption could be internalized by real-life single parents, according to Emily Sculthorpe, M.A., a primary therapist and the director of clinical outreach with the Center for Healthy Sex in Los Angeles.

"They may not feel like they have time or energy to pursue sex and romance, or may experience guilt pursuing these things for themselves because they feel they should devote all their energy to their children," she said.

It makes sense, then, that for Conradt, representing single parents on screen in such a way that they're shown as having "a right to do what makes them feel like full, complete people is really important."

Offscreen, persistent stigmas negatively affect single parents and their sex lives. Some single parents somehow manage to fulfill romantic and sexual needs even as they also face challenges related to caring and providing for themselves and their kids, sans partners, along with all the pressures associated with adulting in the 21st century.

Sex as self-care

Single Black parents encounter additional stereotypes that make reimagining themselves an oft-necessary component of radical love, according to editor and writer Ashley Simpo, in a story published by Parents in 2022. Simpo suggested the process should entail dispensing with the notion that pursuing sex and romance will damage kids.

"I personally feel like I consider sex to be a part of self-care. And I think that a lot of parents kind of limit themselves in that way or can limit themselves in that way because they're afraid of casual sex or how their kids might view them or how the world might view them," she said. "Especially as a Black woman, I think that we tend to be viewed very harshly when we're single parents."

Pleasure can be part of healing, she added.

"I think it's an incredible part of learning who you are and knowing who you are: empowerment," Simpo said. "And I think that reclaiming that when you are in the space of being single or polyamorous or whatever you are, is a huge deal. I always encourage my friends to get laid, honestly, especially my mom friends."

She said sex can serve as a reinvestment in physical well-being.

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Socioeconomic struggles

Ben Gwin, a single dad who organized a union with fellow workers at his job in Pittsburgh while raising a teenage girl by himself after her mother died, said lack of money and time has weighed heavily on him as a single parent.

"They should be able to support their families and spend time with them," he said about single parents, noting that applies to everyone else, too.

Gwin, who detailed his aforementioned struggle in the 2023 book "Team Building: A Memoir about Family and the Fight for Workers' Rights," said he often feels like there's something he's not doing that needs to get done and stress mounts.

"Having to do all the household stuff and work, it's impossible with the way society is structured, where everything is pretty much based on an outdated 1950s model," he said. "Like there's somebody at home to do all the domestic [chores] while somebody else is out working."

Gwin noted he was in a long-term, committed relationship while working on the "Team Building" book, but the partnership did not survive the pandemic. He added that it's difficult to pursue sex and romance because he's so pressed for time.

He said workplace organizing is one way to improve pay and conditions that can lead to more time and more money, which might make pursuing a romantic and sexual life easier for some single parents.

While qualifying that he can't speak for single moms, Gwin has thoughts about how unfairly they're judged by society.

"Single moms probably have it harder in general, just because usually the media and the way society portrays them as it's their fault that they're a single mom," he said. "Whereas, for me, the reaction to my single-parent status has been, 'Oh, my God, this guy is actually like a decent person and is taking care of his kid.'"

Pleasure-enabling single-parent pro tips

Steven Devillier, a father who moved with his daughter to Illinois because he couldn't get the help he needed in Texas, said that in addition to it being tough at times raising a young female as a male, single dads can face hurdles in obtaining resources and help.

"I was pretty much a homeless dude, DoorDashing every day to pay for motel rooms," he said.

His family offered to take in his daughter but not him. He said he knows society expects him to be the provider. He had decent-paying refinery work, but the opportunities evaporated when COVID-19 spread, and then he was working in a warehouse for $7.25 an hour.

Devillier joined a Facebook group for single dads.

"I see people crying on there," he said. "Some guys with kids are in dire circumstances."

Since moving to rural southern Illinois, Devillier has been able to raise and provide for his 8-year-old daughter working a stable janitorial job while receiving community support.

Sculthorpe said support groups and therapy can help people grapple with intimacy concerns, too.

"Given the potentially isolative experience of single parenthood, the ability to connect with and receive support from others managing similar challenges is very important," she said.

For Devillier, the lack of childcare/daycare services in the small town where he lives tends to stymie the pursuit of romantic and sexual partnerships. But sometimes he can find a babysitter. He's also used social media to find dates. His daughter will ask if he has a crush on a woman when she sees him with one, and he tells her when that's the case.

"I don't keep [anything] from my daughter," he said. "She is my best friend."

Mommy might be hooking up tonight

Simpo also sees value in parents having age-appropriate conversations about sex and dating with their children.

Telling a little kid that mommy is going to go hook up with someone tonight is probably not necessary, she explained. She typically keeps casual relationships to herself. But she thinks it's fine to be honest with children of a certain age, to let them know when you're friends with, care about, and having fun with somebody but are not in a serious relationship with said person.

"I think that those conversations, as your kids get older, are kind of a way to talk about sexual health and autonomy and your right to do what pleases you and what feels good to you," she said. "You can also include sexual safety and all those other conversations, but they're coming from a place of experience. In that way, your kid will know that you're not just preaching to them about something you're not doing yourself."

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Devillier said his daughter does have a bedtime, which is when he thinks single parents can, at least on occasion, find time for physical intimacy with a partner. But he stressed that for him his child always comes first.

In contrast, Simpo recalled a talk she had with her mother when her son was a few weeks old. It was apparent her marriage was ending and she'd be a single mom soon. Her mom told her the child would be happy and fulfilled if she was genuine and showed up as a whole person.

"They're figuring out how to be an adult by watching their parents," Simpo said about children. "So if they see their parent completely depleted, not investing in their own community, their friends, not really caring for themselves, not seeking pleasure and joy for themselves, not knowing how to take care of themselves and take time for themselves, then [the] kids aren't going to know how to do that either. And I feel like that defeats the purpose of pouring so much resources into your child when you're not showing them how to care for themselves."

It doesn't have to be like the movies

In the interest of self-care, Simpo has casually revisited dating apps while trying not to be too pessimistic about the prospects. She said going out on dates affords the opportunity to practice being around potential partners and to explore without expectations.

"I think this era of adulthood—being an elder millennial I hear is what I am—is interesting because you know relationships can look like anything," Simpo said. "They can be platonic. They can be polyamorous. They can be monogamous. They can be explorative.

"You don't have to box yourself into anything and [you can] just see it as a way of bringing some kind of pleasure into your life, whether it's someone to laugh with, someone to go on trips with, someone to go to the movies with, whatever it is. Just accept it for what it is, and don't try to make it like this planned-out romantic comedy that you might have in your head. It doesn't have to be like that."