Single Mom Therapy
Being a solo mom can be a challenging and rewarding experience at the same time. You have to be responsible to perform your day-to-day roles and become a mother, friend, dad, mentor, teacher as well as a working mother to take care of your children and make ends meet. It takes immense courage and strength to apply and be successful in these roles. If you are a single mom facing difficulties in bringing up your children then you can see therapy groups and counseling groups where you can build a community and meet other single parents. You can find paid as well as free group therapy for single moms near you and in online communities.
How Can Occupational Therapy Help Single Mothers?
The term occupation refers to things that occupy your time. Being an adult occupation can refer to anything that keeps you engaged during the day. For instance working, sleeping, education, self-care, caring for others, driving, eating, showering, leisure time, and so on. Becoming a single mother is a huge life transition. While mothers have support for all the medical aspects such as pregnancy, childbirth, etc. There isn’t much attention paid to the non-medical aspects of the transition to motherhood. A lot of single moms are looking for support so that they can adapt to the changing rules of life or the diverse experience of conceiving and early motherhood. Occupational therapists are equipped to work with single mothers and address the challenges that we face while transitioning to motherhood including establishing healthy roles, and coping strategies so they can easily transition to motherhood and self-care routines. Occupational therapy can help single mothers in the following ways.
- Helping single mothers get education on parenting challenges
- Engaging in enjoyable age-related play
- Increasing self-confidence and supporting healthy development
- Developing coping strategies and focusing on effective bonding between mother and infant.
Occupational therapy comes with an empathetic ear and counseling from experts that help single mothers to focus on the positive aspects of life and help them to cope with mental and health problems. The occupational therapy group includes workshops from the classes and community where single mothers can connect with others, feel better, and learn a lot of details that can help in their parenthood journey.
How To Explain Occupational Therapy To A Single Mom?
Occupational therapists are health professionals whose occupations include the therapeutic use of daily activities to treat mental, emotional, developmental, and physical ailments that are affecting the patient’s ability to carry on day-to-day tasks. Occupational therapists are practitioners who involve therapeutic techniques for improving, maintaining, or rehabilitating single mothers’ motor skills and improving their overall ability so that they can perform daily tasks. Therapists explain occupational therapy to single mothers by spending time with them so that they can cope with their life situation and address their problems. They also use tools like setting up a habit or routine to help them reach their goal, doing motivational interviews, offering adaptive equipment, and education about mother and infant development. A lot of single mothers who are unsatisfied with their functional performance in play, sleep, work, leisure, social interaction, education, and activities of daily living find it suitable to join an occupational therapy group. Occupational therapy is not the same as healthcare professions such as nursing or physical therapy as it treats the whole patient despite treating a physical disability, ailment, or particular injury. Joining an occupational therapist will help you to get treated by therapists who will use therapeutic approaches so that you can manage your day-to-day activities and develop the skills required to perform your responsibilities smoothly.
Common Stressors For Single Mothers And How Therapy Groups Can Help You
Single mothers face a lot of problems unlike married parents and they have to deal with them alone. Joining a therapy group for single mothers will help them to deal with everyday hardship in a better way and take good care of their children. These therapy groups will keep them in good mental and physical health as well.
1. Work-Life Balance
Employed single moms have to encounter a lot of barriers while striking a balance between general wellness and work demands. Single mothers do not have a spouse or partner to split household responsibilities and childcare costs. As a result, a lot of single mothers have to sacrifice self-care for taking better care of their children such as swapping sleep. Financially challenged single moms find it difficult to put food on the table, access good medical treatment and enjoy leisure time. Joining a therapy and support group for single moms will help you to learn how to make a balance between job and work.
2. Social Isolation
The USA has a high concentration of solo-parent households globally. Around 2/3 of adults in America perceive single-parent households as a negative trend. The religion or culture of a single parent can determine the type of stigma they have to encounter in their day-to-day lives. Single-parent families, especially single mothers, have to face social isolation as a result of which they have to deal with anxiety, depression, and isolation. Joining a therapy group and a support group will help to deal with isolation in a better way and get a support community.
3. Financial Strain
Single moms face financial insecurity, unlike two-parent households where married households can split responsibilities and monthly bills. American parents have to pay around $14,117 every year to cover childcare costs. Single-parent households have to spend three times this cost. Families that are headed by married couples are at higher risk of poverty and unemployment. Online support groups and therapy groups provide a good opportunity to single moms so they can build human connections, practice self-care, and also learn financial tips and strategies from other single parents.
Single Moms Group Therapy
Single motherhood is a whirlwind of daunting and rewarding experiences for every single mom irrespective of whether they are married, widowed, or divorced. Following are those single mom therapy groups that help them to overcome this everyday stress and reach their goals quickly.
1. Parents Helping Parents
PHP or Parents Helping Parents believes that good parenting is a fundamental right of every child. This organization holds a lot of support groups and parent hotlines for single moms and dads. You can view the schedule of parents helping parents by attending a virtual support group. The support group includes single mothers in recovery, men’s support and parents having special needs teens.
2. Life Of A Single Mom
It is a nonprofit organization that is run by a ministry of the church and assists single moms to locate therapy and support groups that are conducted worldwide. If you are locating a group near you then you can just type the zip code and you can see a lot of options generated for you. The therapy and counseling groups focus on financial support, parenting as well as health and wellness. Life Of A Single Mom offers volunteer opportunities and resources that can be of immense help to single moms.
3. SupportGroups.com
This website has access to more than 220 support groups for parents. This website works as a social media network where single dads and moms can make an account, post every day or leave comments on each other‘s posts. Single moms who are looking to build a support network for themselves will find this website to be useful. Apart from this, you can access hotlines and helpful links, and get professional advice and therapy related to life problems or mental illness, child abuse, domestic violence, and many others.
4. CircleUp
This website hosts online spaces for groups of people so that they can navigate through similar struggles together. Therapists, psychologists, and professional social workers lead every circle. Participants including single moms can access weekly video meetings, science-based coping tools, and online group chats to manage their life problems. Around 86% of group members reported that this website has given them positive hope and around 70% stated that they feel supported after joining weekly video meetings of circlesup.com. The membership cost of this group is around $79 per month, however, circles provide financial assistance to people who are in need and require one month’s trial.
5. Single Moms And Single Dads Support Group
Single moms looking for free therapy groups will find this site useful. There are more than 44,000 members who offer an online forum and a community where you can join free of cost. You just need to click, join the group and enter your username and password. Single Moms And Single Dads Support Group will help you to connect with other single parents, discuss your problems and expand your social circle. There are sites for specifically single moms and single fathers. Users may be widowed, divorced, or single by choice. You can also tag your post as a single father or mother and connect with others. People who are suffering from divorce, depression, and loneliness will find this site to be extremely useful.
6. Meetup.com
This website holds one live event per week for more than 59 million members coming from 190 nations. The Single Parent Meetup section has around 777,000 members and around 700 groups. Single moms can explore different healthcare practices, interests, troops on this website, and activities like poetry writing, mountain biking or moms’ night out, etc. This website enables single parents to develop an identity of their own outside their parenthood.
7. Parents Without Partners
This is a nonprofit organization that provides community resources and useful information to single parents coming from Canada and America. The organization hosts a lot of confidential spaces so that single parents can help each other, develop mutual understanding and enjoy companionship with one another. The nonprofit requires parents to hold orientation meetings before applying for membership and parents who do not have custody of their children can also become a part of this nonprofit organization.
Single motherhood is a whirlwind of daunting and rewarding experiences for every single mom irrespective of whether they are ever married, widowed, or divorced. Following are those single mom support groups that help them to overcome this everyday stress and reach their goals quickly.
Conclusion
Joining a single mum therapy group is a brave and effective way to confront the difficulties of your life and chat with other single parents. These groups are led by experts and professionals who can provide you with immense resources and emotional support. If you’re looking for a comfortable and convenient way to meet other parents then online support groups for single moms and dads will be the right choice for you that are open for chatting throughout the day and do not come with specific scheduled time. Occupational therapy for single moms helps them in areas like pediatrics, mental health, environmental modification, low vision, school system, physical rehabilitation, eating, feeding, and many others.
