Dating with children
By Tanya Bricking
Advertiser Staff Writer
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| "I wouldn't even date a person if I didn't think they would get along with my daughter."
Mike LaMendola Illustration by Martha Hernandez • The Honolulu Advertiser What you can do Create a local network for single moms by logging on to Single Moms Connect, a free service. Go to www.CompleteMom.com and fill out the application form. A match will be made based on the information you share. Or phone (800) 804-9210 to request an application in the mail. Men or women who are divorced, widowed, separated or never-married parents are invited to join Parents Without Partners, a nonprofit educational, support and social group. For more information, see http://freepages.genealogy. rootsweb.com/~blackford/ pwp/default.htm or phone 262-6442. |
The Makiki grandmother now finds herself in a role reversal with her two grown daughters.
"I'm 58 years old, and I'm just starting to date," said Mendez, a preschool teacher's aide. She checks in with her daughters about her social plans, and she recently introduced the man she's dating to her family. "It's like now I'm the child."
When Mendez was raising a family, nobody ever talked about single parents dating. Today, she shares the experience with millions of others.
The Census Bureau counts 10 million single mothers with dependent children in the United States, nearly triple the number in 1970.
Single parents of both sexes and all ages belong to a group that's expected to grow even larger in a hurry, with the Census Bureau reporting that half of American adults are single, and the divorced population is the fastest-growing category of marital status.
For Mendez, the biggest challenge was bracing herself for the dating world and learning to trust again.
And for Mike LaMendola, a single father of a 12-year-old girl, rebuilding his confidence was the key to moving on with his life.
LaMendola, 52, a photographer and handyman in Mililani, divorced three years ago. It was his third marriage.
"The first year after my divorce, it was difficult for me to go out and start dating," he said. "One thing I was very particular about is I wouldn't even date a person if I didn't think they would get along with my daughter."
He tried dating services, but he found them expensive and unsuccessful.
One date who was not a love connection suggested that he try a group called Parents Without Partners, more of a social network and support group for single parents. He made friends there and became the Hawai'i chapter president.
Divorce made LaMendola introspective. He figured out what he wanted and what hadn't worked for him in the past. He's dating someone, and he's making sure to take things slowly this time.
Mendez and LaMendola are learning what Wayne Misner has been telling single parents for years: You've got to be assertive, put yourself out there and risk rejection if you want to find love again.
"You can't wait for someone to come knocking at your door," said Misner, author of "Men Don't Listen" (iUniverse.com, 2001, $14.95) and the owner of a healthcare consultant company in New Jersey.
Inspired by loneliness
Misner fell into a second career as a relationship guru after his own 23-year marriage ended. One Christmas day when his daughter was a teenager, she opened her gifts and then went to her mother's house. Misner was sitting in the living room of a big house by himself, and that's when he decided he didn't want to become a lonely old man.
He bounced around on his own for a while, thinking friends would introduce him to potential dates, but that didn't work out. Finally, he joined a single parents social group and began speaking and writing about relationships. He found love again himself, and he encourages other single parents to take risks — like asking someone on a date. Because the worst that could happen is they would say no.
"You have to have alligator skin to handle rejection," he said. "But I think what got me through it was my desire that I didn't want to go through life alone."
But how do you find companionship and chemistry, as well as someone who will accept your kids?
Amy Minami thought that might never happen.
Minami, 50, was a stay-at-home mom on the Mainland when her marriage fell apart nearly a decade ago. She moved to Hawai'i to start over with her son, who has mild cerebral palsy.
Her son, who's now 19, wanted to find dates for her even before Minami thought she was ready. She had enough to deal with finding work as a hospital dietary clerk, raising a son in a new place and making time for herself.
When she did date, she would eliminate men if her son didn't like them.
Then she met someone who clicked. He had three children of his own, and a year after they started dating, the children all met.
Theirs is the kind of blended relationship that's becoming part of the norm in today's society. But with complicated relationships come complicated challenges, like dealing with kids who rebel against a parent's date, budgeting the money to pay for a night on the town or simply finding time for a social life.
Two-part process
Sheila Ellison has been there.
Ellison, the California author of several parenting books and the newly published "The Courage to Love Again" (Harper San Francisco, 2002, $23.95), says finding love again is a two-part process. The first part is an inward journey of loving oneself and getting rid of old patterns to make room for something better. The second part is the outward journey toward a healthy new relationship.
That rah-rah attitude made sound easy coming from Ellison, who blended a family that includes four teenagers from her first marriage and two from her husband's. But when she was first divorced, she had four children under 10 years old, and she says she thought her life was over.
Pitfalls can await the single parent who tries to date, as Ellison well knows — from children sabotaging dating plans to adults too quick to discipline their date's children.
Part of her book addresses what parents should expect about such things as their children being jealous of a new romantic partner. She advises against creating a revolving-door atmosphere that might fuel a child's fear of abandonment. But most of the book focuses on empowering women to feel more confident about restarting their love life.
She says too often, single mothers especially feel they are alone, struggling to keep everything going, with little time to relax or nurture themselves.
Ellison said a friend who can relate to the challenges can make all the difference. This week, she's launching Single Moms Connect, a free service that will be a support network to match single moms in the same area. (See box.)
Dating again doesn't have to be so daunting, she said.
"Instead of seeing it as an auditioning process," she said, "you have to see it as a fun way to practice being the person you want to be."
Reach Tanya Bricking at tbricking@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8026.
