From emotional advice to ideas and networking, there are many websites aimed at single mothers offering support and guidance to help you through this difficult period in your life.

Why not check out some of the following:

• One Space For Single Parents – parenting site for single parents
• Divorce Aid – resource for divorce advice and personal help
• Lone Parents – virtual meeting place for single lone parent dads and mums
• Single Parent Fun – online community for single parents
• Gingerbread – charity providing expert advice, practical support and campaigns for single parents
• Family Lives – national charity providing help and support in all aspects of family life
• Netmums – the UK’s biggest parenting website
• Ask A Mum – home of Pregnancy & Birth and Mother & Baby Magazines OnlyMums
• MATCH (Mothers Apart from Their Children) – a volunteer support network of mothers who have been separated from their children

An estimated 18 million people in Britain today are part of a step-family. A relationship with a woman who already has children inevitably brings with it a good deal of extra responsibility.

If you don’t have children of your own, you are gaining an instant family. If you already have children of your own, you will face the daunting task of merging two families together. However sensitively this is managed, there is bound to be conflict along the way. Below we have put together some hints and tips to make the process a little easier.

• Give it time. Becoming a step-parent is a complex task with lots of feelings to consider.
• Sit down with your partner and discuss the fundamental issues about eating, sleeping and discipline within a family.
• Be open and honest about your expectations and encourage your partner, children and step-children to do the same.
• Accept that your partner and his children will already have established models of discipline and support him with them.
• Be realistic. You may never be able to love your partner’s children the same way as your own but you can aim to build a fulfilling and healthy relationship with them.
• Expect to experience feelings of guilt. It may be that you will be spending more time with your step-children than with your own and you may feel torn between them.
• Continue to spend quality time alone with your own children and encourage your partner to do the same with his. This will provide much needed reassurance to all concerned.
• Don’t be tempted speak negatively about their biological mother and support their need to maintain close bonds with them.
• If you are merging two families into one home, sit down regularly together to discuss issues affecting everyone and draw up house rules.
• Don’t strive for perfection – all families have their ups and downs. If the majority of the time is harmonious you are doing a great job!

It is natural that there will be some conflict. Children can be fiercely loyal to their biological parents and naturally find it challenging to accept a new ‘father figure’ into their lives. Nevertheless, children often appreciate the effort you are making to bring them on board even when the situation is difficult and becoming a step-mum can be a rewarding experience with the opportunity to create a stable and loving environment for everyone.

Parental Responsibility For Step-Mums

Step-mums can acquire Parental Responsibility through a formal agreement or Court Order but all others with parental responsibility must agree before it is granted.

On acquiring Parental Responsibility, a step-mums have the same duties and responsibilities as any other individual including a natural parent with Parental Responsibility. Same sex partners in a registered Civil Partnership are also able to acquire Parental Responsibility by formal agreement or Court Order.

Another order that results in Parental Responsibility to a step-mum or other individual (e.g. grand-parent) is a Residence Order which regulates where a child will live and gives the individual with the Residence Order Parental Responsibility until the child is 16.

Here are some tips from MATCH Special Adviser and Counsellor Sarah Hart to help mothers living apart from their children.

• You have the right to feel good about yourself

Whether you’re a part-time mum or haven’t had contact with your child for years, it’s possible to let go of any unnecessary guilt or shame you might feel. Please don’t punish yourself and find help if you need it.

• Don’t compete for your child’s love

As non-resident mothers, whether we have regular contact with our children or not, we imagine that their father, his new partner or someone else is going to ‘own’ them more than we do, and use up our quota of allocated love. You can learn to reduce the struggle and urgency inside you by centring on your potential for loving in a broader sense. There is no competition – you are and always will be your child’s mother.

• Let go of trying to be Supermother

Supermother – the perfect, always loving, always available mother who raises perfect children – is the arch-enemy of all women and is a particularly nasty bit of work where mothers apart are concerned. Make a conscious effort to banish her. Try writing down the positives to be gained from being ‘good enough’, rather than perfect. For example: ‘I’ll do that scuba diving course I always wanted to do, which will set a great example for my child on living a life to the full.’

• You can change how you feel about your ex!

Some mothers apart are susceptible to remaining psychologically bonded to their ex by outdated patterns of relating, guilt and fear. Your quality of life after your divorce or separation is your choice. Whatever your circumstances, explore your part in the relationship and its downfall, dissolve your energetic connection with your ex and take stock of your emotions in order to truly separate and move on.

• Don’t make your new partner your therapist

Allowing your partner to slip into the role of your counsellor will put a strain on your relationship. As much as you love each other, the reality is that he or she isn’t a mother apart and will never understand exactly how you feel. If you are experiencing a lot of pain, confusion, anxiety or other strong feelings, please find additional support from someone outside your relationship.

• Be your child’s mother, not her friend

Let’s take discipline as an example. As mothers apart, we can hang our inability or decision not to discipline our children on a whole host of reasons – guilt, wanting to keep things ‘nice’, fear of rejection or an attack from our child: ‘What right do you have to …’or ‘Dad’s a much better parent than you, at least he understands …’. Separation means that your child needs consistency and containment now more than ever before. Know that without a doubt, loving your child also means saying ‘No’.

• Remember, another person’s judgement of you is not ‘the truth’.

Remind yourself of this every time you think someone is critical of your situation or you feel bad after reading yet another article about ‘unfit’ or ‘abandoning’ mothers.

• Never give up hope, especially if you don’t have contact with your child

You never know what’s around the corner – stories abound of children’s natural curiosity to find out about the parent they’ve been separated from. Live as well and as fully as you can, respecting your child’s right to learn about life in her own time and pace. If it’s appropriate, send letters, text messages or try to phone. Wait patiently and lovingly, and take extremely good care of yourself. If you live apart from your child, please find the support you need. Create an understanding support team around you – your friends, family and, should you need one, a counsellor.

MATCH exists to support mothers who are apart from their children because of ill-health, fostering, adoption, abduction abroad, alienation following high-conflict family breakdown or family rows.

Most of their Members used to be part of a family structure and were, in the main, its lynchpin. After divorce or separation, many were ostracised from that family, deliberately and maliciously, and denied the opportunity to support the well-being of their children.

How they support you

MATCH believe if the general public knew more about MATCH Members, or were willing to learn, they might begin to ask hard, difficult questions about how children can be better protected, particularly in high-conflict family breakdown as well as in some unique situations concerning the fostering and adoption of children.

Their quarterly Newsletter welcomes and, indeed, depends on contributions from Members who generously share their thoughts, experience and wisdom through letters, articles, poetry in the hope that it may bring a small measure of comfort to other mothers apart. Only a mother apart knows how another one feels when separated from beloved children.

Although all their backgrounds and experiences as MATCH mothers are vastly different, sometimes they share uncannily similar stories, particularly in high-conflict family breakdown where “controlling personality” types have been identified as powerful, manipulative figures. This “type” plays a subtle but key role in premeditating the breaking up of the original family group, masterminding the re-building of a new family group to block out the ‘offender ‘.

It seems that, despite an almost flawless mothering history, once the mother decides to leave home – for whatever reason – the family, now dominated and controlled by one or several manipulating family members, reject her outright. Her mothering role cannot be continued outside the family home and must be aborted.

Local Support Groups

In some areas Local Support Groups have been formed where Members meet occasionally and informally. This offers an opportunity to discuss and share common problems, sometimes for the first time, with other mothers apart in a safe, non-judgemental environment where Members are sensitive and respectful of each other’s situation. Many Members find that emotional stress can be partially relieved through sharing attitudes towards tackling their own experiences or describing practical ways in which they have moved forward.

MATCH also have an AGM in London, perhaps the most important occasion for MATCH, where mothers apart come together to gain strength from their widely differing experiences. Many Members have made life-long friends at past AGMs.

Finally, on Mother’s Day, each MATCH Member across the world receives a hand-written card. These are posted to reach her on the day on which Mothering Sunday is celebrated in her country.

Visit the MATCH website for more information.