Prowess of Single Parents'

By Jolly J Sen

This is a real life story of the success of a Single Father. How he helped his two kids settle down and become winners in life. The author is a single father and a dedicated Home Maker of 2 sons, 11+ & 15+. He learnt the hard way and had to discover almost everything about managing two young kids, battered and broken mentally. The idea behind the book is that all those parents trying to rear kids as single parent need not fear any more.  Most of it has been covered in this book. This book is certainly not a panache for all your troubles, but it will give you a fairly good idea as to how to make decisions quickly. This is more like a resource book explaining the author's take on different situations and how he managed to rear his kids and make them learn the practical way.

These are honest heart to heart stories implemented by him. Some of his thoughts couldn't put it in the right category. Some content has been sourced  from the internet and put in relevant sections of the book. All of them has been acknowledged wherever taken.  All content is original, first hand experienced and implemented and penned by him. The book guides how to make your kids survive happily with single parent and become great citizens. All life skills have been included to provide a survival kit for whichever condition in life a single parent finds themself.

This book is dedicated to all kids of Single parents who are seeking love. Unconditional and unabashed love, without any man made barriers.

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This book shares all my personal experiences and what I have heard from other single parents. Life will have many more different experiences to enlighten us. However, this book emphasises the importance of trust, honesty and transparency as the building blocks of life for the kids. So whichever situation we are in our life, if we stick around these basic principles, we would have done a huge justice to our kids.

The book traces the complete life style of a Single Parent. Right from initial days after being legally Single to again looking for another Life Partner and all steps in between. The book handles all sensitive areas of life of bringing up the kids. The book addresses difficult issues of the kids have to answer socially why they live with Single Parent, overcoming the trauma of living away from one parent and helping stabilize their lives. Creating values for kids their lives to teaching them Value Education and everything else in bring up the child in a healthy manner. Teaching kids manners and creating the art of controlling easy and quick gratification,  this book covers most aspects of real life bringing up kids. Once stabilized, the process of kids being brought into the mainstream life with other kids in the neighbourhood  and in school. This will not only include protecting kids from difficult questions but also ensuring a healthy communication between the parent and the kid. Bullies and interfering parents impact negatively on the kids. Protecting them from such family is important.

The best way forward in child upbringing is to keep an honest and transparent lifestyle. That will give the child a lot of confidence in the parent with whom he is living. I will also help him to communicate openly about all the issues that the child is facing and get their answers without feeling shy about it.

Bringing up a child as a Single Parent doesn't mean abstinence from everything else personally for a Single Parent. S/he needs to be just a wee bit careful. The Parent cannot upset the kids life again. At the same time s/he cannot afford to have an unproven relationship to make headway into the life of kids. The book details a soft approach to address this sensitive issue comfortably and successfully.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jolly J Sen
• Release date: Aug 28, 2020
• ISBN: 9781393006763

Book preview

PROWESS of SINGLE PARENTS’

PREFACE

I am a single father and a dedicated Home Maker of 2 sons, 11+ & 15+. I learnt the hard way and had to discover almost everything about managing two young kids, battered and broken mentally. The idea behind the book is that all those parents trying to rear kids single handedly need not fear any more.  Most of it has been covered in this book. This book is certainly not a panache for all your troubles, but it will give you a fairly good idea as to how to make decisions boldly and confidently. This is more like a resource book explaining my take on different situations and how I managed to rear my kids and make them learn the practical ways of surviving this life.

These are honest heart to heart stories implemented by me. Some of my thoughts couldn’t put it in the right category. So about 10% of the content has been retrieved from the internet and put in relevant sections of the book. All of them has been acknowledged wherever taken.  All content is original, first hand experienced and implemented and penned by me. The book guides how to make your kids survive happily with single parent and become great citizens. All life skills have been included to provide a survival kit for whichever condition in life a single parent finds them self.

This book is dedicated to all kid's of Single parents who are seeking love. Unconditional and unabashed love, without any man made barriers.

This book does not seek to justify the reasons why we have Single Parents kids. This book analyses how we as single parents have a responsibility of improving the quality of life of kids who are our very own blood and who are with us because of our own choice.

This book shares all my personal experiences and what the author has heard from other single parents. Life will have many more different experiences to enlighten us. However, this book emphasizes the importance of trust, honesty and transparency as the building blocks of life for the kids. So whichever situation we are in our life, if we stick around these basic principles, we would have done a huge justice to our kids.

About the Author

Jolly (Jawahar) has about 25 years of corporate experience and 10 years as an Entrepreneur. Jolly has written 3 books so far of which 2 books are on the effects of Covid 19 Pandemic.

Jolly had an illustrious career having worked in top organizations across India. A Topper in MBA from Aligarh Muslim University, 1983, he has experience as a Sales Head, Business Head, Operations Head, VP – Geography Head and Entrepreneurship. Companies he has worked for are Kelvinator, Sprint International, Escorts, Aptech Computer Education and Reliance Webworld.

Manthan Mindcare is an initiative by Jolly to provide free counselling and support to stressed out people. He provides help for stress management with real life solutions. Manthan Mindcare also guides for Career planning, Corporate Training, Coaching and Consulting. De-cluttering workplaces is Jolly’s one of the main area of work. He personally does Senior Management Coaching and career planning. He also helps free budding careerists to find a path true to their nature.

The books of Jolly are reflection of his experiences and based on practical experiences that he has had at workplaces. He has been fortunate to work in both purely Indian companies like Escorts, Aptech and Reliance and Multinational companies like Sprint and Kelvinator.

Jolly understands the decision making processes prevalent in both type of organizations and today his thoughts are reflected in the books written by him.

As a Single Pop, Jolly understands the value that needs to be created around family and kids. Hence, he is starting two podcasts:

Manthan:

This Channel is meant for Young adults and adults in theirmid career journey.

Jolly will talk about how to manage personal and professional life and achieve that work life balance. The Pandemic has brought in its own challenges in Relationship within the family and Businesses/Office. All of them will get  covered here.

It will be for 3 days a week to begin with, Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.

Jagruti:

This Channel is meant for School and College going students.

Jolly will talk about how to build careers and overcome failures. The talk will help students to find a right path for themselves. Besides this the talk will be around how to build oneself without the need of tuitions and how to plan the studies. The question of most students will be answered here.

It will be for 3 days a week to begin with, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

Jolly is based in Gurgaon, near Delhi, India. He can be contacted by email: [e-mail] or [e-mail]

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Chapter - 1

Single Life

It’s never a great idea of splitting from your spouse and starting afresh. Wasted time, wasted effort, wasted relationships and wasted financial opportunities are some of the thoughts that lay heavily on present life. If you have an offspring as part of your responsibility, then I think you have extra loads of work cut out for you. If you have a kid with you, then you also have an extra dollops of Happiness which no one else can bring. At all ages of their life, they are a source of perpetual pristine love. Enjoy the togetherness as long as they are with you and growing up. Once an adult, they will choose their own path and probably move out to charter their own life. Use this time to build the memories which you and your kid can share all your life.

I can say that I had to take care of young lives and I was shaken to the core, even though I am a man. It was a different cup of tea 6 years back. In fact in one of my emails to my ex-wife, I had questioned myself if I had the skills to take over the responsibility of 2 sons and bring them up all alone. After about 5 years and a huge struggle, I feel proud that I did it! I won over all adverse conditions. This win was not to prove anything to anybody. My last 5 years has been dedicated to bringing up my kids, single minded. I think the fight was more with myself. The fight to be fully fit to take on the responsibility. The fight was to prove myself that I had the wherewithal to take on the challenge and ensure that the kids are taken care off well. Most of the time the challenges life throws up at you are meant to create a better version of you. Treat them as personal difficulties and personal wins. You will end up as an enlightened person.

There are ways and alternate ways to deal with our responsibility. Your choice defines what type of future you are looking for yourself and the kids. None of the approaches are wrong if at the center of all decisions are the concern for the young life you have promised to protect. If the kids aren’t at the centre of the picture you have of your family, then it's a yoke that you carry, looking for a suitable time to give off. That's not the best thing for young minds.

If we take our child as a mere responsibility, then we have a huge burden with us. We will then have to decide how long to keep them and when to move out of that responsibility. Did you think like this when you had decided to bring him. Is this your normal? It's either a safe moment to move away and put them in a hostel while you chase your dreams and your career or someone enters your life and you decide to take decisions which are more advantageous to you. May not be necessarily beneficial for the kids. Here you are looking at yourself and what’s convenient for you. Your child is merely a responsibility of bringing them up.

However, if we take our child as a part of yourself, then he is not a mere responsibility. Then kids are part of your larger picture in life. Whatever be that picture, your kid is never out of that frame. What we need to understand is that kids are not looking for transactional parents, they are looking for parents who would partner them in their growth. The kids are your responsibility. Even if you are separated or divorced and kids living with you or with your ex.  Yes, the kids have a lot of hope and aspiration from you. They have no other Hero in their life. You are their Hero, their role model.

Our needs and socio-financial status decides most of them. However, I never threw out my kids out of my frame. Although my very basic survival was at stake. No Money, No support and No family had made my position pretty precarious. I was alone and single in Gurgaon. However, I did not lose hope or ever doubt myself that I would not be able to take care of them. I always maintained my picture intact with kids. So in spite of my weak financial position, I took the responsibility for my kids. The operative part of life is whether you are willing to share your life with a kid or you wish to go solo. The day we decide to become a parent, we have taken a conscious decision of sharing our lives. Nothing wrong with either decision. However that decision needs to be made with a clear thought so that it doesn’t blur your vision later on.

Was I being emotional? Was I being a fool @ 50+. Both questions were irrelevant. Both had no relations which described my closeness to my kids. My ex had mentally moved out of the family at least 5 years from the day we decided to go for divorce. The kids were left at the mercy of domestic help while I worked at the office. A few mishaps at home forced me to relook at my imperatives in life. It would have been easier had I ignored the signals then in the garb of being busy at work. My kids were equally important as my job. My intrinsic family values had always put family needs above personal needs. Hence my kids' wellbeing were more important.

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This is how I schemed my survival strategy

IMPERATIVES

The most harrowing part is settling personal demands during divorce. As a Man, I had to give off everything conceivable. I was left with INR 500 in cash, a broken down car and a home filled with trash.

By this time, however, I had a plan ready for what to do.

1. Save Cash

The first plan was to conserve cash. I couldn’t spend on anything just for the heck of it. So instead of an Attorney heading the negotiation I settled for a personal negotiation to resolve and reach a reasonable decision. I saved on Lawyer costs. Anyways, ex had taken away all cash. So I had nothing additional to lose. I couldn’t allow good cash to chase bad cash. My suggestion to all parents going for a split, please do it within your bedroom. Keep the Lawyers out as only they will make money. Both of you will lose. If you can't handle it together, then have some seniors present in the meeting to drive some sense in the negotiation.

Lawyers work for themselves only, not for you. So use them only as a procedure of Law and pay the minimum fees.

Once you decide to mutually accept the terms, let the person who is keen to move out apply for a mutual divorce. This saved me additional money. My ex was keen to move out and her boyfriend was ready to bankroll her. That was OK with me. I paid no Lawyer fees in the whole Divorce.

After the divorce her lawyer asked me for a big sum to get me a certified copy of the divorce order. I didn’t want to. I was so busy with kids that I knew I wouldn’t need them for many years. I saved that cash also. So how did I get a copy of the divorce paper. My ex had to inform the kids' school about her changed status. The school asked her to provide copies of the court order. The school in turn forwarded me those papers to verify if my ex was claiming the right status. I verified that the papers were in order and the Divorce papers reached me without spending a penny. Patience pays.

I guess by now you must have understood how focused I was in not spending money unnecessarily. My idea