{"id":41186,"date":"2025-12-20T16:41:57","date_gmt":"2025-12-20T16:41:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/usa\/dating-after-your-partner-dies-is-hard-i-feel-guilty-for-wanting-connection-but-i-also-need-it\/"},"modified":"2025-12-20T16:41:57","modified_gmt":"2025-12-20T16:41:57","slug":"dating-after-your-partner-dies-is-hard-i-feel-guilty-for-wanting-connection-but-i-also-need-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/usa\/dating-after-your-partner-dies-is-hard-i-feel-guilty-for-wanting-connection-but-i-also-need-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Dating after your partner dies is hard. I feel guilty for wanting connection, but I also need it."},"content":{"rendered":"<figure><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i.insider.com\/694402bf04eda4732f2dc30a?format=jpeg\" alt=\"The author poses in front of a light-colored wall.\"\/><figcaption>The author<\/p>\n<p>Courtesy of Lisa Sparrell<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<ul>\n<li>Dating as a widowed  parent has brought unique challenges and emotional complexities.<\/li>\n<li>Solo parenting differs from single parenting, with no shared custody or breaks from parenting.<\/li>\n<li>Despite the obstacles, I&#039;ve found dating after loss possible and rewarding.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Dating is difficult at any age. Dating when you have a child is complicated. But, when you decide to date after the passing of your partner, there&#039;s even more to consider. I was 48 when my husband succumbed to cancer. My daughter was almost 10.<\/p>\n<p>Why would I want to date? I was heartbroken. A piece of my life and my entire vision of the future had been ripped away from me. I didn&#039;t want love. I wasn&#039;t interested in a replacement. I&#039;d lost the illusion of forever. <\/p>\n<p>I just wanted conversation, companionship, and a new way of looking forward and reimagining. But, any kind of reimagining requires imagination and reconciliation. I was parenting a traumatized child while also trying to care for myself.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>What would my daughter think about me dating? Would she think I was betraying her dad?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>I didn&#039;t tell my daughter I was going on dates at first. I didn&#039;t bring anyone to meet her until I&#039;d had a few positive dates. I didn&#039;t introduce her to anyone I didn&#039;t think of as potential friend, a good person. <\/p>\n<p>I was clear with everyone I went out with that I wasn&#039;t looking for something permanent and that I certainly wasn&#039;t looking for a new dad for my daughter. My daughter adored her dad, and rightfully so.  She had thoughts on the few people I did introduce her to:<\/p>\n<p>&quot;He&#039;s too young for you.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>&quot;He likes you too much.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>&quot;I don&#039;t have a good feeling about him. Even if he got me a good present.&quot;<\/p>\n<p>And, eventually, &quot;He seems pretty chill.&quot;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Then, when you find someone you&#039;re interested in seeing, there&#039;s the challenge of when and where<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Solo parenting is not single parenting. My daughter didn&#039;t split time between me and another parent. I couldn&#039;t tell a potential date, &quot;my daughter&#039;s with her other parent this weekend \u2014 I&#039;m free.&quot; <\/p>\n<p>I had to define what my boundaries were and enforce them. So, no one could be in the space I shared with my daughter. I couldn&#039;t make him dinner, invite him in for drinks. <\/p>\n<p>There&#039;s also not a lot of free time for a solo parent with a full-time job. I needed to be there for soccer, Girl Scouts, school plays. Those were nonnegotiable. I wouldn&#039;t date someone who wanted me to prioritize them over my daughter.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>There were also internal challenges I had to settle for myself<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Dating as a widowed parent means accepting a need for connection and feeling guilty for wanting it at the same time. <\/p>\n<p>What did it say about me? Did it mean that my feelings about my husband hadn&#039;t been sincere? Was it fair to the men I went out with? <\/p>\n<p>I wanted conversation with people who didn&#039;t know me in my married life, people who could see present and future me, but who also wouldn&#039;t push too much for a future with me.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Even with so much to consider, dating has not only been possible, but it&#039;s been positive<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Despite all of the challenges, I&#039;m not only making it work, I&#039;m thriving. I&#039;ve met some really good people who want connection, whatever that looks like, in this iteration of our lives.<\/p>\n<p>Read the original article on Business Insider<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The author Courtesy of Lisa Sparrell Dating as a widowed parent has brought unique challenges and emotional complexities. Solo parenting differs from single parenting, with no shared custody or breaks from parenting. Despite the obstacles, I&#039;ve found dating after loss possible and rewarding. Dating is difficult at any age. Dating when you have a child [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41187,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-41186","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41186"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41186\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/agooka.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}