“It takes a village. I just do the best I can do, and I don’t try to be superwoman. You just improve greatly, because...there’s this little person who watches everything that you do. [Kids] are a direct reflection of the best part of ourselves.”
The Janét Aizenstros Foundation’s belief is no mother should raise a child alone.
Twenty percent of Canadian children grow up in single parent households. According to Statistics Canada, single mothers represent 15.9% of the Canadian population. Working single mothers are marginalized as they will not receive access to government or institutional programs based on their income.
This grave disparity has left many single mothers in distress having to seek out additional incomes which means more time away from there children, no opportunity for self-care and no community support. The unfortunate outcome weighs heavily on the mental health of the single mother being the only primary provider.
Through Help-A-Mom— a newly launched program alpha started in early 2018, that provides single mothers with the necessary tools needed to raise their children with support from professional women helping women in their communities. Once a month, these professional women select a single mother to receive a day off to restore her wellness.
Also, the selected single mother receives one-on-one coaching from the professional women who are supporting her by working with the local community programs to assist enhancing and developing life skills. The life skills could be teaching basic to advance financial literacy and or career planning assistance.
From this program, single-moms receive housekeeping support, errands delivery, and childcare aid which are based on a needs analysis.
REFERENCES
‘The Health of Lone Mothers’ by Claudio Pérez & Marie P. Beaudet
Census in Brief: Portrait of children’s family life in Canada in 2016
The Mental Health of Single Parents in Canada: Do Gender and Geography Matter?