I used to think that as a single parent, I was just burnt out. Being my child’s only source of emotional and financial support, I need to make the income of 2 people to live near my work in downtown Toronto so that I can handle school drop-off and pick-up and work 2 jobs, and cook, and clean, and improve my education and pay taxes… and on and on. It’s just the way it is. Then COVID happened.

In 2020, my son’s father, who owed over $500k for a decade’s worth of child support and interest, was found and sentenced to prison (this sum has grown significantly since then). As retaliation, he vowed to bankrupt me with frivolous court applications until I agreed to rescind his entire debt.

Rewinding to 2013, when his wages were garnished, he quit his job and left the traditional economy, opting instead to become the President of his own private aviation company. He was paid God knows how and didn’t remit taxes. I, in contrast, went back to school to start a finance degree and moved in with my mother.

When he was released from prison in 2020, he filed a fresh case against me. I never asked for this. Now, not only am I working myself to the bone to support my child, studying for the final CFA exam, home schooling my child during COVID, add what would become over $100,000 in legal fees. He took the position that he would never be able to afford to repay his debt on his meagre income of $7080/year (while paying his lawyer $600/hr to come up with the narrative), and as such, should have it expunged. He completed year’s worth of back taxes, claiming just enough to receive CERB, a covid benefit distributed to those impacted by the pandemic.

I remember the day I found out that CERB income would NOT be automatically distributed to the recipients of child support, despite federal garnishment orders. This was the day I realized I wasn’t suffering from burnout, it was societal betrayal.

This isn’t burnout. This is betrayal.

Just to be clear. My ex has no expenses (according to his court documents, which say he lives with his parents), is making money into corporations, claims just enough income under his name to not pay tax, is in contempt of every court order ever issued and moved all assets and bank accounts out of his name. He has federal garnishments issued against him. He is an undischarged bankrupt. Now, he’s getting tens of thousands of tax-payer dollars in subsidies. And guess what? He doesn’t even need to pay tax on that, because the government has no means by which to collect since he has no wages to garnish. When I called Revenue Canada to ask why CERB didn’t flow through to the deadbeat support payor’s children, the response I got was that it was “emergency relief”, and as such was not subject to garnishment. This was the slap in the face my country gave me, reminding me that the help I so badly needed would not be coming.

While he’s getting free money funded by the taxes I’ve been paying, I’m terrified of losing even 1 of my 2 full time jobs that I get paid for. Add to that, the unpaid labour that comes with managing a household, educating my child and the guilt of feeling as though I’ve failed because “I should be doing more.”

It’s easy to use the word burnout to describe the stress we feel from the crushing reality that our family’s survival is on us and the stability of our sole income. We’ve been conditioned to put the blame on ourselves – that we don’t make enough money, that we’re not smart enough, good-looking enough to attract a loving partner or resilient enough to weather the never-ending storm. No bath can help heal these wounds. What we need is subsidized therapy and paid child-free days off.

It’s the unpaid labour of (primarily) women that we relied on over the course of the pandemic. Those of us who managed to keep our jobs are slowly losing our minds. We were barely hanging on before. When will our health be prioritized? When men feel the same type of burden maybe? We can read article after article about maternal stress and how millions of women have left the workforce post pandemic. Why then, has there been virtually no cultural or policy response to this mental health crisis? Does no one really believe that stressed out mothers pass on their anguish to their children? We know that this has huge impacts on brain development, so why is nobody listening?

It’s because we’re generally too tired to take the microphone. We don’t have the strength or the time between our 3 jobs, raising our children and crying in the bathroom. But we need to find our power, or else the societal crowbar will continue pulling the gap wider and wider between us and our wed counterparts. This work can be done and needs to be prioritized, if not for us for our children. We need to help hold the same door that closed in our faces, open for those that will come after us.

Changing each one of our internal landscapes individually and reclaiming who we are will lead to a rise in the collective power of single moms and dads. Once a critical mass of focused individuals, who care enough to lift those who are more vulnerable than they are, has been reached – we will have power to change the systems that hold us down.  

Your power is relative, but it is real. And if you do not learn to use it, it will be used against you, and me, and our children. Change did not begin with you, and it will not end with you, but what you do with your life is an absolutely vital piece of that chain.
– Audre Lorde, American Poet and Activist