The solo revolution: What it means to be a single woman today
'The problem isn’t being single, the problem lies with the toxic narrative that we are fed about singledom, which was particularly focused on single women'
It remains utterly bizarre in 2022 how, in the run up to February 14, everything involved with being in a partnership is celebrated while being unattached continues to get seriously bad PR, to put it mildly.
In theory, we’ve come a long way from Sex And The City and it’s characters ultimately deeming themselves worthy based on the men they were dating (the less said about And Just Like That the better mind you!), but the pandemic has definitely given singledom a new focus — and not necessarily for the better. It feels like all we read and talk about are the years lost, who found love during lockdown, who didn’t, and what’s next now that some normality seems to be on the horizon.
With my decision to forgo Zoom dates during that time (I just couldn’t), I discovered US writer and podcaster Shani Silver’s brilliant A Single Serving podcast and her book, A Single Revolution. However, more impressive was the community that had built up around this changing narrative of what it means to be single today.
There are Facebook groups, newsletters (journalist Nicola Slawson’s The Single Supplement is a personal favourite), and more books (no less than three authors told me they had books coming out on this topic, including author Angelica Malin). I have enjoyed meet-ups with fellow single women from all walks of life: some single by choice, others new to it after the end of long-term relationships and trying to adjust, but usually just brilliant women trying to have more agency over their lives. This is what is at the centre of this community. It hasn’t really found a footing in Ireland yet but it’s gaining momentum in the UK and US, with books, columns, and debates.
“I’m not an advocate for singlehood. I’m an advocate for women feeling good while single — there’s a difference,” Silver tells me as we talk about the community she has single handedly (pun intended) built on the basis of this.
Was she surprised at how this community has taken on a life of its own? It was, she says, inevitable.
“And there’s only so long that single people who are looking for genuine connection and companionship can slog through a dating space that is just coated in abuse and micro-traumas, and really just a huge lack of manners.
“There’s only so long we can do this, it’s going to cause a tipping point. And we can only do it for so long before we’re going to ask ourselves why we’re doing it. And what’s it for? Why am I here? Why am I even doing this to myself?
“It’s that point of exhaustion. That tipping point can make people challenge themselves, what really is so bad about being single, and there really isn’t that much,” she says.
“When you give it a chance to shine, singlehood almost immediately rewards you with wonderful aspects that we have been ignoring because we’ve been conditioned to ignore them and to believe that couplehood is the correct way to exist, and singlehood is the wrong way to exist. But that’s just a lie.
“I don’t know any other way to say it. Couplehood and singlehood are absolutely equal in value. And I hope that the work that I’m creating can start introducing that idea to people, particularly those who are exhausted with the dating space,” she explains.
Silver says the first thing to do is to dispel the myth that putting yourself out there will yield results in the name of love.
“We don’t know what it takes [to find love]. It is random. It is not within our control. It is unpredictable. There is no way to say if you do this, you’ll find a relationship. If you try this, you’ll find a relationship. Dating is one area of life where effort does not match reward and that makes people uncomfortable and scared.”
When I put a question about being single on Twitter, I was overwhelmed with the amount of responses I received. Irish writer and author Claire Hennessy was one of the first to reply.
“A relationship with yourself? NOTIONS! I mean, it feels self-indulgent and narcissistic and all those other things to even talk about ‘building a relationship with yourself’, doesn’t it?” she says. “And as women we are socialised to think of others, rather than ourselves, to serve and to accommodate and to do all that. And while that’s really important, it’s also important to mind yourself.”
It’s important to clarify what minding yourself really is, she says. “It’s not in that Instagram-ish way of doing ‘self-care’ that’s all about bubble baths and expensive products, but to make sure you’re getting enough sleep, that you’re eating well, that you’re seeing daylight, that you’re doing some kind of movement, that you’re doing something that calms or soothes your soul in some way. If you don’t do that stuff, you run out of energy to mind others — but also you deserve to do that stuff for yourself because you are a human being, full stop.”
Self-talk is just as important as self-care, she says.
“It’s mad because even when I see those words ‘single woman’, I immediately think: ‘Spinster! Failure! Unlovable!’ That’s still my knee-jerk response, even as someone who’s quite happy to talk about being single. There’s still this little part of my brain that thinks it’s terrible and a shame and a pity — and in many ways that’s a part of the brain that is nurtured by society, where we have all these narratives about how someone’s so great, isn’t a pity that they can’t find someone… as though romantic relationships have anything to do with what someone’s like. I mean, Hitler had a girlfriend!
“It’s not a mark of your worthiness or goodness as a person. And yet… we can know this intellectually and still feel ‘lesser’ for not being romantically paired off.”
Karen Sugrue, a psychotherapist and sociology lecturer in Limerick, says the stereotypes around being single have been proven wrong in studies, something which many either don’t know or choose to forget.
“From birth we are all told a fairy tale about love and romance — it’s the ‘happily ever after’ story where to be a successful adult, you need to be part of a monogamous long-term couple. Otherwise you are an object of pity, assumed to be lonely and unhappy.
“That’s how the story goes and we are told versions of this over and over. You will die alone if you are single. These are really toxic and coercive messages, all designed to reinforce the happily ever after myth. They are telling married people to stay married and single people to get into a couple at all costs rather than suffer the ignominy, isolation and despair of singledom. What’s really interesting is that research tells a very different story.”
Bella DePaulo, professor of social psychology in the University of California and leading voice in the newly emerging area of single studies, says the research actually tells a story that is the exact opposite of what is hammered into us by popular culture. Single people have more friends, more hobbies, stronger relationships with parents and siblings, more community links, and are happier — and that includes during Covid lockdowns — than their married or coupled-up counterparts,” she explains.
“The problem isn’t being single, the problem lies with the toxic narrative that we are fed about singledom, which was particularly focused on single women. However, I think that this is starting to change and I think we will look back and see that we have Covid to thank for that,” she continues.
“Covid has shown women very clearly that they are the heroes of their own stories and shone a harsh light on the myth that we need romantic relationships to stop us feeling lonely. Evidence coming out from around the world is that women formed about 80% of the frontline staff during the pandemic, did the bulk of the care work, juggled jobs, kids, parents, homeschooling, child care, and all the household and worry work they were always doing — without any of the patchwork of supports that they had quilted together for themselves. We can see women are increasingly building communities of friendship and support with other strong, powerful, brilliant women.”
Whether you’re looking to stay single or want to reframe your outlook, Silver says there are ways you can move through life as a single person without the weight of expectation lingering.
“I would de-centre dating. And what that means is your whole focus is not on the fact that you’re single and the fact that you need to find someone but finding more balance... Ibetween that area of your life – it doesn’t have to claim the lion’s share of your headspace because when it does, the highs are too high and the lows are too low. It’s just an unbalanced way to live. I think that we can also live more by looking at life and seeing how much time are you devoting to dating apps?
“Simply do more that has nothing to do with the fact that you’re single and everything to do with the fact that you’re human pursuing hobbies, pursuing adult education, pursuing new friendships. And finally, we have to stop waiting. We have to stop waiting to do things or setting things aside on a mental shelf thinking OK, I’ll do that when I’m partnered. Because when you stop waiting for your life to start, and you start acknowledging that it already has, it makes a huge difference.”
