I had been planning a weekend trip for over six months to go to a Folk Festival by myself, but Manny decided to come the morning of and the whole structure of the weekend quickly shifted. But something else shifted as well, something unexpected. And it happened on the heels of the five year anniversary of moving back to NY.

It was our first morning and the showers were ice cold. Manny said to me, while laughing at my anguish under the cold water, to think of happy thoughts and smile through the pain. When it was his turn, his laugh continued to echo through the camp bathroom. He yelled over the shower curtain that smiling and thinking about how much he loved me and our life together was making the cold shower more bearable.

I sat on the stool listening to him and tears brimmed. I loved him more than anything, but I struggled loving our life. It wasn’t what I imagined nor was it what I dreamed. I always pictured sharing a home with a partner and our kids, maybe a dog running about. I never dreamed about divorce and single parenthood, managing the inner-workings of life and family on my own.

Later that morning, we stumbled upon a collage-making class and we decided to try our hand at cutting pictures out of old books and magazines to make something new. Manny was quick to pick it up, creating multiple wild characters like a shark with eyes from a cartoon cougar and legs from a duck. I was not as quick, perfectionism taunting me. I stood flipping through a magazine after magazine when suddenly the lady hosting the class whispered to me beautiful tales of single motherhood. How the joys of it outweigh the hard.

Later that morning, we were drawing in notebooks outside our tent beneath the hot summer sun. Manny was sweating, but said he wouldn’t trade the moment, even for cold air conditioning, because he was enjoying our time together so much. But what he did trade it for was the family who set up camp across from us who had three young boys. It was a warm welcome to our weekend. They scooped Manny right up into some of their family activities around the festival grounds throughout the whole weekend which gave me some moments to myself.

That evening, Manny ran to the main field to set up our chairs by himself. When I finally caught up with him, he was chatting away with an older couple next to him. As soon as I sat down, Manny bounced up and asked if he could go order us dinner at a food truck. I obliged, and watched him from afar. The husband leaned towards me and said he could talk to Manny for hours and enjoy every single minute of it. The wife leaned past him, interrupting, and told me that she was a single mom for years. She told me to keep going and to keep doing what I was doing, that they had never met a kid like Manny. My heart paused, realizing Manny must have told them our life story. “Did he tell also you where we lived?” I asked, half-kidding.

Later that night, I met a new friend who quickly related to experience after experience, knowing the ins and outs of single parenthood. On our last day of camp, Manny ran up to us mid-conversation and asked if I had cash for a cash-only popsicle. I did not, and apologized to him. My new friend grabbed cash out of her bag handed it to Manny, her gesture saying to me, “I’ve been there and I’ve got you.”

The next morning, Manny and I were packing up camp. He said how much he was going to miss camp because he never knew what time it was. I asked if he would miss the porta potties, and he said never. On one of our many trips back from packing up the car, an older man stopped us. He told Manny to never change who he was, that life would be so much easier if he kept the character that he had now. Manny ran back to our tent to keep packing when the older man began to cry. He choked on his sobs when he found out it was just Manny and me. He said how we had given him such encouragement and hope because his daughter had just become a single mom. Later he stopped Manny again, who was carrying the cooler to our car, to show him how to both lift and carry the cooler so Manny wouldn’t have a bad back like him when he was an old man.

And while we were waiting for the last concert to start, a couple who was standing next to us was in a lengthly conversation with Manny. When he ran back to our chairs to grab his water, they told me how deeply special he was. The wife, in tears, told me that her parents divorced when she was 8 and how much music meant to her during that time.

The past five years, there always seemed to be a darkness looming because I’m divorced and raising my kid alone. Because whole marriages, reconciliation, and nuclear families seemed to be praised as the best way to live life. And I was not only living the opposite of that, but I was raising my kid in the opposite as well. Divorce and single parenting is often looped in with failure and wrongness. And because of that, there was so much shame in my soul that it flowed into every vein, wrapping my body up tight, because exceptions like “we don’t mean you or your situation” do not matter once the label is stuck to your shirt — or your kid’s.

It’s been five years with pockets of hiding, scrambling, numbing, questions, doubts, confusion. Five years of figuring out who I was, not being married, divorced, raising a kid alone. Five years of fighting stigmas and beliefs in the attempt to try to soothe the ache and the shame.

But there at the festival, I felt seen and held in the deepest way possible. The label of being a single mom seemed to lose its sticky backing and fall into the mud outside our tent. And instead, the words single mom seemed to etch itself into my soul with the most beautiful ink.

In our home, single parenting is healthy, strong, and beautiful. In our home, love and respect come first. In our home, our family of two is whole and complete and stable. I’m proud of how far we’ve come. I’m proud of my kid’s heart. I’m proud of how he pushes through the hard and holds onto the beauty. I’m proud of how much I’ve grown as a woman and a mom. I’m proud of the home we’ve created together. I’m proud of how we are a team.

And as I was driving home from the festival, with tears streaming down my cheeks, I realized just how deeply the weekend had impacted me. What a gift for the five year milestone. The stigmas and shame sweating out of every pore through the heat of the weekend, the sun beating down, the wind hiding. Every interaction surrounding Manny and me in love, normalcy, support, and acceptance. I had fought every single minute of every single day since our life imploded to find it, and I finally felt that unescapable peace.

I’m proud of my kid and I’m proud of my family of two. I’m proud of our life. And I’m proud of being a divorced, single mom.

Because I do love our life together, and my kid loves it too. Maybe I didn’t dream of being a single mom, but I dreamed of a home filled with love.

And our home is overflowing with love.

It still feels weird on my lips, to say that I’m proud. But it’s what my heart sings. And we do talk and dream of the way our life could be different when we’re laying on the couch together hand-in-hand, but we still wouldn’t give up the moments we have together. Just ask Manny. He says he can’t wish upon a star because he has nothing to wish for, he has everything he wants.

And I couldn’t agree more.

I love my life, and I’m so proud of being a divorced single mom.