the things i carried alone.

ballad of an only parent

I don’t know why this is coming up again tonight, but I keep circling back to the same realization the quiet truth I’ve never said out loud: single motherhood has been the most impossible, invisible marathon of my life.

People see the strength. They see the accomplishments. They see the resilience. They see the kids who made it, who are alive, who are kind and growing. They see what survived.

They never see what it cost.

For weeks now, this image keeps coming to me. Maybe it’s the only way my mind can explain what these years have felt like.

Imagine we all start on some giant ship, out in the middle of nowhere. Someone blows a whistle and suddenly we’re all supposed to swim 100 miles to shore. There’s no choice. No debate. You jump.

And I did. I jumped.

But I didn’t jump alone. I jumped with two children on my back, both of them little, both of them fragile, neither of them able to swim. And I remember that early part of my life with them… I truly felt like I was holding all three of us above water with the tips of my fingers.

Everyone around us took off. Some had partners. Some had entire crews. Some had food and supplies. Some had little boats, or life jackets, or someone cheering from the sidelines.

And I was just… in the water. Kicking. Paddling. Trying not to drown.

It’s strange, the way loneliness feels heavier when people are nearby. Everyone kept swimming past, calling back, “You got this!” Someone would row over and ask me what I needed. And I tried, Gods, I tried, to find the words. But it’s hard to talk when you’re barely breathing.

So they tossed things into the water: a little encouragement, a meal, a compliment, something to “make it easier.” And I was grateful. I always said thank you. But none of it was what I really needed.

What I needed was someone to get in the water with me. To take a kid from my back and say, “Rest. I’ve got this one.” What I needed was presence. Support that didn’t require translation. Help that didn’t need me to first articulate my drowning.

Instead I carried them, my babies, every mile. I carried their fear, their needs, their hunger, their softness, their whole worlds. And I kept swimming.

People said I was strong, but they didn’t know the nights I felt like my ribs were breaking from the weight of it. They didn’t see the way I stared at the stars and begged the Gods for one solid moment of ease. They didn’t hear the silence I swallowed so my kids wouldn’t hear me cry.

Everyone kept getting further ahead, and I kept comparing myself to people swimming with empty arms. I kept wondering why I was so tired, so slow, so behind, forgetting entirely the difference in weight.

But I loved my children more than my own breath. And love can make a woman do the impossible. By the time we reached the shore, I wasn’t triumphant. I wasn’t proud. I wasn’t clapping or smiling or celebrating.

I was wrecked. Shaking. Burnt through. Skin raw. Heart torn open in a way that never fully stitched itself back. And the wildest part? People looked at me, this woman who had just dragged two human beings across an ocean alone, and said things like:

“It wasn’t that bad.”
“You did great, now what’s next?”
“Come on, get up, life keeps going.”

They had no idea I had been keeping myself alive with nothing but willpower and prayer.They don’t see the miles I swam. They don’t see the weight I carried. They don’t see the nights I swallowed my own tears so I wouldn’t wake the kids. They don’t see the panic, the pressure, the loneliness, the grit.

They don’t see the cost.

And they don’t see the way I have been collecting supplies, building a boat for my kids along the way, stocking up so that by the time we reached the shore they’d have everything they’d need to thrive without me. They don’t see the grief in the two humans you just swam 100 miles with, simply walking away.

I think that’s what I’m grieving now, not the journey, but the fact that no one ever really understood the distance I swam. Not the way I did. Not the way my body remembers. Not the way the ocean still lives in my bones.

Some days I feel proud. Some days I feel angry. Most days I feel tired in a way sleep can’t touch.

But tonight… Tonight I’m writing this because maybe someone someday will find these words and finally understand. Understand that I wasn’t weak or dramatic or ungrateful. I was swimming with two whole worlds on my back. And I made it to shore.

That alone should have been enough.

xx 💋

Nikyla Maria

PS- If this resonated and you want to sink into energy all your own, the Sensual Embodiment Activation| Womb Awakening Meditation is a beautiful place to sit.

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