CFDS 021: How Not To Date As A Single Mom (And Still Find Love Anyway)

Description: Heather Craik shares with us some pitfalls of dating as a single mom, with some pretty crazy results. Plus a food that fills you up from the inside out
Hi everybody, I'm Barbara Fernandez, the Rocking Raw Chef, here with my Clean Food, Dirty Stories: one to entertain, the other to inspire.
I help people stamp out stress, depression and fatigue over at RockingRawChef.com, and today's title is:
How Not To Date As A Single Mom (And Still Find Love Anyway)
In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I'll share with you the best food to feel full, in other words, to fill you up from the inside out.
OK enough hints from me, let's get on with the story.
Our guest, Heather Craik
I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Heather Craik. Heather's going to share with us what it can be like to start out life as a single mom, explore dating on Tinder (which like I've never done) and have long distance relationships (which I haven't done either). So all that sounds super interesting to me! She now helps people solve a completely different kind of problem which we'll mention later.
For now though, Heather, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I've been looking forward to having you ever since you told me about your incredible, roller-coaster story!
Heather: Hey, thanks for having me. Glad to be here.
Me: You're so welcome. So I think if I understood it correctly that your story starts where you were with somebody and you got pregnant? And then you wound up being a single mom? Can you talk about how that came about, maybe?
Heather's story
Heather: Yeah, sure. I mean I'd been with this guy for about nine years or so and that's an entirely different story in and of itself. But what happened was I was in Canada when I fell pregnant. And because I wasn't expecting to fall pregnant in Canada, I didn't actually have medical coverage for that. So I came back home to the UK which is where I'm from. And you know a couple of months after that I realized that it was really not working out with this other guy.
Me: The nine year guy.
Heather: So that was just a bit entertaining for a while. I broke it off with him and went through the rest of my pregnancy, it was just me. My parents were there which was really helpful. But I was about 5 months pregnant I reckon when it ended.
Me: That is so, I have to say that is just so, so brave! Oh my goodness. Like how did you...how did you feel like when you... I mean, yeah, how did you feel? I can imagine – I can't imagine, I mean I've been pregnant, I have two kids. But how did you feel when you just like made that, made that decision, you know? To...
Heather: Well I think leading up to it was quite stressful. And I noticed that before the decision was actually made, I felt stressed for a lot of days, but once it was done and it was over I actually felt relieved. Which I think was really telling.
Me: Wow. That's really telling. Especially like the situation you were in, right? Cause I know that for me, when I was pregnant in some ways I felt kind of vulnerable, you know? Because you're carrying this child
Heather: Oh yeah, entirely. I was back staying with my parents even. So yeah. But they were great, by the way. My parents were fantastic from the word go.
Me: Oh wow, that's really good. Well I'm sure that at the end of the day they just really want you to be happy, right?
Heather: Yeah, they're really good that way.
Rebuilding a business
Me: So then you started out as a single mom, so was your son born when you were still living with your parents? I mean, were you working at all?
Heather: Yeah, I was still with my parents for about 10 months after he was born, actually. So I was working, I had started work on my business at that point but it hadn't really fully taken off. I had my business before I fell p