Hi All,

I'm a newly single, 47 year old mom to a five year old son. I'm excited about my new adventure and am learning to adjust my habits to this new lifestyle. I work full time and am lucky to have family on both my side and my ex's side to help look after our son while I'm at work. My ex is self employed so can be flexible with child care. Also, we have a pretty good relationship, considering we're now apart after 20 years together. The three of us (me, ex, son) get together at least once or twice a week to do family things

Probably my biggest issue right now is coping with loneliness; I've discovered that seeing the "couple" friends is quite awkward and they're not sure how to handle me without my other half. Since I come straight home from work seven nights a week to get dinner and be with my son, I don't see any of my single friends in the evenings, and they're not very excited about having dinner at my place as conversation is difficult with a talkative, energetic young boy around ( I find him highly amusing but my single, childless friends are not quite so into him as I am). Then, when I try to arrange playdates for the weekends it seems most families have their together time (understandable, of course) during Sat and Sun.  I always make an effort to get my son and me out of the house on the weekends, but more often then not it's just the two of us. Although we have fun making new discoveries around town, I would like him to have more kid contact and I would like some adult conversation.

I tried looking for some mom and kid playgroups in town, but almost all of the ones I've found are for new mothers, and/or young mothers that mostly seem very nice, but I'm double their age and am interested in different things.

Any ideas on how to go about establishing new friendships for both my son and me? Thanks for any assistance.

Deb