single mother

noun

1. a mother who brings up a child or children alone, without a partner.

Word History and Origins

Origin of single mother¹

First recorded in 1965–70

Example Sentences

The novel is set against the backdrop of the Great Depression and tells the story of a single mother who leaves her family farm in Texas for California.

From Time

Born amid the Great Depression to a young single mother in rural Texas, much of Ailey’s dance inspiration came from his memories.

From Essence.com

For low-income women who work outside the house or single mothers who have no one to help shoulder the burden, the situation is significantly worse.

From Time

In the middle of a pandemic, the single mother had to find a new place to live.

From Time

I got to know Marisela Monroy Ramirez, a farmworker and single mother, who was struggling to support her family financially because of the pandemic.

From Voice of San Diego

A white single mother to a seven-year-old son, she works (or worked) at the local mall, and only recently got into Allah.

From The Daily Beast

I interviewed Lilian, a single mother living in a Rio de Janeiro favela.

From The Daily Beast

Jane was raised in a matriarchal family by her hyper-religious grandma and young, aspiring singer single mother.

From The Daily Beast

Taylor, a single mother and still pregnant, was locked up in jail for two days until charges were dropped for lack of evidence.

From The Daily Beast

She was a teenage single mother in a place bereft of options and Isaias spoke to her about a land of promise.

From The Daily Beast

When daylight came we got them enfiladed by machine guns and every single mother's son of them was either killed or captured.

From Project Gutenberg

He loves his kind so much that he has not a word softer than a brickbat for a single mother's son of them.

From Project Gutenberg

A kindly touch of the hand, a single mother-smile, and she would have flung her arms about the other woman's neck.

From Project Gutenberg

What is the sorrow of a single mother compared to the suffering of an entire nation!

From Project Gutenberg

In this way the old nest of the Mason-bee of the Pebbles is colonized, cell after cell, by a single mother.

From Project Gutenberg