I was two months into a master’s degree when my children’s Dad said he was ending our 15 year marriage. On Christmas bloody day, I might add. The next year and a half was a jumble of solicitors, sleeping pills, counselling and dragging my sad backside out of bed to do exams. I failed almost everything and retook it all twice, waking up before my children did to study and commuting from Bedford to London for lectures.

At 46, this career change meant the world to me, and despite being urged several times by the alarmed University lecturers to defer the course, I was determined to stay. My children’s Dad had changed every single aspect of my life in one move, but this course was mine, and I was going to pass or die trying.

I asked for help from total strangers, professionals who generously marked my work before I handed it in, and student friends who sent me their coursework to copy in a bid to shove me through the course. And yes, I realise this is cheating. And no, I don’t care.

I did online mediation in between lectures, battling for a childcare schedule that would give me some shred of autonomy and regularly cried my way around Sainsbury’s. Note: No one ever noticed, so go for it. Its quite cathartic.

Leaving my family home, I rented a tiny house without a shower or dishwasher. To a lot of single parents this is hardly life or death, but at the time, it was a big departure from my family home and felt embarrassing.

To begin with, every time I squatted in the bath, hosing my tired body on a freezing February morning, I thought about the comforts of the life I had lost. But, over time, I realised that I didn’t actually care about the expensive appliances I never really knew how to use. It didn’t really matter where I lived, as long as my children were happy. And they were. We built entire toy villages in the tiny courtyard garden, had water fights and filled the house with friends on Halloween.

When the children were with their Dad, and I wasn’t studying, I doused myself in essential oils, pointlessly watched candle flames, cleansed my chakras, walked miles listening to deep and meaningful podcasts and did Olympic levels of crying.

Friends posted chocolate through my letterbox on Valentines day, and I trawled Gingerbread, secretly terrified of joining a single parent tribe I didn’t yet identify with. But the online wellness groups were so inclusive and introduced me to the sheer diversity of single parents.

Members shared incredible life strategies, and seeing their ability to accept and adapt was inspiring. Shared stories on Gingerbread gave me the confidence to take my children abroad. The holiday reps always joined our table out of pity, and I put make up on for dinner every night, only to take it back off fifteen minutes later when my children had finished eating. But I did it.

Whilst studying, I tried online dating, but when a particularly intense man leaned in and kissed my sad and stationary face mid-conversation in a pub, I realised I wasn’t ready. My ego had been pulverised, and my life had become purely reactionary. My autonomy and vitality had been stolen, and I wanted them back.

“Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this, too, was a gift,” The uses of sorrow by Mary Oliver

Two years on, and I’ve passed my master’s and now run my own clinic. I’ve decided to love my children’s Dad and his girlfriend because I don’t fancy carrying a bag of hatred and resentment around with me for the rest of my days. My back wouldn’t take it.

The biggest challenge today is accepting that I now only see my children half the time. This breaks me on a weekly basis. I can be a heady mixture of lonely, horny and bored, and I try to welcome all those feelings and simply feel them. But a victim mentality is not welcome. Like a Jedi, I practise the art of swapping those stubborn ruminating negative thoughts for elaborate imaginings of our future.

I visualise walking the Pennine Way, winning BAFTA’s, a huge Greek island holiday with friends where my children swim naked and I drip with confidence and silver jewellery. Most of all, I imagine I’m an incredible parent to my children, full of motivation and silliness, flawed but with a huge and loving heart. It’s a working progress, and like the master’s degree, I’ll fail many times, but I will succeed.