Odds are that when people hear the phrase "single mom" they envision an unwed teen, poor, uneducated, unemployed, and struggling. There is a real stigma attached to being a single mom. A recent poll of “Moms Today” revealed that:

• 86 percent of those interviewed believed that most single mothers are on welfare,

• 90 percent believed that most single mothers are under the age of 25 and

• 77 percent believed that most single mothers didn't graduate from high school.

I used to believe these things too, and then it happened to me. I was married. We decided to have a baby, and when I was eight months pregnant my husband left. Just like that, I was a single mom. I'd never been so terrified in my life. For the first few months I would ask, "How did this happen to me?" I'd try to pinpoint the exact moment that things went bad, thinking if I could just nail that down, everything would make sense. That was the hardest part, the utter shock that I had let this happen to me, that I could be so blind.

After I got over that stage, (I never did find that moment), once the rawness wore off, I started to pick up the pieces. I worked at finding the perfect balance between loving my son, being the best mom ever to him, and taking care of myself and other things I love. Slowly, I've figured out ways to navigate life as a single mother. And I’ve met other wonderful single moms who have redefined what it means to be a single parent. We're educated. We work. We pay our bill. We take care of our kid(s). We date. We have fun. According to the US Census Bureau, this is what single mothers really look like:

• 44 percent are divorced or separated

• 79 percent of single mothers work full time

• 72 percent of single mothers live well above the poverty level

• 69 percent of single mothers do not receive public assistance

• 68 percent of single mothers are over 30 years old

Yesterday in NYC I was walking briskly along with a businessgal buddy when the oddest thing happened. I hooked a man — literally.

I was carrying a suit bag filled filled with clothes on hangers over my left arm as we yapped our way down the street.

An older gentleman and his wife were walking past us in the opposite direction. They obviously passed too close and somehow my hangars hooked on the husband, and yanked me backwards after him.

I was trying to unhook myself from him but his wife thought I was intentionally molesting him and was pulling him away from me yelling, "He's mine!"

She obviously didn't see the hanger.

Strangely, the same thing had happened just three minutes before with a construction guy as I was crossing the street. That one almost cost me a two by four to the head.

So here's what I discovered: You can literally hook a man on the street.

Now I just have to work on my aim.

You've learned to ask for help. You've leaned you don't need to do this alone. You know you don't have to sit there on your miserable little island trying to cope all by yourself.

But then you realize you don't actually know anyone you can call and say, "I am hurting. Please come over." Well, you do, but they can't. They have kids. They live in other states or across the bridge. They are no longer drop-of-a-hat people. (Reason #732 not to have kids: they prevent you from coming to the aide of your single, sad friend with Nalgene bottles of cocktails and a comforting presence, but that's beside the point.)

So, here I am, in my living room, alone, trying to remember that I've learned, in the course of things, to take care of myself. That doing this alone is, in fact, what I've preferred. Because this week I was hit with some pretty bad news. This week I'm really struggling. This week I could use someone to come and just sit with me. And there isn't anyone who can.

Here's what I recommend to all of you pondering divorce: Get yourself some single friends. Friends without babies. Friends who live within 15 minutes of you. Because there's going to come a night when you need someone, when you're in a place where you want that help, and you'll need someone in your phonebook who not only loves you and stands by you, but is actually able to come over.

I'm in a more cynical space than usual, I guess, because I wonder: What's the use of learning to ask for support when, in the end, you're still going to end up on your couch alone?

There's been a lot of buzz on the blog in regards to songs and song lyrics that remind us of our exes or of our divorces. It reminded me of how I felt immediately after Levi left and the songs that I listened to.

What is it about the human condition that makes us sort of torture ourselves with stuff like this after a breakup anyway? My divorce process had a soundtrack. For real. I made myself a CD and I listened to it all the time. Sometimes singing along, sometimes crying, but most of the time, pining away.

My divorce soundtrack — along with the particular lyrics that would absolutely slay me — went something like this:

U2, One Love:
"Did I ask too much
More than a lot
You gave me nothing
Now it's all I got"

Johnny Cash (previously done by Nine Inch Nails), Hurt:
"What have I become
my sweetest friend
Everyone I know
Goes away
In the end
And you could have it all
My empire of dirt
I will let you down
I will make you hurt"

Dave Matthews Band, Stay or Leave:
"Wake up naked, drinking coffee, making plans to change the world
while the world is changing us.
It was good, good love.
And you used to laugh under the covers,
maybe not so often now
The way I used to laugh with you was loud and hard"

The Felice Brothers, Wonderful Life:
"Me and you have done the same damn thing
We fell in love knowing the pain it would bring
Now all I do is sing
Sad songs with red underneath"

Ani Difranco (every girl going through a divorce needs Ani), Done Wrong:
"like how could you do nothing
and say, i'm doing my best
how could you take almost everything
and then come back for the rest
how could you beg me to stay
reach out your hands and plead
and then pack up your eyes and run away
as soon as I agreed"