single mother

American  

Informal, single mom

noun

single mothers plural

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

---

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• single mothers
  plural

Etymology

Origin of single mother

First recorded in 1965–70

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

single mother

After two deployments, Desma, a single mother of three, wonders whether the two years she spent overseas took her away from her son for too long.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 21, 2026

Manson was born Charles Maddox in Cincinnati to a single mother in 1934.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 20, 2026

Kochaporn was a single mother of a daughter who also came to Bangkok to do a DNA test, Jarunee said.

From Barron's ● Jul. 14, 2026

Susan Lilley, a single mother of two who is training to become a classroom assistant, said the weekly shop has become one of her biggest financial worries.

From BBC ● Jul. 7, 2026

She was also, not incidentally, a single mother raising a dear, precocious boy named Jonathan, whom I often babysat.

From "Becoming" by Michelle Obama