The Let Down

I've always considered myself to be pretty reliable, but lately i just feel like i'm letting more and more people down, tonight 2 of my closest friends are angry with me because a commitment to something pretty important needs to be broken, I've been in tears for hours over it. I don't have a sitter for my daughter and I can't fulfil my commitments to them without one, it's thrown their entire day off schedule. I know they are hurting because of it.

It's hard for them to understand what it's like to be a parent, they are just newly engaged and don't have kids of their own yet, let alone asking them to grasp what i'm going through as a single mother, that isn't their fault nor does it reflect badly on them either, they just can't understand and that's ok. Every time i make a commitment or need to be at an event child free i need to find someone to babysit, even if i just want to go out for coffee for half an hour, my Dad works 6 days a week and he is the only person i usually have mind my little one, or sometimes my Nan but my Nan is getting on in years and she can't run around after an energetic 3 year old all day, yes i do have other relatives and friends but most of them live too far away or have commitments or children of their own. I don't have a partner, there is no team work or joint raising of the child, not that i'm complaining, i'm happy doing it alone, I really am, but it's times like tonight that make it hard, disappointing people you care about. Not only that but the guilt you feel when you ask someone to mind your child for the night knowing that it is either their only day off in the week or that they've been working all week and all day and need to watch your daughter when they finish. I feel so guilty even asking, it's not that they don't love her or don't want to mind her, it's more so that they need that one day a week to unwind or get things done that work days don't permit, and that's fair enough, they've raised their kids, but often it does leave me feeling stuck, guilty and when I am out like I can't relax.
I wish i could make them understand that i never intended on throwing off the whole day but my daughter will always be my first priority, everyone and everything else comes after that even if it's just as simple as not having a babysitter, I can't just leave her with anyone, I can't just switch off from being Mumma and I don't want to, sometimes plans have to change even really important ones like tomorrows.