For Bernie Sinclaire, raising three young children in the Big Apple is like a dream — especially because she’s raising the children with another mother instead of an annoying husband.
The “Mom” of the city, a shelter where single mothers share the debts and burdens of raising children, is a “Barbie Dream House”-esque place where she and her two sons live in pink harmony with mother Anabelle Gonzalez and her young daughter.
“No Prince Charming Required” fairy tale life, say Sinclaire and Gonzalez, two in the growing army of single parenting rather than single parenting.
“My best friend and I are two single moms, living in New York City and raising our kids under the same roof,” Sinclaire, 38, explained in an Instagram video.
She and Gonzalez, 39, both teachers at an all-girls school in the Bronx, agreed to live together nearly two years ago, following their split from former colleagues.
The Kings are now reportedly living in a three-bedroom, two-bathroom, 1,200 sq ft apartment across from the Hudson River in Manhattan’s Hamilton Heights. The building includes a gym, play area and laundry facilities. And their children, all under the age of 10, live happily together in a bubble of fake siblings they call “fairy tale.”
Sinclair and Gonzalez did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
“We decided, since this is working so well for us … that this was not going to be a temporary thing,” Sinclaire continued in the clip. “We upgraded our apartment to fit our family, and we’re building it to last.”
“This is not a temporary thing, it is not that we expect to find a boyfriend or a man or a human family,” he added. “This is the kind of life that works for us – a woman-centered life.”
It is the mother of all setups.
With the cost of living at an alarming high, and the prospect of eternal love at a depressing low, mothers like Sinclaire and Gonzalez are building women-only communities from coast to coast.
In fact, there are more than 10.9 million single-parent families with a child under the age of 18, according to the US Census Bureau, noting that 80% of those single-parent families are supported by the mother.
With the financial commitment to raising a child in the US reaching a staggering $300,000, according to recent reports, pooling energy and resources has served as a lifesaver for singletons with children.
Kristin Batykefer and Tessa Gilder, from Jacksonville, Florida, became a single mother shortly after the pandemic, combined with their divorce, in the early 2020s. The two famously gushed about the benefits of dating and dating online, boasting “Life. Good. Baby!,” in a recent post.
Shannon and Cheyanne, best friends and parents of parents based in Nevada, also, proved the beauty of continuing life with another mother on their social media account last year.
“Life is simple in a village,” Shannon said in a TikTok caption, which has garnered more than 9.5 million views.
“We both love men very much,” he stressed about his sexuality with Cheyanne, “but two women who are separated. [the] house and children [and] household chores seemed easier than men.”
Sinclair and Gonzalez echoed similar sentiments across the internet.
“Less work. More ‘me’ time. More fun. No default parent,” the platonic friends listed as their top four benefits of co-parenting. “The dream of being a living mother. You don’t need Prince Charming.”
Still, digital naysayers often downplay their seemingly barbaric, girl-fueled lifestyle, leaving comments like “I hope you don’t have boys… god help them.”
One internet critic wrote, in part, “Seems like a bunch of women who have been hurt before and instead of moving on they’re taking this new misogynistic culture as if we’re all oppressing women…Adults thinking this way is sad.”
But rather than being “sad,” Sinclaire says she and Gonzalez are happy for the support.
“Society tells us that if we want to be single moms, we’d better be really rich or willing to be broke for child support, crippling childcare costs and to take out our trash to begin with,” she said in an Instagram testimonial. “But we said ‘No.’ We said ‘Matriarchy.’”
“We said that we will stop being a single mother and the income earned by two. We said that we will reduce the housework by our sisters. We said that we will put our children on the table,” she continued. “Sometimes the weight of being a mother still weighs on us, but we always have the space to take care of them, wrap them up and put them in their place.”
