We know you’re tired of hearing the same old advice: Sit down and assess all of your family’s expenses for one month—including seeming essentials like bottled water and iTunes—to find out where you can cut back. You haven’t actually done it, though, have you? Like many parents, singles often feel as if they’re already pinching pennies. But even $25 a week can kick-start an emergency fund, which Blagrove defines as the amount your family would need to live on for three months. “It’s essential as a single parent that you have that extra money in the bank, because you are the one your child is relying on,” she says. (No pressure or anything.)

A tax professional can help ensure that you take full advantage of your single-parent status on your tax returns (child support, for example, should not be claimed as additional income). Spouses who are separating or have recently separated should consider meeting with a financial planner to determine how to downsize—some expenses, like a hefty mortgage, that were doable on a double income may be impossible to manage alone. It’s scary stuff, but remember: You don’t have to make big financial decisions on your own. A close friend, family member or another single parent can talk through money issues with you.

Think ahead in other ways, too. Not to be morbid, but you should have a will in place in case something happens to you. If you can afford it, take out life, disability and critical-illness insurance policies, and name your child as the beneficiary.

It also helps to think creatively. Years ago, Vanessa, whose son Sebastian is now 21, arranged an informal child-care system with four other Brooklyn moms. They hired a full-time babysitter and each chose one day of the week to stay home. “The cost was minimal, and it gave us each four full days to work,” she says. For Vanessa, banding together eased what is often the biggest financial burden for parents—child care—but it can sometimes seem as though no matter what you do, the system is stacked against you. Parents who pay child support, for example, often complain that they don’t get to write off that amount on their taxes, and that managers of apartment buildings don’t take child-support payments into consideration when they figure out income-adjusted charges (like the maintenance fee on city-owned co-ops).

Single parents can expend a lot of energy fighting for equitable treatment. Just ask David from the Bronx. He battled the Department of Housing and Community Renewal so he could move into a three-bedroom with his twins. “I live in a co-op that is supervised by the city, and they have a rule that a single parent with two children is not eligible for a three-bedroom—even though a married couple with two children is. I think the idea behind it is that the parent and the child of the same sex could share a bedroom.” In this case, persistence paid off: It took him two years, but he finally got his housing waiver.

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