Even before she became a mom, this Manhattan woman wanted to be part of a “mommune,” a group of women raising their kids together without the assistance of adult males. Today that dream is her reality, and it’s better than she ever thought it would be. Bernie Sinclaire, 38, is a single mom of two boys, and she convinced her friend, Anabelle Gonzalez, 39, and her daughter to share a home, finances and most importantly … the mental load. Sinclaire didn’t make this decision on a whim, and it’s not a temporary arrangement. “I have letters from me and my college roommate about our Barbie Dream House, living together with no men,” Sinclaire, tells TODAY.com. “It’s been a part of something that I wanted for a very long time.” Sinclaire, a teacher, examined matriarchal society and human rights movements in her college programs — and she is fascinated by indigenous communities in which women are the center of memory and culture. “I’ve never wanted to live with a man. From my perspective, it is additional labor that is put on the woman, and I feel like that builds resentment in the house,” says Sinclaire. “This isn’t because I hate men. It’s because I don’t think socially we’re in a place where it is equitable for a woman to be a wife.” Because the arrangement has been working so well and the social media response to her mommune posts has been so strong, Sinclaire decided to create an organization to help women connect in similar female- or child-centered family units. And that’s when she adopted Bernie Sinclaire as her online alias. “I think there are going to be a lot of unhappy boys out there,” she says in a teasing tone. “So we’re saying Bernie.” Where did Sinclaire’s idea of a mommune come from? “The mommune phenomenon is trying to recover something real — the female solidarity we have largely lost,” says science writer Elena Bridgers who researches hunter-gatherer societies. “We have very good evidence that humans evolved to raise children collectively in communities where women were extremely socially close, collaborated on childcare and protected one another from male domination,” she adds, noting that fathers were still always in the picture. Modern women have envisioned a slightly different future. The mommune trend has been slowing gaining steam, born mostly out of economic necessity. For Sinclaire, the desire to raise kids without relying on a romantic partner existed even before she was pregnant. Raised by a single mother as the oldest of six children, Sinclaire says she ended up being “parentified.” She recognized the uphill battles her mom faced. “Ultimately, because it was an economic struggle, my mom ended up in this situation where she had to choose between poverty and partnership,” Sinclaire explains. She knew she never wanted to have to make that choice in her own life. “In my late 20s, I realized that I did want to be a mother, but I wasn’t totally convinced that I wanted to be a wife,” says Sinclaire. She made several different attempts at creating female communities, but nothing seemed to gain traction. So she explored starting a nontraditional family of her very own. “Of course I stumbled on a man along the way, like every woman does,” Sinclaire laughs, “but at the end of the day I always came back to that childhood dream.” By “stumbled on a man,” Sinclaire means that she met and had a relationship with the father of her two sons — Marcos, 9, and Nicolas, 4. “Mommune Level 1” After ending her relationship with her sons’ father, Sinclaire once again started hunting for a non-romantic female life partner. She had met Gonzalez in college, and they reconnected when they were both in the parenting trenches with young kids. They slowly started spending time together. Sinclaire had been single for over a year when she first approached Gonzalez with the idea of combining households. Gonzalez recalls replying, “‘Girl, what are you talking about?’” Because Gonzalez was still in a romantic relationship at the time, she wasn’t ready to make the leap. But she was ready for what Sinclaire calls “Mommune Level 1.” “She came over a lot. We cooked together. We took the kids to parks. We even went on a trip upstate, just us moms and kids,” says Sinclaire. When Gonzalez’s romantic relationship started fizzling a few months later, Sinclaire asked again. This time, the answer was yes. “It was God’s timing,” Gonzalez says. “It was hurting both of us to see each other struggle so much through motherhood separately. We had been building nuclear family dynamics already.” Moving in together In August 2024, Gonzales and her now 7-year-old daughter Sophia, moved into the small apartment Sinclaire and her sons were sharing. Both women agreed that children are the center of their home, and any romantic relationships would take place outside those walls. “Even in the tiny apartment with two additional people, the relief and even joy was enormous compared to the feeling of burnout and isolation before,” says Sinclaire. “There was a very big change in the emotional temperature in the house.” Why was the impact so great? Sinclaire points to several reasons. Both she and Gonzalez had been the default parents — they were in charge of everything. Combining forces allowed them to create a more equal balance of domestic labor. Sinclaire also found it easier to work through disagreements and conversations with another mother rather than a romantic partner. “I didn’t feel like I was responsible for another person’s feelings in the same way,” she says. “I didn’t feel like I had to make sure everyone was happy.” Of course there are more tangible benefits too. The women had begun teaching in the same all-girls school, so they commuted together and shared childcare costs. They also save money on takeout and cleaning services. When they only have to do tasks half the time, they don’t get overwhelmed by them. “Being equitable is really important for us,” Sinclaire says. But they “don’t do the 50/50 thing.” The women are emotionally attuned to each other, and one will automatically take the lead when the other needs a break. “Neither one of us need to walk in the house stomping around and banging things for one of us to notice that the other needs support,” she says. “We can cover for each other because we’re used to doing it all ourselves anyway.” After the initial “tiny apartment” experiment worked, the family-by-choice was able to pool their rent money and move into a much bigger apartment in December 2024. The building has a playroom and a gym, and it’s located in a better neighborhood. “No men that are not related to the family are welcome in the home,” Sinclaire says definitively. “We have a boundary for that, and quite frankly, it’s also a safety issue for the kids.” If either of the women want to bring a man into their orbit as a parental figure, they’ll discuss how to proceed. Adding a male parenting perspective can be a positive thing, according to researcher Elena Bridgers. “Men and women parent differently in ways that complement each other, and children benefit from both,” she says. Sinclaire and Gonzales agree that for now, however, their home is centered around their children — not romantic partners. “Every child in our home regularly sees their father, and we are blessed because of that,” explains Sinclaire. “Can I imagine wanting to introduce my children to an additional father figure? No. That’s just not what I’m interested in doing.” The revolution begins Sinclaire says the response to her social media posts about her mommune have been “overwhelmingly” supportive. She has loved showing followers “the joy and success of choosing friendship.” Gonzalez admits that while nothing is ever “perfect,” the mommune makes life way more “manageable.” She says, “I don’t feel like I’m suffocating just to get through the day.” Of course, the women don’t want to diminish the experience of moms who go to work during the day and tackle the second shift as primary caregiver at night. “I retired from that life and I’m good with the one that I have now,” Gonzalez says. Sinclaire is especially thrilled at the model they’re presenting her young sons. She hopes they will gain a better appreciation of household equity, maintenance, emotional attunement and conflict resolution than they may have otherwise. And at the same time, Sinclaire and Gonzalez are just plain having fun. “I like my living situation,” says Sinclaire. “I’m really happy with the changes that I’ve made, and I wanted to share and just be a little silly and talk about what we’re doing differently.” This story first appeared on TODAY.com. More from TODAY: 100 Cool Baby Names to Make Your Little One a Trendsetter Parents Are Yelling This Girl Name to Stop Toddler Tantrums Instantly 240 Rare, Vintage Baby Names That Sound Fresh … But Not Too Popular This story uses functionality that may not work in our app. Click here to open the story in your web browser. ...read more read less