'I Am Solo' Season 22's Oksun opens up about life as single mother: 'There were conditions'

Oksun from Season 22 of "I Am Solo" has opened up about her time as a single mother, saying it was "incredibly hard."

When Season 22 aired as a divorcee special on ENA and SBS Plus, Oksun drew wide attention for appearing as a single mother raising her son alone without ever having registered a legal marriage.

A video uploaded Wednesday to broadcaster Jang Young-ran's YouTube channel showed Jang visiting the newlywed home of Season 22 participants Oksun and Gyeongsu.

When Jang asked what life had been like as a single mother, Oksun said it was deeply difficult — and that the hardest part was the child support lawsuit.

"He said the child wasn't his and refused to pay child support. Because there was no legal marriage registration," Oksun said.

"To get proof, someone came from the court to pull out the baby's hair. Because it was a baby, the roots wouldn't come out properly, so they pulled out whole clumps instead of single strands. That was mentally devastating," she said.

"Of course, the paternity test came back positive. But there were conditions for the child support. He agreed never to appear in front of us for the rest of his life, and I received it as a lump sum," Oksun said.

She added that she worried she would gradually spend the money if she kept it on hand, so she took out a loan and bought a home to protect her child's share. "I carried my newborn on buses and subways, going around looking at apartments," she said.

Oksun said she fled to Jeju Island alone to give birth. "My parents were against it. No one was supportive. Even my close friends said no, and I felt like if I kept hearing that, I wouldn't be able to go through with it. I thought I had to run away somewhere no one knew me," she explained.

"Depression set in on top of everything, and I thought that if something happened to me, it might be better to go to Jeju Island and just end it there," she added.

Oksun married Gyeongsu, who has a daughter from a previous marriage. The two completed their marriage registration last May and held their wedding ceremony in November of the same year.

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