'Are you lonely?” my mum asked me over supper one night. “I’m no sad anorak,” I said, incredulous that she had asked the question. “I didn’t say you were,” she persisted, “but you have just gone through a family break-up.”

Doing my best to dismiss the question from my mind, I went home, cracked open a beer and put the television on. Later that night, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t sleep. Maybe the few pints hadn’t been such a good idea.

Diving under my double duvet and shutting out the world didn’t solve the problem. Eventually, I got up. As I shuffled past my boys’ bedrooms, the darkness within was disturbed enough by the landing light to reveal clothes and gadgets strewn haphazardly across unmade pits.

Ben Adams with his sons Joe, right, and William Credit: Julian Andrews

Once downstairs, I put the radio on. Elvis was singing about how lonesome he was. I turned the radio off. On went the television; I needed some noise to create the illusion of company. But of course it was only an illusion. While all my mates were happily tucked up with their loved ones, I was on my own, watching some late-night nonsense.

Six months earlier, my wife and I had called time on a union that had formed in the Austrian Alps, grown stronger with children, dwindled with routine and floundered under the weight of everyday stresses.

After 16 years, two children, one and a half cats, one wife with a wagging finger and a dog with a wagging tail, I was single again. I missed having someone to care about.

I missed someone caring enough about me to ask me how my day was. And being a full-time dad on a part-time basis was breaking my heart.

I missed someone caring enough about me to ask me how my day was. And being a full-time dad on a part-time basis was breaking my heart.

Even though my kids split their time equally between their parents, for part of the week I missed the play fights, the banter and the strops. Observing the boys’ lives felt like reading a book with half of the pages missing.

Weekends were the worst. The emptier-than-usual washing basket and the untouched chocolate in the fridge were constant reminders that my offspring weren’t there. What were they up to? Were they OK?

As well as missing the kids, I missed adult conversation. My children are great, but when all’s said and done, they are teenagers. Take the high point in my career as an author, which I tried to share with my eldest son.

“My book’s number one on Amazon!” I blurted out as he opened the front door, schoolbag in hand. “Great. What’s for tea?”

As a cure for my insomnia, I Googled loneliness. It turns out that I’m one of nearly a million men in the 25-to-44 age range who live alone. Because women tend to keep the children when families break up, men in this age range are twice as likely as women to be shopping for one.

Some people choose to live alone. For them, being in sole charge of the remote control and having no one to answer to is a bonus. But I was never going to be one of those people. On my own I was miserable. More than that, my mum was right: I was lonely. Painfully and pitifully lonely.

When I was young, the map to my future seemed clear – grow up, get a job, meet someone, settle down, have kids, argue with kids and then grow old with the wife while spending said kids’ inheritance. But the ebb and flow of life had a different course in store for me.

I no longer had a clue which direction was next and that scared me. As that sleepless night dragged on, I made a decision. It was time to stop wallowing in self-pity.

With the odd exception, once my marriage was over the friendships petered out. As each friendship died, my mojo diminished.

Tackling my loneliness wasn’t easy. Recovering from a break-up, I needed to learn how to live again. First, I was desperate to be the best dad I could be in my changed circumstances. By admitting defeat in my marriage and, therefore condemning my children to life in two houses, I felt I had let them down. I needed them to know I would always be there for them. I started by bribing them with gifts, but it would take more than shiny tablet computers to re-establish my role.

It was about being positive myself, being fun to be around as well as being the strong dad they still needed. Learning to live again also meant having to reinvent my social life. In the months after my separation, adult company had become something of a rarity.

Many of my mates were married to the friends my wife had made while chatting to other mums in the school playground. With the odd exception, once my marriage was over the friendships petered out. As each friendship died, my mojo diminished.

Socialising became a real effort. I spent the entirety of a friend’s 50th birthday party at the bar because everyone else was doing what couples do at a party. The experience reminded me of connections I wasn’t making, of intimacy I wasn’t part of. They say a problem shared is a problem halved. But what you don’t hear said is that a joy shared is a joy doubled.

I missed company. After years of being married, I was just hopelessly out of practice at meeting new people. “You’ve got to try internet dating,” friends urged. In the months after becoming single, I did everything I could to avoid internet dating. As an excuse to squirrel myself away at home, I even wrote a novel about a man coping with divorce.

But eventually, once my demons had stopped threatening to jump out of my head singing “you’re a lonely loser” and once I didn’t need a cacophony of noisy appliances to drown my sorrow out, I felt able to take the plunge.

If my recent midlife crisis has taught me anything, it’s that loneliness is nothing to be ashamed of.

And I am happy to say that, after only a couple of forays into the unknown, on a cool, wet evening last September, I met Melanie. A few minutes into our stroll along the Thames, realising that the internet dating gods had been kind to me, I took Melanie’s hand.

We haven’t looked back since. If my recent midlife crisis has taught me anything, it’s that loneliness is nothing to be ashamed of. Like happiness or sadness, loneliness is an emotion that all of us will feel at some point in our lives.

Every day, I thank my lucky stars that my loneliness was only transient. I know others aren’t so fortunate.