When Atlanta-based therapist René Mondy thinks back to the earliest days of her divorce, she remembers how carefully she tried to hold herself together. She had the paperwork handled, her budget reviewed, the therapist scheduled, a career counselor lined up—every box checked except one.
“When’s the last time you ate?” Mondy’s father asked her. She tried to piece together the fast food meals she’d grabbed without thinking. “I had McDonald’s, I think, this morning… Wendy’s last night,” she recalls telling him. He didn’t let it go. “He said, ‘You can’t really remember the last time you ate. Why are you eating so much fast food?’”
Mondy admitted what she truly felt. “I don’t want to be bothered right now,” she recalls saying. “I just want to get through this.” Her father pushed back gently but firmly. She needed real nourishment, not drive-thru fuel. And more than that, she needed a reason to step back out into the world.
He told her to pick one day a week and go somewhere that served a real meal. She chose a buffet near her house and committed to Tuesday nights. “I found a regular place to sit,” she says. The waitresses began to remember her face, wave when she walked in, check on her, and give her a sense of belonging she didn’t know she needed. “I actually started to look forward to it every week,” she states. “And it healed me in such a way that none of the other things that I had planned to do did. It brought a peace to my life that I didn’t know I needed.”
Mondy didn’t know it then, but she was building a habit of self-connection one meal at a time.
Years later, as solo dining became a fast-growing trend, she noticed the national shift echoing the work she had been doing privately for years. According to TouchBistro’s 2025 Diner Trends Report, 21% of Americans typically dine alone, 18% ate out solo in the past year, and 29% now dine out by themselves weekly or more. Younger generations are leading the way—49% of millennials and 46% of Gen Z diners say they eat out alone at least once a week. While the trends are just starting to garner attention, Mondy had already built a foundation for what solo dining could mean, especially for Black women: reflection without interruption, nourishment, personal enjoyment and a moment to hear your own spirit clearly.
Still, she knew not every restaurant created space for that. After years of dining alone, she felt the contrast. “I think because I had the good experience with the waitresses who got to know me at the buffet place, that when I started to go to other restaurants, I could tell the difference,” Mondy recalls. “They’re not quite checking on you the same.” Women she counseled told her how often they were met with dismissive energy, being rushed, or repeatedly asked if they were waiting for someone. “That was part of the setback,” she says. “The eye rolls, the ‘Are you waiting for somebody?’ or ‘Why do you want to sit in that seat?’ Little things I’ve heard people say that discourage them from wanting to eat alone.”
With that in mind, earlier this year, she launched The Solo Dining Directory, a guide created not to critique food but to center how women feel when they walk into a space alone. “I always had a directory on my site that had professional sites for counseling and attorneys, where women could connect to real resources in their community. I started adding the restaurants to the directory. I really wanted the directory to not just be a place finder, but also to answer the questions a solo woman would have.”
Mondy invited nearly 100 women ambassadors—Black, brown, international, single, dating, divorced—to contribute reviews. “They were ready to be adventurers. It really excited them,” she says. They shared what made them comfortable, what made them tense, and what signaled that they were welcome there.
Mondy’s personal experience proved to be a valuable compass toward the directory’s creation.
“That aspect of getting your appetite back goes back to my dad asking about the last time I ate,” she says. “I was going a long time without eating, and I didn’t realize that my appetite had gone. I was grieving the divorce, and I didn’t realize that’s how my body was grieving. I was working full-time and going to school full-time and doing all these counseling visits, and I really didn’t know I wasn’t eating. I think there’s a part of the directory that speaks to that. It’s cool to have a safe space and hear from somebody who’s been in that same spot.”
To help women navigate the uneasy moments like waiting to be seated, or scrolling through their phone to avoid feeling awkward, Mondy added therapeutic prompts women can text to themselves. “That’s when you kind of need that in-between time…that reflection and encouragement,” she says. The prompts turn anxious silence into grounding, into intention, into a moment with your higher self instead of your fear.
For Mondy, this movement is part of a larger shift among Black women embracing softness, self-connection, and independence. “It feels good to hear and see more of us getting out and adapting that mindset, creating spaces and opportunities for us to stay in that power,” she shares.
And she hopes the next generation sees solo dining not as something to keep private, but as something to honor. “I hope it reminds them that they’re always connected to something larger than themselves and they’ll be able to pave the way for women in the future.”
Mondy’s Solo Dining Directory is free and available to anyone who wants to begin or deepen their own solo dining journey. The directory can be found on her website at DearJohnTheBox.com, where women can explore restaurant listings, journal prompts, and reflections from ambassadors across the country.