Mothers Groups...yay or nay?

[nurseymum]

Hi all,
New to this...Long time follower, first time contributer!
Just sitting here wondering how people generally feel about mothers groups? In a single parent family I was hoping for a supportive, encouraging enviroment and was lucky enough to find an extraordinary group of women. I'm surprised at how often I here such negative things about these groups though...competitive...fake...etc

Just up late with a sick kiddy and pondering...Anyone's thoughts or experiences most welcome

[Ca Plane Pour Moi]

Hi there. Good to see you joining in - be warned, this place is addictive!

I think it depends on the group. The group I had was fine, but we didn't really keep in touch once we all went back to work. Occasionally see each other at the shops now. I wouldn't complain about them. Other groups are closer, others are cliquey - just like workplace relationships. All you have in common is your child's age, so not everyone is going to be BFFs just through that one factor. It can be the start of a beautiful friendship (two of my good friends I only know because our sons went to the same nursery), or maybe not.

I'm glad to hear you had a good experience of the groups though. It can make all the difference in the world.

[feeb]

I love my mothers group we have been catching up once a week since our babies were 6 - 12 weeks old. Some have left group, some have moved away, somne have gone and come back, some returned to work but majority of us catch up weekly and also every few months have a dinner out.

We have been together for 3 years as a group

Welcome to BB enjoy!

[Glass half full]

I love my mums group! 2 and a half years and still going strong I have made some really great friends that I hope will still be friends with in years to come.

[nurseymum]

Thanks for the reply, I anticipate now that I'm here, i'll be spending a lot of time checking out the forums...have always found them to be a wealth of knowledge!

You're so right about the fact that you need to connect on levels other than just your kids. I think I was so nervous about being a single mum and having no real connections, that I probably had so much invested in making friends I was almost a bit crazy Lucky for me the stars were alligned or some such nonsense as I found a group of "orphans" - or other mums with no family close by, An amazing group of women who had all come through some sort of extraordinary circumstances.

I guess it just restored my faith in women, as working in a very female orientated enviroment, I'd previously seen the worst of the female psyche. What I valued more than anything else was the honesty and support I got from them in regards to certain issues, that I somehow felt all those "you're having a baby" books NEVER gave me

[nurseymum]

And boy did I buy alot of "those" books

[TeniBear]

This is my mothers' group, here on bellybelly


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[Gigi]

This is my mothers' group, here on bellybelly


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Yes, i feel the same way. Have not found it IRL. (when i DID find it, petrol and geography made it impossible).

[FabFiona]

Love mine. We still catch up weekly and 3 of us have had our second child over the last 6 weeks.

I found it great to have people to hang out with during the day that lived near me. All of my friends were at work.

We had none of the bad behavior that sometimes happens in groups. I guess you can only see what the people are like and if it's not for you then stop going.


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[Sterla]

I love my mum's group. They are the loveliest bunch of women and I have made some wonderful friends through it. We still meet up twice a month and go out for dinner every few months (I'm the organizer). Some of us make it every single time, others come and go, but it has always been a friendly, supportive group. We've been meeting for just over two years now and most of us have had/are having our second babies.

I had heard bad things about competitive and clique mum's groups too, but thankfully ours isn't one of them!

[YoYo]

I love my mums group... Each and every one of them in different ways. I am overseas now and I miss them so much. Bellybelly is my second mums group. No matter where in the world you are, everyone is still in the sane place right there with me!


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[zap]

I didn't click with anyone in my mothers group. Mostly because I had twins and people seem to think you are superhuman and feel ashamed of admitted one baby is tough. I felt very alone for the first six months of my boys lives. I even found it hard fitting in with a twins playgroup I went to because all the kids where toddlers.

[sloane]

i almost didn't go to mine. i had lots of pre-conceived ideas about what it would be like & none of them were good! i stuck with it though & it took me a while to click & feel comfortable. but now i'm still friendly with 4 of the 7 others - and we joined a local playgroup session that was started by the MG before ours. it's been a great support for me & a reminder that most things that happen are pretty normal!

[SunnyRain]

Yeah I didn't click with my mums group, either. I found most of the woman dishonest about their experience as a mother (there were a couple of honest women). They also started doing other things together during the week that I couldn't attend and i just ended left out.

Recently I had a 2nd baby and I was the 6th woman in the group to do so, but the only woman they didn't organise a little get together / shower for so I finally decided I was over them. Pretty hurt actually.

Luckily my hospital antenatal group from my first child still meet regularly and they are lovely ladies, it's a small intimate group and we are really lucky to usually meet at 1 woman's house so we can sit and relax in a child safe place and not worry about the kids.

It's hit and miss.

Sent from my Desire HD

[Cassius2]

I have loved all my mothers groups (thankfully!). i had two when DD1 was first born (for some reason the local MCH centre booked me into two and being alone in the babyworld i didnt query lol). and then when we moved to melbourne my MCH nurse booked me into one here and almost 4 years later we are still going strong! i still keep up with the other girls back in canberra via FB and we catch up when i am up there.

i love my melbourne crew though. we do nights out together (sans kids), have BBQs together on weekends so that the dads can join in etc and now we are planning a spa weekend away (sans DHs and kids lol).

love them

[glenny_c]

Love, love, love my mothers group!! The girls have been invaluable in that tough first few months. We are all very honest and different in our parenting but nobody is judgemental we are all interested in what everyone is doing. Some of the girls are starting to return to work now and so far every one has maneuvered their work days so that they are still free on Thurs so they can make mother's group.

[~ Mylitta ~]

I think it definitely depends on the group of woman that are in the mother's group as to whether you find it a good or bad experience.

I am lucky that my mother's group from my son is a great bunch of supportive woman and we all get along really well. It's been 2 years now and we still catch up weekly at each others houses.

I've heard disaster stories about some groups though. The most common gripe I hear is about overly competitive mothers. "MY child can do this! Yours can't" etc... We all know kids develop at different rates so I see no reason to be competitive. There's a huge difference between being proud of your child's achievements, and bragging in a way that puts down the other children.

In my area you only ever join a mother's group for first babies, so DS has a lovely bunch of little friends to play with and grow up with. I feel bad for my DD because she has no mother's group buddies, so a much smaller number of little friends Luckily one of the Mum's from my son's mother's group had a baby a month after my DD was born, and another is pregnant. I already feel guilty that DD's 1st birthday party is probably going to be a much smaller affair. Especially considering I didn't form a bond with her BB belly buddies like I did with DS's, so no BB buddies for her either, whereas with my DS we are all quite close and catch up in real life regularly.

[nurseymum]

So interesting to see everyone's responses. My mother's group has been going strong now for 4.5 yrs and has seen many new additions, life changes, moves and various other challenges. I agree that there are some enviroments that have a strange competitiveness to them, I was originally part of another group that had a really superficial feel to it, and as someone said in a previous post, that feeling that if I admit to not coping or not turning up looking fully made up was somehow equivalent to failure, was not nice

The lovely group I then found through the Ecc was such a better fit. We came from backgrounds that included 2nd marriages, 2nd babies, single parenting, IVF, premmie babes and even surviving international incidents!! We seemed to all need each other, and need the honesty and openess...so lucky! Still catching up weekly and even putting together a collective of our pre/post baby experiences in a book, so when the years pass, we'll always be able to look back at the raw, honest side of being a mum - not everyone gets the fairytale, but what you often get is so much better