Motherhood can be pretty lonely, especially in the first few years. Just keeping a whole tiny person loved, safe, fed and dressed can seem like the most monumental of tasks, let alone attempting it all AND leaving the house at the same time. It’s easy to slip into a routine of naps and feeds and realise you haven’t worn real clothes for five days, or that the only person you have spoken to that week is your spouse, or maybe even the baby.
The comments will start as soon as your bundle arrives, sometimes even sooner, and especially if you are the first in your friendship group or generation to have kids, like I was.
You need to get some mum friends.
People will suggest that you need to ‘get out there’ to mum and baby groups and meet some people who are in the same position as you. And at first, it seems like a good idea. You need people who are living through those rough early days with you, friends who are also on maternity leave, friends who you can have coffee with and go shopping with, people who you can begin to rely on and swap babysitting favours with occasionally.
And so, when the newborn fog starts to lift after the first month or two, you look up the best groups near you, pack a bag with four changes of baby clothes and an item for every possible eventuality, and off you go, full of hope that this will be the beginning of some beautiful, life-long friendships.
Except they lied.
Mum and baby groups, toddler groups, bumps and buggies, stay-and-play – whatever the names of the groups in your area, they are the most impossible places to find new friends ever.
For a start, all the people there are either new and shy, like you, or they are in established friendship groups and not as fussed about meeting new friends.
Then, add in the fact that the church, town hall, children’s centre, wherever, will be filled with approximately half as many again babies and children as there are adults. And they all need A LOT of care and attention. If by chance, you manage to strike up a conversation with a mum you like the look of, you will barely have exchanged how old your children are before one of you has run off to feed/change/calm/prevent a toddler from doing something dangerous to himself or another child.
The room is scattered with abandoned tea and coffee cups, above toddler reach, because no one has the time to stay and chat for extended periods, especially with people they don’t know that well.
Finally, groups usually last for between one and two hours each week. If you add up the time you have had for meaningful conversations during that time, it will take about ten years before you have chatted enough to form a friendship in the traditional way.
You are still feeling a bit raw and emotional. Motherhood affects us all in unpredictable ways and the adjustment period is a long one. It is just so hard to march up to an individual or crowd at a baby group and start chatting, and even harder to suggest that you could meet up with someone outside of the group.
I went to mum and baby groups for a full nine months while I was on maternity leave with my son, and a full year while on maternity leave with my daughter. And, do you know what? I don’t have a single mum friend nearby. Not one. I have no one to have coffee with, no one to shop with, no one to talk to about sleepless nights, no one to swap babysitting favours with.
And I am lonely.
Introducing the Momzie App
BUT, there is hope. Modern technology is a wonderful thing and there are now ways that lonely mums can reach out to other mums in their areas. Momzie is a new mobile app where mums and mums-to-be can meet and make new friends in their local area, in an easy and fun way. Momzie came to be when its founder Hanna realised that it was really hard to be a supportive friend to the new mums she knew as she did not have children of her own. She also noticed that her mum friends did not have a supportive group of friends to help them through this challenging time. During the day when stay-at-home most needed company most of their friends without children were at work.
Momzie is a bit like Tinder for mums – you are connected with like-minded mums in your area and you simply swipe right to show you would be interested in meeting (much easier than lurking in a crowded town hall, nursing cold tea for two hours). If they swipe to say they would like to meet you too, you are put in contact with one another.
I have been trying out Momzie over the last few weeks and it is extremely user-friendly and simple. I have already found a few mums that I would love to meet up with. The only downside at the moment is that the app is new and there are not many mums registered yet. That’s where you come in. You can download Momzie now – it’s free. I really wish something like this had been more established a few years ago. If it had been, I might already be enjoying some of those life-long mummy friendships I have been dreaming about.
You can find the apps on the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store
*Disclaimer: This is a collaborative post with the Momzie App All words and opinions are my own*
Your experience of baby groups is so spot on – how can anyone make friendships between changing the baby (again!) and stopping the toddler from bashing someone over the head with a plastic truck! This app is such a good idea x
Some of these observations ring very true I always felt like Bill No Mates and everyone else seemed to know each other.
I disagree with your analogy of mum and baby groups. This may depend on the quality of a group in your area or other factors perhaps including your own ability to make friends but generally for myself and many of the friends I’ve met through them they are invaluable and supportive in the main!
The difference in this tinder for mums malarkey is that in that situation is is almost only about the mum and what she gains from friendships. In a mum and baby group it’s a place designed for both the mum and baby.
A place for toddlers to run about, make craft, sing songs together and socialise at smack times etc. This means mum can actually have a conversation without feeling guilty or worried their baby is being ignored which is very important!
You say there’s not enough time to chat due to toddlers needing parents intervention in their play and I would challenge you to have a conversation around kids ANYWHERE where this isn’t true!
I’m sure this app is very valuable and useful to mums who can’t get to groups or don’t enjoy them personally but to just write off mum and baby groups is at best short sighted and at worst downright unfair. I for one have formed lots of friendships over the past year at these groups and we do meet outside the groups and get together.
Your post has no doubt caught the eyes of many, some agreeing and some in total disagreement, everyone has their own views.
I’d like to voice my views and these come without any judgement to anyone, what’s right for one may not be right for the other.
The fact is that these groups are set up for the benefit of both parents/carers and the little ones. Attending a group gives both parties the opportunity to chat (even if the toddlers just spout a collection of ga ga noises), make a mess, play/meet with others, build social networks, even just to see smiling faces from other parents who understand when your child having a total hissy fit over nothing in particular. It’s far more interactive for everyone concerned than sitting at home alone going through your phone. Its more important for the children to see your smiling face than the person you’re messaging. How can you expect a child to engage with you when all they can see is the back of your phone while you go through your flick list of possibles. It may work for you and it could be a great resource for catching up with people and making new friends but it could be something you do as well as going to the local M & T groups rather than instead of.
There’s no need to be one or the other, you could use both but I’m guessing that given the choice the little one would rather go to group to play with others than sit their while mum finds a friend on the phone, she can do that while the baby sleeps.
Just saying…….