Friendships can be fleeting
This is a photo from May of 2009. Ella was playing with her best friend Little Bean. Sabina, Little Bean’s mummy, and I had met over a circle of babies at a baby music class through our local SureStart Children’s Centre. Our girls were about 3 months old at the time and Sabina and I always ended up sitting next to each other. We started talking, found that our girls birthday’s were only 3 days apart and continued to sign up for other classes at the Children’s Centre together. I met a few other mummies whose daughters were all a very similar age through Sabina and these classes. The SureStart Children’s Centre saved me. I didn’t know a soul until directed by our local health visitors. Finally I had some other mummies to be around! Eureka!
Over the next year, our Mummy Circle grew to include about 6-8 mummies/girls who all were born within weeks of each other. Most of us were on Maternity Leave at the time and had all the freedom that first-time motherhood allowed for. In addition to the classes we attended at the Children’s Centre, I started organising weekly “coffee mornings” or “play dates” and later, walking adventures to help us all get a bit more fit while we chatted. It wasn’t just me organising things but I tended to take the bull by the horns. We even started having a Mummy’s Night Off once a month, enjoying local restaurants and a few hours of “normal” before heading back to our families. Through it all, Sabina and I were quite close and did a fair bit together with our girls.
As all friendships tend to have their “season”, so did our group of mummies. Two of the mummies went back to work part-time which limited their availability. On the days they weren’t working there were jobs to be done and errands to be run and eventually, there seemed to be more “no, can’t make it” replies to the attempts to organise outings. I stopped making an effort to invite and by the time our girls were 1 1/2 we were acquaintances only, for the most part. I think you realise who you are truly friends with when the common bond (your children) is taken out of the equation. It’s totally understandable. But also, utterly depressing. It seems that friendship can be fleeting.
Obviously, me being a “foreigner” has put me at a bit of a disadvantage in the “friends” department. I didn’t have any friends when I arrived other than the few couples that had been friends with my husband. Unfortunately, most of them, while lovely and wonderful, were well beyond kiddie years and were closer to retirement years so I didn’t have a wealth of “peers” to choose from. Not going back to work also put me at a disadvantage in that department as well. I had made friends of my own with my work colleagues but they were just that, work colleagues. Again, once the common bond (work) was out of the equation, there wasn’t much else keeping me there.
For those of you in the blogging world who know me, finding out that I have only one very few friends in REAL LIFE may surprise you. For whatever reason, I’ve been able to strike up quite a few friendships in the blogosphere and am always outgoing and confident at blogging events and in public situations. I’m not sure why but I see it as a challenge. And as I’ve gotten to know many of my blogging friends better through their blogs, I feel like I’ve done the “hard work” prior to meeting in person and we can just jump into the middle of the friendship without a sideways glance. But my blogging friends aren’t here on a daily basis. They aren’t available for coffee mornings and play dates. They aren’t able to drive 3+ hours for a Mummy’s Night Off. They are my “other world” so to speak.
Since Ella began nursery in January (can it have been six months already?), obviously I have seen other mums on the “school run” which is all of 5 minutes from our house. However, it’s only a fleeting “Hiya” as we bustle our children into school, kiss them goodbye and tend to any business before racing back out the door. I feel like I should try to organise something but everyone is so busy and I don’t know if I want to be rejected like in the past. I don’t know what to do but I’m lonely and bored and feel bad for Ella because she only has Little Bean in her life and can’t even remember the names of the children in her class much less make new friends.
I’m whinging, I suppose…but that’s what I get to do every so often on my blog. And I think there may be a few of you who might feel the same in your corner of Real Life. What do you do to make new friends? Have you tried to “force” yourself on other mums at school? Do you feel like you’re holding your child back by not making more of an effort? Any suggestions are more than welcome.
I don’t have any practical suggestions or solutions to offer. Sorry about that. But I did want to let you know that I have two people in my life, who I would call on in the middle of the night. Both friends since I became pregnant the first time and it’s weird to find that some friendships seem to be for a 2 year period, with the baby thing and then life moves on. I’ve found it quite intense in some ways to be honest. And I’ve made mistakes in the friendships as well, which has been upsetting. It’s felt like being back at school sometimes. What I will say, is that I’m now adjusting to my weird online life and my at home life, because I work from home, am a full time working, self employed bird, and I have to accept that there’s no more social stuff in the day for me. I saw some photos on Facebook at the weekend, and they were from a fair on Saturday that friends had gone to, and they’d not let me know they were going. I don’t know whether to be sad about that or not. I couldn’t have made it, but they didn’t let me know. In hindsight, it’s just that friendships do change, and things change and people move on, don’t they? And that is just what you and I need to do Karin, move on. But it’s hard to do it, isn’t it! x
I know exactly how you feel. Kind of. After getting married, we didn’t suddenly start being friends with married couples. Our closest friends were still (and still are) single. We are all still good friends, but at different phases in our lives. So now after having a baby, I’ve suddenly become part of a new circle of mummies and babies (which is great). But I am under no illusions, I know it’s only because of the children.
I want to give you a big hug! I think those of us that have family and friends around us neglect other ‘foreign’ Mums. I for one will be making a bigger effort to invite a Mum for coffee after the school run.
My only suggestion would be to invite one of Ella’s friends for lunch or tea, presumably the Mummy would also be there and voila, you have someone to talk to. Continue to do this on a weekly basis and hopefully you’ll find a Mummy that you have stuff in common with.
Also, once you’ve befriended one Mummy, arrange a coffee after the school run with her and spread the word to the other school run Mums, I’m sure at least one would be free?
Hope this helps!
My friendships have changed so much over the yrs beginning when I met hubby as a teenager. We were so wrapped up in each other that I didn’t need or want any friends. Then when I become a Mum I felt a bit lonely and wanted/needed other Mum friends. I craved a social life. I finally got it when my boys started school. I’m quite good at striking up conversations, infact I’d dive straight in & as a result I ended up with a very active social life.
I have changed as my kids have grown though and actually prefere a much quieter social life nowadays.
My advice is force yourself to chat to other Mums at the school gate and persevere with it or failing that deliver Avon books, you dont really earn much money but you do meet loads of Mums…I met my best ever friend doing it! x
I hope that you count me in those few friends? You better had or there will be trouble.
Life is a lonely pursuit – look at me… my best friend is my macbook air:)
Things do change and you’ll find that when LM starts school you’ll become friends with a whole load of new people.
I’m with you on this. I have very few friends in “real life”. My closest two friends live in Manchester (200 miles away) and the other lives in Torquay (about 600 miles away) so as you can see, I am stuck for friends up here in Northumberland. I have about four or five friends up here but I wouldn’t call them really close friendships. They used to be when Amy was younger but like you say, friends drift away. I’m a bit of a loner and lack in confidence, hence not going to Cybermummy, but to be honest, apart from Jane and Lorraine (my 2 closest friends) my main friendships are actually online.
CJ xx
As an old fart with teenagers, I’m going to give you the benefit of my vast experience *cough*.
I found that every life/parenting stage brings new friends – first there’s the ante-natal group (sadly I’ve lost touch with most of mine too). Then there’s mums you meet at nursery, then the school gate brings a completely new set, then when your teens don’t need taking to school, you maybe go on to meet new people…at work, or I even met my lovely friend Julie at an evening class I took.
I’ve made really good friends through blogging, but also have friends back from when I was a teen (I’m looking forward to moving back near them very shortly).
I think what I’m trying to say, in a waffly way, is that there are potential friends round every corner! Some you’ll move on from and some you’ll keep hold of. Don’t lose hope – just be open to new experiences and things will change. I promise. xx
We moved to a new area at the end of 2010 and my mission since then has been to make some pals for me and for the boys. It is so hard, it really is, I know exactly where you are coming from. My main pool of potential friends is pre-school as I don’t work. Luckily my son is very sociable and makes friends easily so I have spent the last few months quizing him about who he is playing with and then (ahem) forcing myself upon their poor mothers. It is hard work and breaking into the little cliques that exist amongst the mums is even harder.
Forcing myself on folk is really not my style but as we arrived half way through the term and friendships with kids and mum are already in place so I felt I had to be a bit more forward than I usually am to make sure my son had the odd playdate and I occasionally got to speak to someone other than the 2 kids and husband.
5 months down the line and I am still slogging away!
I went through the same patch with Elliott and I was one of those who returned to work. Like you I was the “organiser”, the “gatherer” and when I slowed down due to lack of time I ended up losing a few “friends” along the way. It’s life, that’s the way it is. Then I got pregnant with Victor and I realised that it was going to be a lonely business since all the mums I had met were now back at work and with no intention to procreate again just yet. So on a practical level here is what I did to meet people:
I became chairmum for the Netmums meetups in my area, look for yours, there must be one and if not contact them to create the group. It doesn’t take that much time and effort, just promoting your events on the netmum page provided and create your own local FB page.
The other thing I did is became a member of the committee at the pre-school and got involved with most of the mums. It was very useful especially during the school holidays.
I hope this helps a bit.
It is not always easy and I find it goes in waves. Now that I work most of the time I have again lost touch with a lot of mum friends and it is scary especially so close to the summer school holidays…
Good luck xx
I think this is so common and I do feel for you. I’m the kind of person who has never been shy and I do have lots of friends as I tend to shove myself into conversations with people, some of whom like it and others who don’t! It has a very low success rate but there are little gems out there to be found. I can only imagine how hard it must be if you are shy and find it daunting.
Even with my comparative ease at making friends, I have times when I feel incredibly lonely – I think most Mums do if they are honest about it. I think it is the nature of being at home with kids and I’m feeling it more now I’m on maternity leave with my second. I always think I could use more friends to help break up the week with adult conversations and play dates. I’ve done the usual things from antenatal classes, where we have stayed in touch, to contacting women on NetMums, mostly disastrous but one that was a huge success who I still see all the time.
I don’t really have a lot of advise other than to say that I really do believe most Mums with pre-schoolers are keen to have more friends for themselves and their kids, even if they look like they are sorted, so most are likely to be receptive if you try to befriend them. You may not get on and, in that case, try the next Mum in line until you find someone you gel with. I’m no expert and I’m still trying to build up my list of friends to keep me busy and therefore happy. My thinking is that they don’t have to be bosom buddies (although having a few that are helps), just people with enough in common with you to share a chat and a moan to keep you sane. Many of them may be fleeting friendships but that is OK too as there are many friendships out there which suit you at certain times of your life, not necessarily forever. Just like-minded people helping each other through the ups and downs of being a Mum.
I wish you the very best of luck with it, I really do.
xx