About morning baby groups (light-hearted).

[KitKat1985]

So I am trying to get out of the house more with DD (nearly 4 months). I'm trying to do some more baby groups and really struggling. Why oh why oh why do so many of them start at 9 or 10am? Good lord if DD is up several times in the night and is having a grumpy morning it can be nearly lunchtime before I even manage to get dressed. On the occasions I do make it (late obviously, with still wet hair) the room seemed filled with well dressed women (with hair that they have even managed to style before going out), calmly sitting and drinking a fruit tea whilst their babies lie next to them in perfectly co-ordinated outfits. How are they managing it?!? Why can't I manage it? AIBU in wanting the groups to start late-morning at the earliest, or do I, as I strongly suspect, need to just sort my damn morning routine out?

I felt it gave me structure to the day. I have to be up and dressed though. I couldn't spend my mat leave in my pjs. Little babies I just took in what they were wearing (I only changed when needed rather than day clothes and night clothes as I like them in baby gros).
Often my twins would sleep at the grout and I would have a coffee and chat to other mums.

I remember once having to be at an appointment at 10am when DD1 was little and fretting for days as to how I would actually get there on time.

Pinpoint where the delays are. I am always looking for underwear!

Have a bag packed the night before, all clothes, including your own laid out, even your breakfast stuff ready, teabag in cup, bowls and spoon, anything in fact to ease the morning rush.

It gets better with practice.

I totally agree and I am always amazed that people are out and about in the morning but then again I am not a morning person!

You could always organise one?

I used to get this when I organised things. Thing is I organised stuff in line with my other commitments including dropping and collecting a preschooler.

Will you be going (back?) to work when the baby is older? Consider morning groups practice for getting up for work.

It is tricky, I guess just be super organised, I used to unpack and repack the nappy bag the second I got home, so all I had to do was grab and go the next day. Bouncy chair in the bathroom for showers, so baby could still see me. And if baby goes out in their nighttime sleep suit, so be it - no big deal and you can change nappy / clothes once you get to the group!

Or huunt around for more afternoon groups.. There aren't many (I have bemoaned this many times!) but some de exist...

Both DC have been morning nap takers so anything from 9-12 is out for us. Such a shame as all the activities seem to happen in the AM.

The trick to look good when you go out is to have plain clothes that all go together and do your eyebrows. No matter what I grab first thing in the AM I look alright. I am up at 6am to get the kids to daycare for 730 and me to work for 9am. It is incredibly stressful getting everyone out the door in the morning.

I always worry about making the 8am pediatrician appointments. I wake up at 5AM on those days.

DS is 6 weeks and we can usually get out the door by 8.30 or so. That said I don't do any baby groups and have no real intention of joining any! Also I concentrate our activities in the morning when the sun has come up and I've had several strong black coffees got my second wind, whereas by afternoon I'm usually wilting and aiming for a nap (I mean me as well as DS).

DS gets up by 7, feed, usually get DH to entertain him before he heads off to work - otherwise I put him down on playmat or in the buggy while I have a shower & get dressed. He sometimes kicks off so I make it snappy but I don't feel guilty about showering! Then we head out at 8.30ish, do a big walk or at least just a small walk/coffee run (seeing a coffee theme emerging here), or pack him into the car if we're going further afield (last week I took him and the dog to the beach for 9am which was very ambitious...)

When DH gets home in the evening I usually try to leave him with some EBM & duck out by myself for a swim for an hour - bliss!! (Also great because I miss some of the witching hour madness) Exercise used to be such a chore, now I love it, time alone all to myself!

Despite the annoying people who said "oh you'll never shower again/you'll spend all day in your nighty" I have managed to get dressed and a bit of make up on at a reasonable hour every day. (Not trying to be smug, I may have got dressed but I did wander round all day once with my leggings inside out) *Squizita" how about you? I remember discussing this on the pregnancy boards.

Hi there,I run a morning group that starts at 10:00am.Please lower your expectations- the babies/toddlers are sometimes in jams and it is obvious that some mums/ dads / carers struggle to get there for 10:00.However you are EXACTLY the kind of mum we need- they tend to be the kind of mums that encourage everyone else.In my experience - about 15 years of running the Group,mums leave in a buoyant mood with a sense of achievement.
Please try- you have so much to offer,it's obvious from your post you have empathy and would make all the difference to other mums who need warmth and encouragement- we don't need perfect mums we need the human ones like you!

You haven't been to any of the groups I go to. I never look groomed, although some of the other mums do tend to look like they have made an effort. I agree with everyone who has said to be organised about it.

Clothes out the night before, bags packed. Bowls and cups out ready for breakfast. A hair style that doesn't need anything doing to it each day, just a brush. Maybe start showering at night to save a few minutes.

Being organised in the mornings, will be good practise for when you go back to work or when your dc have a morning preschool place.

But, if you don't want to go to groups, you don't have to. A four month old baby isn't bothered if they are at home with you or at a group with you.

I run a breastfeeding group that starts at 9.30am. On a monday.

We make it clear on our leaflets that it's a drop-in session, and rocking up at 11.20 (we finish at 11.30) is perfectly fine and understandable and we will be pleased to see you and make you a cup of tea.

The woman I run it with drops her kids at school and then saunters over around 9am and sets the room up. I screech in at 9.29, baby under my arm, toddler hanging off my leg. I usually have sick in my hair.

Great post Lucy

YY to Not too! X

Thank you for all of your replies. I wasn't expecting so many! I will make more effort to get to some morning groups. It's more for my benefit I know than DDs, but I know it'll be good for me to socialise a bit more with some other mums even if they look more well preened than me, and I usually have at least one of DD's bodily fluids on me by 9am!. As some posters have said, it'll be good practice as well for when I have to go back to work (please DD be sleeping through by then - I'm going back on double shifts, I.E, 14 hour shifts with a 6.45am start so a sleepless night followed by a 14 hour shift would be hell).

Can i just ask (and sorry to hijack this thread slightly), timings aside of the baby groups. Has anyone just not done them because they were so tired from being up all night? I used to look at people going to the groups thinking how on earth have you managed to get dressed and get here. dont you just want to sit at home?

Genuine question. My ds is now 2 and a half but the first night he slept through he was 18 months. I was permanently exhausted and as much as id have loved to do baby groups I just couldn't manage it. I had no help from family, dp didnt really do the night feeds until the weekend. so I spent every day mon- sat doing night feeds, then all day at home alone with him and the only respite i got was when he was asleep.

I always feel i slightly failed him in that way by not going to groups, but looking back I honestly dont know how i got through it all.

YANBU! BF groups, play groups, baby cinema, mum and baby fitness - all stupidly early for some with young babies. I was like you. Mine used to wake early, feed, then be back asleep by 830/9am and I needed to sleep when he did! Now DS is a toddler it's easier but 10am can still be a challenge some days.

honey you're NBU either! My 2.5 yr old still sleeps badly and it's hard after a bad night to do much, but they're so much more energetic and demanding as toddlers that staying in isn't an option I find.

Parents of children who sleep well regularly make everything look easy. It's annoying! I have to remind myself how easy everything feels to me after the odd night of good or unbroken sleep...

I didn't go to much with my first baby. He slept like crap and I took any opportunity at all to be horizontal. My second isn't the world's greatest sleeper either, but since there's not a snowball's chance in hell of me getting a lie down - much less a nap - with a 2 year old about, I would much rather be out. Misery loves company and all that.

Honey. My DD didn't sleep for over 2 years. Quite how I coped I don't know. I got out and about as I had older child going school.

When the sleep deprivation was at its worse though I had days and weeks where I just couldn't drive.

The reaction from some of the mums- mainly first time mums whose children slept were they just didn't get it. Some were damn right nasty! Now some of them with two or more are struggling and they do and the perfectly made up mum halo is slipping.

My ds is 41/2 months. If I'm dressed by midday I'm happy but I have been known to bath mid afternoon and get straight into my pjs again. Sometimes I haven't even bathed by the time DH gets home as I need to wash and dry my hair and that's not really possible

He still has good nights and bad nights but with a few feeds he is not normally up before 830 or 9am. I know it sounds ideal but wake ups at 11pm, 3am and 7am mean we get up
Late. I used to get up at 5am for work and Now struggle to get up at 9am! I'm trying to do two groups a week (one morning and one afternoon) but it is a mission ... Especially with the cold wet weather.

I think we are all in the same boat. Some just hide it better than others

I also find I am not so bothered about the baby groups for me to socialise but am more concerned my baby will be bored of me and want to interact with other children (even though he is young). The days also go quicker when I am out and about.... But sometimes I just can't be bothered.

Because slightly older DCs fall into a routine of refusing to sleep after 6-7am and wanting a nap late morning.

DD1 slept 11.30 to 1.30/2pm, so mornings were great, but afternoons were hopeless because she wanted lunch so late.

Mornings worked best for DD2 because, DD1 was at preschool 9-11.45am

And yes babies get bored, especially older non mobile ones.

I remember the older NCT group being very apologetic their toddlers were being horrible one day.

I couldn't have cared less, watching their antics had stopped DD1 grumbling about nothing for the first time for days.

What is it you find difficult? Not saying that to be nasty, genuinely which bit of the process of going out feels most challenging and restrictive? Feeding? sleeping? stuff? the clock? Truly I have been there with my first baby, first couple of weeks in the middle of winter and feeling like I needed to take everything in the world with me, physical baggage, emotional baggage! I felt really trapped in, so I changed it.

I felt most trapped by feeding, and stuff. Mostly stuff. It felt like such a big deal to pack a bag and unfold a pushchair and arrange a car seat and fasten straps and coats and bump out up the steps and raincovers and gloves and all the million things I thought I needed, and if the baby cried to be fed, what would I do in the pee it down rain, would everyone look at me, disaster, felt awful. Really, I suffered with my mental health not because I had a baby but because I had a shitload of stuff and felt trapped by it.

Firstly I turned off the clock. Literally, at night, and only checked periodically during the day. I went out and found a group or activity to fit my being out, and if there wasn't one I went for a walk. If anyone asked me how my sleep was, I might have a vague idea I had been up 6 or 7 times but that was better for my brain than 'I was awake 11-12.10 and 1.13 until 3.20 and 3.57 until 5.01....' which drove me mad. I also felt much better and more in control when the baby slept because sleepy and ate because hungry rather than because of the clock.

I streamlined my stuff. A lot. My routine for getting ready usually included putting some clothes on, changing the baby's nappy, putting the baby in a sling, doing my hair and make up to feel human, adding a hat to the baby and a coat to me, putting a nappy in my handbag and picking up keys and brolly. Sure, we had incidents, there was the vomiting incident and the falling in a lake day out, also the borrowing a nappy from a stranger once, and more than once baby was transported home without trousers or we made an emergency purchase. But when I think of how much I didn't have to carry, how much time I saved, and realise I've grown two children past babyhood intact, I figured stuff is definitely over rated.

Then I had my second and I can now get all of us dressed and out of the house in ten minutes flat, twenty five if I want a shower and make up and for the kids socks to match.

There is a big caveat to all that which is baby groups aren't compulsory and are actually a bit crap to be honest. They are kind of a last resort solidarity thing to stop us all going mental in our living rooms. If you feel fine in your living room, stay there. I didn't. I needed to be out, so I literally strapped the baby on and went, and fed it on the go, once I could feed it as and when and lost all the stuff, my life got better.

sockmatcher I was the same, sleep deprivation left me unable to drive too. I would spend my days wanting to get out and about but just couldn't drag myself and baby off the couch. I searched for nurseries when he was 2 weeks old as I couldn't cope. Friends just couldnt understand why I was always cancelling things, cos I was too exhausted to get there.

Getting dressed and walking to the local asda (25 mins away) and back was a massive achievement to me some days.

I wouldnt wish a non sleeping baby on my worst enemy.