Facebook Birth Groups

[littlerascal12345]

AIBU to think that these are a nightmare?

I've just left my second. Was on one with my first child and not long after they were born it all descended into bitchiness. If you offered an actual opinion rather than 'you ok hun?' It wasn't liked.

Baby 2 is now 12 weeks old. I posted in the group I've just left asking advice about moving him to his own room as he disturbs me constantly but sleeps through himself. Only to be basically shot down with all the so called risks and the 'admin' shoving guidelines down my throat.

Does anyone actually find these groups good or useful or are they just another way to make mums feel like crap?! Friends I've got love theirs.

You don't have to adhere to the guidelines of the Lullaby Trust or the NHS, but you can't pretend like they don't exist, and people aren't allowed to refer to them!

This. My group is very supportive, but you would've definitely been informed of the guidance around safe sleeping. And I think that's fair enough tbh, so long as it's not done in a cruel way.

Some are great for support when you need it, and I think those are the ones where people are not over invested.

Other are poisonous because some posters seem to turn into their worst selves when on social media.

As an anecdote, I am on a mums group and one poster asked if there were any nice places she could take her daughter's dad when he visited, and then went on to say he was married with children .

I didn't say anything but someone criticised her and was banned. Drama started with other posters being very supportive saying that they could understand her and surely she was a strong woman. Some people are just weird.

Is global development delay what used to be known as 'learning difficulties ' ? ( genuine question)

I am in one that started on here and migrated to a private Facebook page when we were all 12 or so weeks pregnant. About 45 members from all over the U.K. DS is 2 and a half now and it is still going strong, very good balance of sensible advice, sharing and support and silly fun. We are mostly pragmatists with a strong sense of sarcasm and we swear quite a lot. Nobody ever calls anyone else Hun and we agree much more than we disagree, and if we disagree we do so politely. It’s a great place to share pictures and videos of DS as I don’t do that on open Facebook and I love seeing the other toddlers too. The admins are extremely light touch. I have met about half of them in person either at group meet-ups or one on one if local. I consider them to be actual friends.

We also talk about interior design a lot.

@littlemeitslyn Global development delay is where all their development is delayed (mobility, speech and language, gross and fine motor skills, social and emotional development.... the whole lot)

It's a bit of a broad term, but means more than learning difficulties. It means all of their developmental milestones will be delayed.

I was in a MN group that moved over to FB, our dc are now all 10, they were all a help when the dc were babies and it’s evolved into a friendship now as they are much older.
My other 2 dc I stopped bothering, too much hunz for my liking and not enough swearing

If you offered an actual opinion rather than 'you ok hun?' It wasn't liked.

...asking advice about moving him to his own room as he disturbs me constantly but sleeps through himself. Only to be basically shot down with all the so called risks and the 'admin' shoving guidelines down my throat.

Which is it you want then, platitudes or opinions?
I think groups have to very careful about advising people not to follow recommendations. A baby died after a mum followed advise given by 10 month mamas Facebook group.
Whether you like it or not SIDS is real, a family locally lost a 3 month old baby a couple of years ago, baby was in own room with a breathing monitor.

I've been on one since my first was born - she's nearly 10! Still going strong but not as busy as it was but most of us are still there 😌

It's possible @ElfridaEtAl it did start on here then move over to FB 🙂

@KatnissMellark

Thank you for mentioning the groups, very kind of you.

I am happy to say that at 15 months old she is now 100% allergy free and loving her food and a chunky little madam :)

Oh that's fab @PrancingP. DS is two in a couple of weeks and showing no signs of growing out of his allergies

BUT, OP - on one hand you complain that people are not giving actual advice, and on the other you're so annoyed that they're shoving "guidelines" and "so-called risks" down your throat about safe sleep for babies. Did you want them to just say "you go mama your bubbz!"???? You don't have to adhere to the guidelines of the Lullaby Trust or the NHS, but you can't pretend like they don't exist, and people aren't allowed to refer to them!

This!

Sounds like they gave you some very good advice...

Yep they're awful. In mine someone wanted to wean their 11 week old baby. 11 weeks! When I posted nicely that recommended weaning is six months and so young is dangerous Merry hell broke loose.

I also got kicked out of one because a member posted a picture of her boyfriend who was off on a stag do and had blacked up as a Jamaican and I challenged it. To be told "it's not racist our friends are black"

I’m wondering if I’m in the same group as a few others on here- I love my Facebook birth month group. Wouldn’t be without them- I consider most of them close friends.

I was on one years ago whilst pregnant with my eldest son. It all went very weird with one of the ‘popular ‘ posters making up odder and odder tales about being raped etc then being outed as a bullshitter by others in the group who checked her out in real life. Then she kept coming back with grandiose apologies whilst the group split in two halves over whether to accept her back or hate her guts. Anyway, at least it was more diverting than the usual dull conversations about how many muslin cloths one might need.

I'm on an international one and so far we've survived without huge drama apart from one episode where the creator flounced off because we collectively thought she was batshit and unstable. Our kids are all 20m old now and the 100 (approx) of us are legit like an internet commune. We formed via reddit though.

@strawberry oh it can't be then, mine started on BabyCentre. We moved over when people started getting nasty over absolutely anything.

@KatnissMellark
That must costing you a fortune in milk free products! I know my bank balance cried over the price of it all and she wasn't even fully weaned.

Hopefully he will outgrow the allergy sooner rather than later, I remember the dietician telling me it's a common allergy upto the age 5 years, I will keep fingers crossed that he is allergy free before he hits 5.

I have to say the only mums groups I am really in are cloth nappy ones and despite worrying they might be very crunchy and ‘woo’, they are actually genuinely really helpful, friendly, fun pages to be on. The Nappy Lady Pregnancy, Baby & Parenting Group is my favourite 😊

I've been in one since pregnancy and my son is almost 3. There are only about 13 of us, and we made a group after meeting in a larger group that has descended into craziness and very "us" (Europeans) v "them" (Americans). It's a shame, really.

Reindeer I think I was in the same one. It really terrified me! I have easy pregnancies, straight forward births, etc and I wouldn’t dream of forgoing prenatal care.

Yes I left mine!
It was actually created on the back of a pregnancy thread on here.

At first it was lovely and supportive and then became very cliquey. A couple of my posts were ignored completely, but was a very busy page mainly filled with the same people.

The tipping point for me was when they started linking photos from other FB pages to poke fun at people's choice of home decor! It Became more of an unnecessary bitchfest and less about he babies!

I'm in one that started either on here or babycentre, I forget which, and our kids are 6 soon :) numbers have dropped from about 150 to around 40 active, but given 6 years have passed that's pretty awesome! We have a big meet up every year or so and do a secret Santa every Christmas, they're honestly the loveliest bunch of women and even though I've never met them in the flesh (I live quite remotely) they feel like proper old friends. I feel all glowy now! 😁

Mine is lovely! I think I got very very lucky because I (foolishly) didn't do NCT and so don't have that automatic support network in person. It's nice to have a virtual one instead.

Quite shocked at some of these stories and feel very lucky not to have any drama llamas in my group even though we are all very different and from very different backgrounds.