Being asked to make meals for new mums

[Paquitalaflor]

Feel free to crucify me but I am irked. I have been added to a Whats app group by someone local in my village, along with about 16 other people, asking us to make meals (fresh, freezable, etc) for some new first time mums in the village. I have been asked this before and mentioned that with a full time job, two kids of my own and regularly being on my own as my husband travels a lot, I struggle to cook meals for my own family, let alone someone else's. I offered up a bag of chicken dippers and everyone laughed at my drollness.

BUT ACTUALLY.... JUST MAKE YOUR OWN FECKING FOOD!!! It isn't hard! When I had a newborn and a two year old and my husband was working away and I could hardly walk due to a nasty c-section that woudn't heal, I made my own food! I had food delivered to my house, some of it was fresh ingredients, some of it was ready meals, some of it was delivered on a moped. Literally no one in the village offered me food and if they did, I would feel a bit weird about it.

In this day and age, it isn't hard to source food. Will you be tired?! Yes. Will your other children eat fewer vegetables than they should? Probably yes. But christ alive, that is what parenting and motherhood is..... I would rather be offered food now when there is work and school and activities, rather than when they slept most of the day and we all had nothing else to do. AIBU?

CatteStreet good points re: feeding “the man” and only women being asked. Why is the focus “new mums” and not new parents?

I kind of hate this type of thing, When I was living in California this was not uncommon and honestly I never got the impression that the new parents were even grateful for the food (or wanted it really in the first place). Many of the contributors secretly hated having to do it as well.

As one new mum I was close to said, it created a whole new obligation to send thank you cards and make sure various dishware was returned to the right neighbour and she couldn't refuse any of it without looking very rude. Then there's the fact that different people like to eat different things, many times the meals that were made would be a rich unhealthy dish that the cook knew would turn out well but do the new parents want to eat endless high fat/calorie dishes - lasagnas, creamy casseroles etc. day after day? When I did it I generally made a slow cooker lentil soup, easy to reheat, tasty (at least I think so) and not unhealthy.

i suppose I find the implication that the family (the man) needs to be catered for while the mother is indisposed a bit

or you could see it as a kind thing to help a couple with a new baby, who might not be breastfed so they both share the feeds.., and where half of that couple goes back to work within a week or 2!

Why is it always a men vs women for some posters.

I wouldnt want that service who knows whats in it.

YANBU. My questions are: doesn't this woman have a husband / partner, didn't they freeze some meals in preparation and don't you have takeaways / delivery where you are?! I wouldn't be getting involved personally.

I had a child with ASD, a newborn who breastfed for 90 minutes every 3 hours and who slept in the lounge and stirred at the slightest noise with no door to close on the kitchen and a partner who expected me to carry on doing everything if kept a sort of scorecard if he had to ‘help’ me. I’d have killed for a little help and support. It was shit, it affected my mental health, I felt like a complete failure, and I wouldn’t begrudge anyone else if some thoughtfulness and support, and if I didn’t have the time now to help I’d just say so. You’re being judgmental.

God No!
Theres a church in our village does this.
I know a few of the people who are involved, one lives on a farm and literally has cow shit all over her kitchen floor and cats asleep on her kitchen worktops.
Others use it as an opportunity to market their Church and/or to have a good gossip about the new parents.
I also think its quite wasteful, bet loads of meals get secretly put in the bin.

It is probably well meant but agree that many new mums do not want random meals from strangers and these days when most have freezers/home delivery /microwaves etc it is not like new mums are all going without hot food.

I am sure the new mums would rather the 'helpful brigade' offered an hour of help doing whatever the new mum needed.
I would have loved someone to come over and make a coffee and have a chat for an hour tbh when i was stuck home with newborn, severely anaemic so couldn't walk anywhere without getting dizzy and post c section..i wanted adult company.
Or someone to clean the kitchen or load dishwasher or walk the dog !

I often include a meal as part of a gift when a friend has a newborn baby. I think a casserole or pie is very welcome in those early days, especially with second or later siblings when life is more chaotic and they generally have everything a baby needs.

I wouldn't dream of asking other people to do so though, and I'm in the camp that would find it weird to receive from someone I wasn't close to.

Was it just women invited to do the cooking?

I really appreciated food delivered by my family and friends when DS was a newborn. He and I weren’t well and I was struggling a lot. I’ve also been on food rotas for friends. With DC2 I felt fine and it wasn’t such a huge shock so nicely let people know that I was ok for meals.

It’s a nice thing to do but no one should feel pressured into participating as a new mum or as a cook.

It's a great idea for people who have time to cook. I know what you mean though about offering the chicken dippers. I've been invited to join several of these groups over the years and find it hard to say that we're so busy we struggle to make home cooked meals and often live on food from the freezer.

What would have been a great help to us would have been if someone had offered to take one of our older children to the play park along with their kids.

Gosh, I actually needed this service once they all started after school/evening activities and sports, all clashing times and DH often on long shifts - not when they were newborn.

I bet the new parents are probably horrified and already have plenty of freezer meals and are hoping no one responds. I had someone bring me a meal when my 2nd one was a few days old. It went in the fridge (no room in the freezer because I had plenty in there already) and then after a week, it went in the bin. I had plenty of food prepped and frozen and we got some ready meals our older one would like and my dh is perfectly capable of cooking meals after a full day at work if I was sleeping or tired just like he does half of every week anyway. Because we are adults and we can manage.

The last thing I wanted when I was bf and starving was someone's no fat, hardly any calories vegan soup.

"yagayagayo

Has no one ever sent you a Tesco shop or Cook new parents pack of freezable food when your babies were born? It's quite normal for people to offer food OP. "

I wasn't given or offered any food from anyone when my 2 kids were born. My husband went away a lot too and I struggled at times. My kids are such fussy eaters though (Sen issues) that I don't think anyone would have wanted to cater for them.

I would be enraged by the request as well (incidentally does this person ask for meals for disabled or elderly people as well?) but I would rant to husband and just remove myself from the group.

I think I'd be pissed off with just being added to a WhatsApp group without permission (isn't it the equivalent of handing out someone's mobile number without asking them?). The cooking for other people thing would just make me roll my eyes, have the new mums actually asked for help?

I think it is a very nice thing to do if you have time and can afford too. Yes, I agree that I would be more inclined to cook for someone elderly as they may have trouble ordering online. I had a second section and had a toddler who wasn't walking to tend with. I batch cooked in the last few months to make our lives easier in those first few weeks. After that you just get on with it.

I would leave the watsapp group and leave the others to it.

Must be a bloody big village to have all these new mums.

My village has about 100 people, and 98 of them are elderly.

Definitely not being unreasonable.

It's enough to me to make a fish pie/cottage pie for me and DD, let alone anyone else.

Expensive too, TBH.

I did this for my friends when they had babies and had friends do this for me when I had mine. I wouldn't do it for a stranger though. How do you know what they like/dislike/are allergic to/how much freezer space they have?
I wouldn't accept meals from a stranger either - how would you know what's in it/how clean the hands were that made it?

I don't understand all the mum one-upmanship at all. Wouldn't you have appreciated someone dropping off a meal when you were in their shoes? Just because you coped in challenging circumstances doesn't mean other women shouldn't get to benefit from a bit of compassion. And if you don't want to join in just make your excuses.

Don't any of these new mothers have husbands? Bit sexist if you ask me, has she added any "dads" to the group to help out the new moms?

I have been asked this before and mentioned that with a full time job, two kids of my own and regularly being on my own as my husband travels a lot, I struggle to cook meals for my own family, let alone someone else's

BUT ACTUALLY.... JUST MAKE YOUR OWN FECKING FOOD!!! It isn't hard!

I've said YANBU to refuse to do it, but I think YABU to say it isn't hard. You even say you struggle with your busy life when your husband is away... basically, you never know how much anyone else is struggling, for whatever reason, and it is HARD when you first have a new baby, especially if you're a first time mum. I certianly don't think you should be guilted into cooking for them, but I don't think it's fair to say it's easy. I was very ill after DS was born, as was he, and I found the whole thing, including cooking with a sick baby who screamed constantly, very very difficult.

It's no big deal. You were asked no coerced. Just say, 'Lovely idea but right now I can't commit to this,' and leave the group.No fuss.