To wonder if your NCT group are still friends?

[whereilived]

Ours was pretty tight but now the year before school I can feel is drifting. It’s sad but a bit inevitable I suppose! Has anyone managed to maintain friendships?

Yes and kids are 17 now.

Not the entire group though. One family moved away and a few gently fizzled out but if I bump into them we always have a good chat. But the rest we catch up fairly regularly. Kids from that smaller group are still good friends too.

Obviously most of us being in the same area helped and we generally had a nice group. It's pot luck really!

2 years on and still close to a couple of the girls. Don't actively chat to the others, but we do bump into each other at toddler groups/in town and say hi.

We had a funny group including a fairly well known influencer and what later turned out to be our local Reform candidate.

Not at all. Live in a city and everyone went back to work after 6-7 months and the WhatsApp group fell silent! I speak to one of them who lives nearby but the group itself not at all. And it seems no one else made one on one friendships either.

We moved away. We're still in touch with two couples but have entirely lost touch with the others. Once school starts though, friendships are very school-focused so you'll forget about NCT.

Yes all of ours are just in their first year of school, our babies were all born in or around the first Covid lockdown. We have a few moms that have just disappeared, about 5 couples where we meet for kid free quarterly meals out and then 2-3 couples where we have regular weekly monthly meet ups. One of them is even my hair dresser now, it takes a lot of effort and commitment to keep the friendships going especially as we do not all live close but alway have our diaries to hand to plan the next meet up.

Fourteen years on and four out of the original eight of us are still going strong. We get together every month or two for a meal out. The other four would have been very welcome to join us but it was their choice to drift off.

Edited to add that none of our children ever went to the same nursery or school as each other. When they were younger we used to get together with the kids, but that stopped with Covid and we just picked up with just the grown ups after.

Yes, 19 years on and we get together regularly, some of us more frequently than others, but we kind of merged 2 groups unofficially so we are a large group. Our closest friends from it, we see several times a week and holiday together frequently etc. We spend Christmas Day together every year so they address more like family tbh.

First babies NCT group, children are in their second year at school. One family lost touch after the first year. Another family, the mum sadly died. The remaining five families are all close friends. We rarely manage to meet up all five families together because everyone's busy, but we are in frequent contact, all invited to each others' parties (child and adult), and have lots of playdates.

Second babies NCT group was during COVID. We barely got to meet up because of restrictions. Everyone was supportive via WhatsApp for the first few months, but have only really been in very loose contact (FB friends) since then.

Third time we didn't bother. I totally would have done for £100, but didn't want to spend the £250ish when on a tight budget, knowing that I didn't need the classes.

15 years on and meet up once or twice a year as the whole group. Within the group there are smaller closer knit friendships that meet much more often.

My one from 15 years ago - some are still friends not so much with the wider group. I occasionally see one or two of them at Christmas local carol concerts or pass while shopping.

The health centre one for the GP we are a lot closer and try to catch up a couple of times a year - I think sadly due to a still born and one other other mums having breast cancer - we’ve stayed a lot closer as a point of support- 15 years on the six of us still message occasionally and I know if I needed anyone they’d be there for me.

The group from 21 years ago nope - they may still meet up but I definitely didn’t fit in!

Regular contact with one couple, Facebook friends with two, and lost contact with the final couple, partly due to people moving away.

That reassures me. I always read about NCT friends for life etc on mumsnet and that did not happen for my group at all! Our little ones are 2 and the group hasn’t been active since they were 11 months so I feel reassured!

10 years and still going strong! Weekends away as full families, girls nights out, day trips. We meet up all together or if just a few are free those few meet up for lunch, cuppa. We live geographically close and I see at least 1 of them per week and monthly all of them which is good going now all kids are at school and we are all working minimum 3 days a week and half of us full time

In touch with a couple but we had a really silly group very spread out about an hour plus on good day away from some of them lol we where in the middle area too so further fir others. . Half of the group had divorced within 2/3 years too.

Yes, 3/5 of us are very close (like that advert atm where the moms are all supporting each other in the middle of the night with their newborns). Godparents to second and third borns. Incredibly glad we met them.

We do see the other two couples round about annually too, we all have a great time when we get together but we're less close with the other two couples

Sorry should have added - 15 years and counting!

2 and a half years later it’s sporadic at best. Those who went back to work are often free in the same weekday but I’m not. Some are having second babies so will be back on mat leave again (we won’t be having a second).
We are spread out across the county so not round the corner. All lovely ladies though and enjoyed our meet ups, so wish it had worked out with us being closer as that’s what I wanted from it.
However I still meet up with mums and kids from our children’s centre baby group I started going to to when DS was 2 weeks old! They live closer and WhatsApp group much chattier.

No. But there were two couples who were really horrible to me when I was pregnant with DD2 and so not being in touch is a very good thing. We live in a small place though and whenever DH sees them he goes over and is super friendly and chatty and enjoys watching them squirm 😂. Love him.

On the other hand I'm still good friends with some women from the breastfeeding support group I went to and my DD is best friends with the other girl. They are at 6th form college now. So it's just a matter of finding your tribe and that isn't automatically your NCT group.

Yep, 10 years on and there are 3 out of 5 mums who are still good friends. One kind of just disappeared and the other moved away, though we still text here and there.

Am still friends with one person from my NCT group 27 years later. I didn't have anything in common with the others and we drifted after a year

Nope, wouldn’t even remember their faces or names for that matter. I moved countries anyway.

23 years on, no, not really, other than a couple of ladies I still have on Facebook. I was very close to one but she died three years ago. Another of the ladies also passed away a few years earlier, which is pretty sad; that's two out of maybe 6 or 7 of us

2+ years in, yes, I'd say someone checks in once a day at least. Once a few of us were out for lunch in the early days and we met a group who happily told us they were also an NCT, just 40+ years ahead of us

We still meet up fairly regularly. Always do a dinner around Xmas time, try to arrange lunch or coffee every few months and kids still go to each others parties. Definitely harder now we don't see each other weekly, which we kept up till kids went to school but we message and a couple of them see each other weekly still as they had their second babies around the same time. We're doing a little Xmas party for the kids which will be nice. I'm really pleased we've managed to keep the friendship going.

17 years on two of the mums are amongst my very closest friends (sadly they don’t speak to each other). Of the two I am friends with one is best buddies with a mum who moved away 14 years ago. I see her sometimes but not so much these days. Our DC don’t get on so it makes meet ups more challenging.