Tell us how your Elderly Parents community works

[Eleanoratmumsnet]

What should a new joiner know about this community?

Tell us about the tone, how people support one another, and any unwritten rules, customs, traditions or in-jokes that help make this community what it is.

Reply to this thread to share your thoughts.

What Community?

Surely you are some kind of journalist or researcher asking this?

However you have missed out the apostrophe in your title. Either before or after the final "s" in your title depending on whether you are referring to one parent or two. Do perhaps you are not a researcher.

What are you asking?

It seems to be a Mumsnet thread? I think they need to put a bit of effort in to explain themselves if they want people to reply. It's not making a lot of sense as it stands.

Hi @Mosaic123 thank you for your reply. I work in the Mumsnet digital team and I’m doing some research into the different communities that naturally develop across Mumsnet topics.

We’ve noticed that many topics have their own tone, customs and unwritten ways of doing things. We’d like to understand what already works here and what a new joiner should know, so we can help people find their feet without losing what regular users value about the topic.

So you want unpaid mumsnet contributers to do your paid job for you? I suggest you spend time reading the threads and you'll quickly learn what people are like and how they behave on the Elderly Parents topic - after all that's how we've done it.....

A lot of us here are women past 40. We have a lot fewer fucks to give and the instructional tone of your post comes off as an extremely rude demand that's going to get our backs up. We have enough demands placed on us already. We're here for support not more shit. Please leave us alone

This.

People caring for elderly parents are probably too busy to start volunteering for MN.

In any case, I'm sure you can get AI to analyse this for you if you can't be arsed to read the threads themselves.

@Eleanoratmumsnet, you didn't even say "please".

Perhaps basic manners are an unwritten rule of this Board? But it shouldn't need to be spelled out.

If you want people to engage, I really think you're going to have to rethink your strategy.

We’ve noticed that many topics have their own tone, customs and unwritten ways of doing things. We’d like to understand what already works here and what a new joiner should know, so we can help people find their feet without losing what regular users value about the topic.

If that’s so, then it’s happened organically. Big mistake to think you can distill the essence of a topic and its contributors and present a neat little package to a newcomer. Why would you do that? We need things to be less formulaic, not more. The individuality of posters is what makes threads so interesting. Don’t encourage people to follow a template. Let them find their own path. We all did. What’s behind all this?

Surely MNHQ can scrape any topic and run it through AI to analyse whatever patterns you want to. Isn't that a more reliable way to gather this information for any of the site's topics?

Hi all, thank you for your comments, we're taking it all onboard. @MrsBennetsPoorNervesAreBack apologies if the tone came across as demanding, that was not my intention.

Yes totally are, we have read through the threads, in particular cockroach cafe, and have a good idea of the tone, themes and sense of community.

However rather than us write out a guide ourselves, we just wanted to put the question to you, the Mumsnet users, and get your thoughts on the idea and if there is any thing in particular you would like included.

If this is so, why don't you post a draft of what you think this topic is like and what potential users might want to know and then let us comment on that, rather than facing us with a blank slate?

Why is it necessary to have a guide? Is it something people have been asking for? I think anything that makes people feel that there’s any rigidity about how they can or cannot post will be off-putting to many. Also not sure what you mean by ‘community’ in this context. I mean, I’ve posted on this topic many times, as both dh and I had experience of many of the issues raised here with our own parents some years ago, but I don’t feel part of a particular ‘community’. I appreciate that there will be people who only ever engage with one or two topics, but I would say most people pick up on interesting threads by seeing them on ‘active’. I suppose I feel part of the MN ‘community’, but it doesn’t stretch to individual topics! Quite prepared to accept that others see things differently, though.

Well that OP was a bit of a fail, I thought you were asking us to tell you how the communities our elderly parents live in function.

Eff off. (Does that help with "tone"?)

In summary, posters on this board are on their last shredded nerve. Tread carefully OP 😁

I'm feeling kind today.

I found the elderly parents boards a lifeline when my darling Dad was diagnosed with cancer aged 82. The Cockroach Cafe was my safe space where I could say what was in my head without anyone judging me. I could say things that I would never have said out loud, if that makes sense.

It's a much gentler and safer corner of MN to be in and I'm not really sure that the normal need for boundaries apply in this section. I found that several other users were in exactly the same situations and we all lost parents within weeks of one another. I'll never forget the kindness that I found from those people, and everyone else frequenting that chat.

This is all very true.
And because of this, to some extent I feel protective of this space and the people who come here to find support. It feels distasteful to put us under the microscope and write a guide about how to interact here. We're all navigating difficult and emotional paths. Who's to say how anyone should express their pain. The request from OP feels intrusive.

I don't think there is any need for a guide. People should be able to access this board as and when necessary, in a way that suits them. No need for rigid rules or one right way of doing things.

If anyone posts anything offensive or insensitive, then they should expect to have their arse handed to them on a plate. If anyone posts genuinely looking for information, advice, support or just solidarity, then I'm sure that will be forthcoming. Isn't it just basic common sense?

The existing members support newcomers, there isn’t, ‘something they need to know’.

The rules are,
don’t judge because this situation sucks. It’s ok to let off steam, the people here are the ones doing the grunt work so they are allowed to complain.

The way to get your arse handed to you, is to say, ‘You’ll be sorry when s/he’s gone!’.

@PrizedPickledPopcorn The way to get your arse handed to you, is to say, ‘You’ll be sorry when s/he’s gone!’.

Or say, "Of course I will move in with my elderly relative and provide all their personal care for the rest of their life, anyone who says they wouldn't is a monster'. Generally said by someone who has next to no idea about caring for an elderly person with complex and evolving needs.

@Eleanoratmumsnet This isn't going to go how you want. PPs have nailed it about everything, including having no fucks left to give, and not wanting a guide to how to post/interact on this topic. I post little but read a lot, and my hackles went straight up at your rude, demanding OP. Suggest you close this one and try reading the topic a lot more.

I'm finding these 'guide' threads very odd.

People should be free to post on this board for support without having to knowing the bloody in jokes.

Typical Mumsnet. Any way to get people to do their work for free.

It’s a very strange opening post. It’s written from the perspective of someone who knows what they want to achieve, but does nothing to explain it to everyone else. They dropped it into the Cockroach Cafe with no comment.

It reads like the kind of email I send when I’m already late and have to dash something off because it can’t be left until there’s time to do a proper job.

Why do we need a guide? I’d you read the threads you can figure it out yourselves. What is it with these
threads? It’s your website do your own research.

@Eleanoratmumsnet the answers to your questions are in the threads, cockroaches and all. The section that was pinned to some of the older threads give all the info.
As a veteran and graduate of the threads they are a very special place for posters at one of th3 hardest times of their lives.