I can't do baby and toddler groups any more!! Will this have a negative impact on ds??

[tinky19]

Hi,
Well thats it really. I've tried all sorts. Play groups to music 'lessons' but ds (2yrs) just wants to do his own thing. We don't have any friends with children his age so i have tried to keep going but i just hate them. No body talks to me. I spend the entire time racing round after ds and carrying dd(6mo)round.

DH and inlaws think i should coninue for ds sake,

What do you think?

At 2 he's probably not going to be that interested in playing with others yet.

Can you go to just one a week? They do eventually start to join in / interact.

Don't do it if you really hate it, I'm sure he's getting enough stimulation etc. in other activities.

Well I'm on the fence a bit as my nearly 2yo is very sociable and loves meeting up with his little "friends" (I"m very lucky in that my M&B mums have become close friends). If we go to a park and there's no one he knows, he normally tries to befriend another similar aged child but with the other children he knows, there is a definite playing "together" although in reality it's just playing in the same place.

So, on one hand I think making sure they have time with other similar aged children is good, especially from 2+ as they start to learn about how to co-operate, how not to whack each other, how to share (vaguely) etc.

Having said that, if it's painful and boring for you and your children are happy, then I probably wouldn't worry because they'll learn all that stuff at pre-school and school anyway.

In honesty, the way it was for me was that I go a bit stir crazy if I don't see friends a couple of days a week, and the socialisation part of it for DS is a kind of added bonus really.

I would recommend the NCT. Coffee mornings are in each others houses so they can't ignore you! The host has to let you in, find out who you are and introduce you and then space is limited so that no one can go off in a clique - they have to include you in the conversation.

I'm going to go against the grain here and report that, although I gave up toddler groups with DS as we both loathed them, he is perfectly fine and, age 3.7, is a sociable and articulate little boy who engages well with adults and other children.

I didn't see the point in going to something we both weren't enjoying.

It's difficult to go to playgroups with a toddler and a baby. The baby groups aren't suitable for an active toddler, and mainly get visited by first time mums with just a baby, so no other kids there for your elder to play with. Toddler groups are very active, but it means you have to juggle all the dancing/running around with looking after an immobile baby.

I take DD to a singing group while I'm on mat leave, and it's quite an undertaking and only works because DS (4 months) is a fairly chilled out baby, who will happily sit on a pillow for an hour watching the entertainment. I tried a free play toddler group, but it was impossible to keep an eye on DD while preventing little DS from being trampled by the bigger kids.

It's a tricky combination of kids. Can your family/DH support by having baby while you take toddler to playgroup?

Also, your DH can help by taking toddler to public parks in the weekend. It doesn't have to be just you doing all the socialising.

I've never gone. My son is perfectly sociable and has friends at 3.

My DCs are now 15 and 20.

If there's one thing I learnt from my years as a mother of small children, it was that toddler groups were not worth the grief. Being forced to socialise with mothers whose only link with me that we gave birth around the same time was a false and pointless way to make friends. It never worked.

My DCs never benefited from any group they went to and didn't make any lasting friends there.
This whole 'socialising' theory is a complete load of bunk. Your DCs will make friends wherever they go and don't need to be herded into community halls etc to do so.

We all have lots of lovely friends and I wish I hadn't bothered with toddler groups - I should have just stayed home and done baking and finger painting with them instead!

If it is no fun for you I would stop. You can always try again in a few months, when your DS might be ready for a different kind of interaction.

They are not obligatory.

I would just stop too. Presumably at 3 you'll be using your 15 hrs a week of playgroup or nursery provision, and at 3 he'll probably be more interested in other kids. So it's not like he'll start school never having seen another child!

Your DS will be fine.

I'm on my third child and have officially retired from the Toddler group circuit. Btdt and really not my scene. She's fine. At this age it is really more for the mother's benefit IMO, and if it isn't your thing then no harm done. Eh are not compulsory.

Thanks for all your replies

I completely agree that it is false to make friends with someone just because you gave birth around about the same time, and I'm glad I'm not the only one who finds it difficult to juggle a toddler and a baby at these things.

One of my big problems is that we moved last year, 250miles from family and friends and my only support here is dh. I've made no friends yet despite trying these groups. I feel quite isolated and don't want my son to feel he same.

We go to the park every day, swimming once during the week and again at the weekend with dh as ds loves it. This is social interaction for him, but, we're not making friends just polite chatter to anyone who's there at the time iyswim.

There was a lady at our old toddler group who carried her baby around in a sling, have you tried that, so you can be handsfree to play with DS.

DS actually has made lasting friends from toddler group and so have I and I have also been introduced to other lasting friends from the toddler group mums.

If no one talks to you try either smaller groups or structured groups like Tumble Tots, swimming classes, The Little Gym, Gymboree, Baby Yoga, Socatots, Rugbytots etc

There's absolutely no developmental point to them - they don't play 'with' other children in co-operative play until they're three-nearly-four anyway. They're for adults who want to get out of the house. Being at home with you or going to the park is ample stimulation and exercise (as long as you don't have plastic toys!) and you won't harm his development by one iota.

as long as you don't have plastic toys?????

I don't understand this.

They don't go in for them in the country in which I live.

Most children appear to have made it to adulthood.

From what I can see, they're just something for bored women to do - and if you're happy, why bother?

Maybe while it's summer, enjoy the parks or fields with a little picnic and a ball instead.

Then try again in the winter for playing at a playgroup.

I also hated going but ds was ready to be socialising, and like u I had no friends or relatives with children so I went for ds to play.

Won't do any harm. Give him a few more months to grow then he might be more interested in interacting with others

Humphrey - too many plastic toys (of course a few doesn't hurt!) can hinder development of the fingerpad-brain connection, because plastic is such a neutral substance. Metal, stone, wood, wool, resin, china, cotton, bone - all these have texture, weight, they're hot/cold, rough/smooth etc etc. Plastic is room temperature and has no real weight. Natural substances and textures convey a lot of information to the brain via the fingerpads and as a result the fingers and hands become more sensitive, more dextrous, the brain is stimulated and develops better. Children who still put things in their mouths at three years old, for example, have often had too much time with plastic (often at nursery, because of course plastic is cheap, bright and easy to clean) and so their fingers have never taken over from their mouths as their primary way of experiencing the world. For example it's far better for them to play with a real metal saucepan than a plastic toy one.

I take my 16 month old to baby and toddler group once a week, sometimes not every week, and I try to make the effort for his sake even if I really don't feel like going. I'm usually glad I did.

It's a nice group as there is an area for mums with small babies to hang around and the rest of the hall is given over to the toddlers who run around playing with a million toys and dressing up clothes, there's a craft table and every week someone brings snacks for the toddlers too.

I just think it's good for him to spend time with people other than me. He loves playing with stuff that's different to what we've got at home. It broadens our horizons even if it's only a little bit.

But that's just us - we're all different and if you and your little ones aren't getting anything out of it, don't feel pressured to do it!

Exactly what cutteduppear said.

I took dd to mother and toddler group once. No one spoke to me, dd was knocked flying by 2 boys who were running wild and their parents just looked and then carried on chatting! Never went back again.

Dd went to a play school that was attached to her primary school when she was 3. She is an only so had no interaction with other children until then. She's now 16 and doing great!

Your ds will be fine without it, it's not worth the stress!

classes don't work for us i.e. signing etc. but the ones where they just run around play work great. Means for two hours I don't have to entertain two of them. It is hard going from knowing people to making friends. We are a few hours away from family and moved just before DS was born, it is isolating :(

I think organised music/ sport/ library groups are much better than traditional toddler groups where the kids run around rampaging through a hall trying toys for a second then moving onto the next . That type did my head in and overwhelmed DD. The ones with a leader and parents interaction and routine to the session she love love loves and interacts much more with both children and adults.

I find toddler groups an absolute lifeline, I would go absolutely batshit crazy without them. I go at least three times a week. I don't really go to them for DS's sake, more for mine, although he does really enjoy them. I find that looking forward to being able to let DS off to run around and play while I have a cup of tea and a chat really makes the week more bearable. Thing is though, if you do go to them you have to be prepared to make an effort. I have become the default "meeter and greeter" at one group and I do make an effort to talk to everyone who arrives but sometimes it's like dragging blood out of a stone. If someone chats to you, chat back for the love of god! I often wonder how mums who don't go to groups fill up the week. Days when I don't have a group seem very long, even though I do meet up with friends and go out to the park etc.

We went to toddlers maybe half a dozen times, and then not at all between 18 months and 2 1/2 because of a ridiculous series of serious illnesses/family emergencies that pretty much wrote off an entire year of our lives. DS didn't seem to notice the lack of toddler groups at all. Our firneds with similar aged children all live quite a long way away and we weren't seeing them all that often, but he didn't seem bothered by the lack of small people until he was 2 1/2. At that point we started him in nursery two mornings a week just for the socialisation and he dived straight in and loved it, and at nearly 5 1/2 is now a very, very gregarious little chappie with loads of friends at school. I don't think the lack of toddler groups has had an impact on him whatsoever.

OP, absolutely not! They're boring, dull and full of hyper-competitive sleep-deprived women. If you're really really lucky you can chance upon a lovely and supportive one, but to be honest they are rare and you'd be better off doing something you enjoy. Your children will not miss anything. I wish someone had told me that 17 years ago as I struggled to get DS to behave nicely at any of these things.