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[cheekymonk]

I have been thinking alot lately (always dangerous!) about how parents and many mums in particular seem so isolated and the feelings that this brings ie. loneliness, frustration, possible depression, stress to mention but a few.
I think being a parent is really tough and that somehow, there has been a real loss in a sense of community and everyone helping each other out.
I mean, would you have needed mumsnet 40 years ago?? I just worry I am too dependent on it and have noticed my lack of RL friends! So many of the posts do sound so desperate, I mean people really crying out for help and Mumsnet offers fantastic support but I guess my point is that it is a sad indictment of society that people cannot get this help in RL or don't feel they can ask for it.
I do genuinely think that some people take better to parenting than others and some people do have to work harder to make it all work despite that natural love.
I would love to run a charity where all these frustrated mums could ring and relieve their guilt and ask for no strings attached or judgement help. I think it would be a lifeline for many mums who feel they are going out of their minds and save many a harsh word, smacked bum or worse.
I just think about these stories like that poor child being left by himself all weekend for example and think that there is definitely some collective responsibility too. How bad do things have to get??
anyone know what I mean??

cheekymonk - I agree, I was looking through a book of mum's old village from a few years ago (20 years I think) and there were street parties, people hanging over the fence (I assume talking to each other)

I dont' even know who my next door neighbours are. (Would love to but i'm too scared)

There is too much pressure on mums today. 40 years ago you would have just been left to get on with it, and extended family would have provided much more help. Now mums are targeted by the media more and more. Celebrity mums are held up as examples of how we should all be. We are told to lose the babyfat asap. There are different methods of parenting, all neatly categorised in books which tell you that their type of parenting is the only way to go. There are different ways of weaning now, different theories on this and that. No wonder we don't trust ourselves to just get on with it, we are constantly terrified that we are getting it wrong. And we can't turn to our own parents because they did it all wrong in the first place!

Yes it is more pressurised these days. I don't know what you do about that though. The media are to blame for much of it.

I agree too.

There is a collective responsibility -as there is for our young people.

You may have needed mumsnet. There was a book recently published called "Can any mother help me" which was a sort of round robin magazine for women to write in and ask advice but all anonymous. It was probably at it's height around the war years.

To ask for help, we can perceive, as a sign of weakness whereas in fact it is a strong person who turns around to say I cannot help and need it.

Does not Homestart offer some help?

I think the media are to blame too. Just as they are to blame with making every young person a pariah of society.

Previously we would have just done our best but now we mere mortals hold up ourselves against women with bottomless bank accounts which they can use to tummy tuc, botox and generally buy themselves out of trouble. The rest of us are waving, some drown.

I think you are rught RHUBARB

These days you are made to feel you cant get it wrong or you will damage your child in someway be it the food they eat ,the toys they play with ,if you work or if you dont work.The list is endless.....

I do blame the media for this

Yes I agree. I read so many books that I lost sight and sense of my own instinct when DS was a baby.
It is so easy to feel inadequate if you are not fantastic mum/gorgeous/high flying career woman/devoted wife
I just feel it is a very dangerous pressure... Not sure either what you can do about it but I like the challenge of trying to find a solution!

There's things like that BF thread. Being told the baby weighs too much?! You wouldn't have even bothered with things like that before.
I think people need to stop relying on technology as much.

Too many people (i'm as guilty as everyone else, if not more) sit in playing on computers, watching TV. Kids especially.

Me and DP were only just talking about how it used to be that kids would get up on xmas morning and go riding down the street on their new bike. Now they're say indoors playing the latest killemall computer game.

I would be interested to know if there was more abuse/neglect/harming of children now or 10,20, 30, 40 or 50 years ago?? Were things just kept under wraps more then?
Homestart is brilliant from what I have seen of it but its the emotional support for women too that I feel is needed.
I had 6 weeks of counselling a while back and I cried after my last session because I had so enjoyed being able to talk openly and at length and I didn't want it to end. It really gave me the chance to sort myself out but I could still do with a weekly session really!!!
If I had had my whole family in the same town or village as me would I have felt like that?

I don't think the abuse/neglect thing will have inceased as a % but it is more widely reported. Our hunger for news drives this.

I go see my mum once a week but cos she's not that keen on DP (thinks he's lazy - which to be fair he is abit) I'm very careful with what I say.

I'd love to be able to go and say we're running out of money to do stuff, he's doing my head in, DD is always wingeing but I can't. I wonder if this would have been the same then (i'm only 23 so couldn't technically find out)