Come and share stories about positive support you've had from other women :-)

[LRDtheFeministDragon]

I wanted to start a thread about the sense of support and community I sometimes feel very strongly, both on MN and in RL. I thought maybe we could share some positive stories, and maybe get to thinking about what is so important about community and shared experience for women. I don't just mean women-only spaces, but all sorts of times when you've felt picked up and cared for by the support of other women.

The background to this post is a trip I got back from last week. I went abroad, and I've never been so far away or visited this country before, and not to put too fine a point on it, I was really nervous and stressed about the whole idea. But not one, but two feminists - women I'd never met before in real life - rallied round to help me find places to stay and work out how to best get on. And both of them met up with me during my stay, and we had a ball. And it just made me feel an amazing sense of community, that women from halfway across the world could all meet up, with very different beliefs (really! One is a devout Orthodox Christian and the other an atheist academic), and still be so kind and supportive.

I just thought it was amazing, and it made me very proud to be a feminist. So ... over to you.

Long time lurker btw. Hi!

This thread is making me a bit misty eyed!

I have been so amazed by the women in my work - two lecturers during my BA who read my writing, and who advised me and encouraged me to apply for the MA. And during my MA my thesis advisor was amazing, Yay! she's here and encouraged me to think and talk about women's lives as if they were important. I was already a feminist but this was a big step in improving my confidence. I only worked with her for about four months, but wow, what a four months.
And she helped me apply for the PhD I am now finishing, and during that time I have had women of all levels of the profession support me, both in my work, when having DS, and in making things all add up.
I'm close to my sister and mum, but we don't talk feminism. My "work friends" and I do - all the time. Men and women. I think when I leave this line of work I'll miss it being an automatically-reached-for diagnostic tool!

And then there's MN. I just bloody LOVE you all. From the gorgeous people who send me jaffa cakes when I moan (or lug them across the atlantic, now that is love!) to the women on the Breastfeeding board who helped me over and over and over again, reassuring me, giving me REAL factual information, and above all encouraging me to trust my body to care for my baby. These amazing women are basically responsible for the picture that greeted me this morning when I looked over and saw DS (nearly 2) in his spiderman pajamas, breastfeeding his Cookie Monster toy, and singing to it.

I have found so much support here, I've just recommended it to a pregnant friend. Motherhood would have been very different without it!

I'm on a very female dominated course at university, and this year (our final one) everyone's really pulled together and its lovely. Everyone's happy to help and offer suggestions or just generally be a shoulder to whinge on.

One of my lecturers at uni has been fantastic. I first really met her after I was ill in my first year and saw her to try and catch up in her module. Ever since she's been so supportive, taken a real interest in my plans post-graduation and emails me jobs/masters that she thinks I might be interested in and stops me in the corridor to ask how my dissertation's going, even though she's not my supervisor. Speaking of which, my supervisor has also been fantastic, really, really supportive and very much guiding me to do well rather than simply telling me what to do, but we'll save him for another thread

Guiding for me has also been fantastic. I moved to a new area and got involved with Brownies again after a long break. The adults have been like family almost, not in any massive way, but just that mundane chatting and asking how this essay went, or did I get this sorted out and whatnot. It's that family feel that I've missed whilst being away. And seeing the girls each week, finding out their trials and tribulations, who's friends with who, how they did on their homework, what their brother's been up to. In the time I've been there now a lot of them are getting ready to move on to Guides and it's lovely seeing how they've grown up and changed in the time they've been with us.

Beautifully said, Kritique

TEO - thank you! I love your stories and especially because they counteract that myth that women can't get along with their inlaws (which I always think gets turned into a really nasty, anti-woman stereotype). Your SIL in particular sounds lovely, and I can identify - both my brothers are with women I'm so glad to know.

sting - what a lovely midwife!

first - oh, that's reminding me of the lovely women at my granny's church who looked after her really well - and again, weren't judgmental at all despite the stereotype you sometimes get.

mags - your boss kicks ass!

oil - so good to see a lurker! I hope your DD is enjoying her time at university - it must be great for her knowing she is missed, though ... it makes you feel more secure when you're just starting out (I think).

blackcurrants - jaffa cakes?! Don't know what you mean!

Love the description of your DS.

My supervisors have (by and large) been wonderful too, and it's great to know that they do really have my back and want to help me make my work as good as possible - so hugely different from what I've seen before, it's amazing.

edu - that sounds fantastic. That kind of support matters so much. Good luck with your final year!

i've had wonderful support from women in my life on the other hand i've had women as collectives being incredibly nasty about me - sometimes having whole threads on facebook to slag me off i do find it confusing when people who talk about lovely support from women can be so utterly vile to women they decide they don't like for whatever reason.

some women even stalk other women who have been bereaved hunting them down and revealing their real life identity in an attempt to prove them liars when it turns out they really are just some poor woman going through the loss of their child reaching out to other women for support. shocking really.

i guess women, as with all people, sometimes just talk the talk but don't walk the walk.

ho hum.

Women writing whole threads on facebook slagging other women off? My word, was is the feminist world coming to. I take it that you have never taken such terrible actions, then?

Oh, come on, both of you knock it off.

Ok.

I don't know if the issue here, SaF, is that you're upset with me, or other posters on this thread, about something off-board, or if this is a continuation of the issue with a poster who has posted on this thread and who has also posted elsewhere on MN in such a way as to upset some other posters on this thread.

But can we perhaps take this off this thread? Lots of posters won't know what is going on, won't want to see a bunfight, and deserve not to see one since they've posted personal experiences on this thread that should be respected.

i think you know exactly what this is about lrd, odd to pretend otherwise.

no bun fight necessary.

not upset - bit shocked! especially the stalking bereaved mothers - that is shocking isn't it? it seems so cruel and vindictive and heartless.

is it a positive thread when you state you're starting it because you don't like some feminists and want to make a point and then when people post on it that you don't like you are all slagging them (not me) off elsewhere and saying let's just ignore them?

not in my book.

I have already said, I don't know if this is about you being angry with me (in which case, PM me?), or you being angry with several people (in which case, PM them), or you feeling angry about the situation with dworkin's thread.

I'm pretty sure it's one or all of those things, but none of them should be raked over on this thread where lots of women who don't have any interest in those issues have shared personal stories.

SaF - I started this thread for various reasons. One was, all over MN at the moment there are threads where people are either saying nasty things about feminists, or one group of people who identify as feminists are tearing into another. And there have also been trolls who think it is funny to stir up upset and hurt.

I wanted this thread to be a good space to talk about women and support, and also, frankly, a huge 'fuck off' to the patriarchy trying to pit women against each other.

OK, see you around.

Sorry about that, everyone.

I have had a lot of bad experiences with female bosses and/or women in senior management/female clients who simply didn't click with me (or me with them), but in my first proper job I did have a female boss who was brilliant.

A few months in, I screwed up some figures which I was supposed to have ready for end of day on Friday and had to be emailed to a client. I had a total meltdown (bear in mind I'd only been using Excel for around 4 or 5 months at this point!) and panicked that I was going to get into massive trouble.

She didn't give me a bollocking, she sat me down and we went through the figures together till the mistakes were corrected and the file could be emailed off. By the time we finished it, it was well past 6.30 on a Friday and by rights she ought to have been on her way home/off to a night out, not having to stay back in the office to help poor old muggins.

The fact she DID stay behind and help me, and not be prepared to leave until she was sure I understood how to do the report myself and would not make the same mistake again, was really the measure of a good boss. I have never forgotten her patience on that evening and I still rate her as one of the best managers I ever had.

So, to S.O., I'd like to say thank you for helping me that time :) and also that I tried to apply the same behaviour when managing junior people myself - it was one of the best lessons I ever learned in my career, and I hope I instilled the same patterns of behaviour in others too.

That is really nice, marsh. I love that it's set off a chain reaction of positive behaviour, too.

And that's one in the eye for the 'all women bosses are mean' stereotype o' shite.

What is going on? I can't even see how this started!

I have some great women in my life, the one that springs to mind is when DP rang me with the news that my little sister had been taken into hospital with suspected meningitis (it was meningitis, she recovered eventually) I was on my way into the museum with someone I had recently met and our children when he rang. When he put the phone down to clear the line for more news she got me into the cafe, fed me tea and talked to me and looked after my DDs until I calmed down. She then drove me to the hospital and cared for the DC while I got my Mum calmed down and talked to the doctors. She then drove my Mum home (she was in too much of a state to drive herself).

She sounds really kind, msbuggy.

SGM - I hope you had a lovely lunch.