Little Harry's House

May 25, 2010
PREGNANT WOMEN ARE SO NAIVE
I was wrong. There I said it.

I thought I knew it all; how to breastfeed, how to put a baby into a routine, how to be a mum . Then I gave birth.

Turns out most pregnant women are cocky and confident when it comes to the question of how to best raise a child, that is until they become mums.

My advice to pregnant women? Forget antenatal classes and baby books, go to a mum's group.

All the breathing techniques and baby routines in the world will never measure up against the brutally honest tongue of a new mother. If you want the truth about what to expect post pregnancy, a tired, sexually deprived new mum who hasn't had a chance to shave her legs let alone have an uninterrupted shower in weeks will be sure to deliver. She will slap the truth down like a cold fish in a fine restaurant; forget etiquette, if she has something to say she will damn well say it.

I think schools should abolish sexual education and instead make it mandatory for students to attend a mum's group. I guarantee that after hearing about botched caesarian, stretch marks, and baby faeces (in detail) there would be a reduction in the amount of parents who had to hear their daughters mutter the words “Woopsy, I'm pregnant”.

Perhaps if I had not been such a cocky and confident pregnant woman myself, I would not have been so adamant about certain things, like thinking mum's groups were lame.

Once again I was wrong.

I have now had to eat those words. I have had to force their pointy hypocritical corners between my tight lips, down my presumptuous throat and into the guilty depths of my unforgiving stomach. I have had to admit that mum's groups were in fact my savour.

They opened doors for me into a wonderful world full of other irate, over protective mothers who helped to validate my own sense of sanity, however false that may be.

They understand what it's like to have a child that won't stop screaming, to be thrown up on while trying to dine in a cafe like a civilised person, and the humiliation of discovering 20 minutes into a supermarket trip that your top is undone and your breast exposed.

Mum's groups have led me to the conclusion that in the same way pregnant women don't really want to know what lies around that birthing suite corner, nor do new mums really want advice on how to best tackle their parenthood issues. New mums just want to share in the company of other sympathetic mums who struggle at parenthood just as hard as they do.

Preferably, more so.