Funny parenting facts #1 The Mummy Club

Over the next week, I am going to talk about the unspoken things of parenthood. The things they don’t tell you in magazines. This is my first. The Mummy Club.

Becoming a parent for the first time is many things. Scary, tiring, exciting and most of all amazing.

There is however one aspect of parenting, being a mother especially and that is the little spoken about ‘club’ that, the minute your little one is born, propels you to a fully fledged member.

Try it out for yourself. Nod at another mother as you push your baby around the supermarket. Smile when you’re at the baby group when another mummy’s eye catches yours and roll your eyes when someone else’s toddler throws a tantrum in the middle of the street.

Yes it is true, as a woman without a child, you can gurgle at other people’s children but unless you have your own child, I’m afraid the club is closed to you-I don’t make the rules.

It was my husband who first remarked on my entry to the club. As I walked to the door in a restaurant, I passed a woman holding a newborn baby. I gave her a knowing look that basically said, I feel for your sleeplessness, it will pass and don’t take a minute of it for granted. All in that one look-and she nodded back, knowing what I meant.

That one look said all those things and, in return, her look said; I know isn’t he amazing, I have never felt like this before.

It seems very elitist to be a member of this club. You feel bad for your childless friends. No matter how you explain it to them they won’t be able to understand.

The club can be taken to the extreme though. My personal pet hate is when someone announces they are pregnant on a social networking site. Some over-zelous members of the club will put things like “welcome to the club” or “your life will never be the same again”. Well duh!

Think back to before you had children, even when you were pregnant. If someone told you how hard it was would you have believed them? I certainly didn’t. You have to experience it for yourself.

The mummy club is brilliant because of the reason you are in it-your children. Not because of the other mummies.