Bloody Mums' Groups

Wow !

I'd forgotten I'd changed the background.... Wonder what my one reader (hi how you doing ?) thinks of the chirpy decor here .....

I have a complaint - It's been eight years now and I am finding it depressingly isolating the way many cliquey Mums' groups operate ... e.g. I constantly discover I have been dropped from the email coffee-morning list, or that I am not invited to social stuff - even after being practically forced to come along by some those who were invited (bless 'em I still have one or two friends) but are not the actual Mum running the social event du jour ("of course you're invited - don't be paranoid there, Mr. Stoopid !!" - with a pat, very high up on the back).

This morning, after being ridiculed as per above, for thinking that I wasn't invited to a lunchtime thing being held today by one of the Mums, I received a desperate text, stating ...

"Women-only lunch at El*****'s!"

(as in 'holy crap, I hope he gets this in time or we'll all look a bit silly and El***** will be pissed of with me and may not invite me next time, either !')

to which I have bravely (jokingly !) replied

'Suspected as much - thanks though; enjoy the naked firemen ;?)'

I'll bet that gets some real belly laughs .... 

I had no intentions of 'crashing' that one anyway - I know better from experience now, and can read the signs without fear of it being attributable to silly paranoia. When someone has your email address phone number and sees you every morning at school drop, if they want you to come they invite you ... ffs

Well I guess on the plus side it helps me to understand and empathise with my poor 8yo daughter's current dilemmas at school. They have that awful "If you want to be in our gang then you're not allowed to play with your friend Amie, and she can't join our group 'cos she smells" type of bullshit that's going on bigtime at the moment in her class.

Helpfully the teacher tells me "Err yes, this is the age that they seem to do that quite a bit" ...

Good, great, so that's ok then, I guess, it being the standard to be expected type of bullying, not that awful, horrid non-standard bullying.

In other news related to this ...

Few days ago I was called up out of the blue by a Michaela Strachen of BBC Radio 5Live to do a live interview type program feature, based on the news that stay at home fathers experience post-natal depression.

.... As I suspected she may have more than just my phone number, I declined. My partner is not a big one for dirty linen being washed in public and I have to respect that. 

But if I could have been assured of anonymity I could and would have ranted for England on this topic. 

The above sexist exclusion by the supposedly more downtrodden gender would have been very high up on my list.

I am particularly angry about it now that I discover one of my neighbours, who has decided to support his wife's return to her career by going part-time with his career, to do the stop at home dad thing, is experiencing exactly the same thing.

Poor sod - he's sane and stable now, but I wonder how he'll be in four years time ? Previously working very high up in mental health care, I am hoping he'll spot the warning signs before it's too late. I say previously because whilst he's still at senior level at the moment, I'm wondering whether he'll get sidelined as he's no longer full-time.

So ..... Hey !! Way to go there, Gals ! ..... you actually get another male who is prepared to do what you all spout on about, and you socially exclude him.

[Men - pay attention; this may be one of those 'if you actually do what they say they want you to do, you are fucked' -type conundrums of the female psyche, the kind of thing that misogynist old men try to tell us about]

Again there's a silver lining - on the plus side it helps me to realise that I was correct in thinking it was happening to me because of my gender, rather than my personality or smell or something.

Now - if you've found yourself here because you are a new stop at home dad, brace yourself for the truth - you are going to need to mentally protect yourself from this, because with no career and a pile of domestic drudgery, a partner who is having a shit time at work and taking it out on you, and (in my case and I hear many others also) no intimacy or loving sex for months on end, you are going to find it tough.....

As in battle-tough; it may break you at worst or be bloody lonely at best.

Once the novelty of having you around (possibly the sole stop at home male in their group?) with your still-taut forearms changing nappies during Monkey-Music/Have fun with Polly's Phonics wears off, THEY WILL DUMP YOU.

Get a massage. Use childcare. Keep fit. If it's too late and selflessly you have let a lot of things go, like your old friends and your sixpack, go to a male environment (e.g. grubby old man's pub/bar, cricket club, golf ? etc.,) once a week at least to remind yourself you are a man. Observe how the other men there don't seem too troubled by life ... you too can again be like them !

Do this now. Before you are rudely awoken and find that not only are you not a woman (eh ? .. a flight of fancy ? - hey those delightful mums will soon remind you you're not ...) but neither are you any longer 'a man' in others eyes.

Or, you'll be occupying space somewhere between 'east European nanny' and 'scruffy incontinent dog', with similar house rights and occasional access to the t.v./fridge/bed.

You're partner will have lost respect for you (she sees alpha males at work who still get to the gym and have 'mojo' as well as a fat paypacket and career, that will flirt with her). She will think you are making this all up, so don't expect any sympathy there if you dare whinge on. 

My beloved helpfully insists it is all in my mind, that other Mums are having a way worse time of it etc., etc..

Consequently would I be out of order if I wondered whether the glass ceiling she cites as reason for her lower paypacket is all in her mind ?

Got that ? - Yes I'm bitter, but I didn't start out that way.

Thanks for all the support Ladies.

#drippingwithsarcasm my tweeps.

L8ers - I have beer to drink and ironing to do :(

;?)