New Parent Connection two years later

As a first-time mom with my husband away for the day at work or school, I was home alone for long stretches with a newborn Oliver. I knew I needed to get out and meet other parents, but had no idea where to turn. I did what anyone else of my generation would do by searching the Internet and stumbled upon a weekly gathering for new parents at a local hospital, United Hospital. I started attending New Parent Connection when Oliver was four weeks old, a point in which I was still recovering from a c-section and feeling like a physical and emotional mess. Breastfeeding was more difficult than I could ever have imagined, I knew nothing about child development or babies and sleep deprivation was wearing me thin. By the end of my first New Parent Connection session, I knew the group was my lifeline during what was such a vulnerable period in my life.

Over the next few months, the weekly New Parent Connection gathering was the highlight of an otherwise mundane week of caring for a newborn. I was with parents in the same place in life and I had people to commiserate, laugh (and, yes, sometimes) cry with. The facilitator, Kathy, had a knack for listening and making you feel like an empowered parent, even as you admitted you had no idea what you were doing. Eventually Oliver aged out of New Parent Connection and I was really sad to stop attending, but I knew I was a much different mother and person than when my son was four weeks old, and felt I was ready to move on.

Most of the moms from my New Parent Connection cohort went back to work, lives became even busier, and parenthood, while still daunting, didn't feel so new anymore. But slowly many of us began to reconnect on Facebook, playdates, stroller walks and visits to local story times were planned, and invitations to the odd soup swap were issued. One woman organized a baby sign language class and others of us ended up in the same early childhood education class as our "NPC friends." Our paths kept crossing in what can feel like a very small parenting network.

After some time, real friendships formed. The issues we faced when we first met at United Hospital may have changed, but we discovered that the need for peer support never lessened. We started a babysitting coop and monthly meal exchange and got to know each other's partners, and some cases, extended family. I provided daycare for a little girl from the group, whose mom ended up becoming the daycare provider for another in the group, while I in turn, provided daycare for another NPC friend's son. As a testament to how quickly life marches on, some of us have even had a second child in this time.

So it was quite special to gather at a park on a late summer afternoon morning nearly two years after we met to have a group birthday party for our kids, who were born within a few months of each other. Whether quite early or a little belated, the happiest of birthday wishes go out to Alexa, Wyatt, Noelle, Archer, Elsa, Atticus, Stella, Gabe, Vivian, Baron and Oliver.