I love the ideas other folks have raised, especially bringing folks on errands and hosting game nights with babysitters. One I'll add is that it's fun to build/rebuild community around existing groups. A parent at my kiddos school has organized all the parents of the first grade class with playground dates and other activities - I'm plotting doing the same for our grade! I've also been hosting playdates for folks in my high school class who have kiddos (or who want to hang out with those of us who do!).
One idea I have for year 3 of your lovely substack is a series of interviews with folks who are living the kinds of values you discuss here. How have they managed to do it in practice? What do they wish they could have told themselves earlier on their journey? What was surprisingly hard or surprisingly easy?
Oct 19, 2022·edited Oct 19, 2022Liked by Leah Libresco Sargeant
Really love your substack and your way of thinking about our world! I pretty constantly live in community so dont do much alone. Id like to see more on the hows of sharing: how to share childcare, how to share meals, how to host bible studies, how to respond to big needs like refugees or sudden disability. I think many of us agree philosophically that women's lives could be better by sharing more, but what are the best practices? How do you avoid the pitfalls? And where do you find the people to do community with?
Longtime reader, first time commenting. One of the (many) reasons I love this substack so much is that it regularly raises questions I’m already thinking about myself. (Or maybe I’m already thinking about them because I’ve been reading this substack…)
Both before and since Covid, my husband and I have become increasingly aware of the loneliness of those around us. (Ironically, our awareness of others’ loneliness has grown as our own loneliness has decreased, through our marriage!) While we want to provide respite for those who are lonely where we can, we are also busy people (who isn’t?!). So recently, instead of adding a *new* activity (like a game night) in order to spend time with someone, we have started trying to look for ways to fold other people into the activities we would already be doing anyway.
For example, my husband needed to go to the hardware store to pick something up for our new house. I suggested that he invite a friend of ours (a single guy who lives alone) to tag along. Another time I wanted to shop for some new pants (an activity I find very UNenjoyable), and I invited another friend, an international student, to join me. In both of these cases we were able to spend time with someone who would otherwise have spent the evening by themselves. This is not to say that we *never* have people over for dinner and games or other times of more *focused* togetherness. But we’ve been able to *increase* our ability to spend time with other people by simply inviting them into the already-happening-anyway parts of our lives.
Thinking about the third year of Other Feminisms, my favorite aspect of the substack is the roundups of reader comments. Whether advocating a different perspective to Leah’s original post or sharing their own experiences (as I’ve tried to do here), these are always super interesting to me. I don’t know that I want to see *more* of them this coming year — I think the current balance and rhythm is just right — but I definitely want them to continue, whatever other changes may come.
In terms of content, I’d love to hear about experiments in living arrangements that explore alternatives to the nuclear family or rent-sharing roommates models. Due to my own circumstances, I’m particularly interested in examples that combine both single and married folks, and ones in a suburban/small urban/“single family” home context rather than a rural or heavily urbanized one. But I’m curious about any and all examples that would help us imagine other ways of living in community. What does it look like when mutual dependence means not just helping one another here and there but actually living together?
One thing I really like about inviting people along on errands is that it makes it plain you simply want to *be* with them, rather than impress or entertain.
I’d also like to explore living arrangement experiments! I value community – especially Christian community, but also local neighborhood community. And in theory I would love to be open to living arrangements that combat our atomized/nuclear family style of living. But in other ways that is also my worst nightmare! I’m fairly introverted and having a lot of other people around can make me feel anxious/overwhelmed. I also struggle with inviting people into our often messy home. We have four kids, and truth be told I’m a less tidy person than I’d like! I don’t know… I can feel very anxious about people seeing the literal messiness in my house.
One approach that may help: do you think less of your friends when they have slightly messy houses? I think most people are harder on themselves than they are on people they like, and your friends usually feel the same way about you!
(This was also helpful for me in HS when thinking about breakouts. I wasn’t upset by someone else having a pimple so why should I assume they were distressed by mine?)
Yes, I too value intentional community (both with neighbors and with other Christians) in theory, but have a lot of questions about logistics. How does it work if there are single people and married people in the same household? (Actually that’s multiple questions in one!) What about small children? If the non-parents are good with children (and have the time and desire), you potentially have live-in babysitters; but what if the non-parents in the household have significant needs (physical, emotional, whatever) of their own?
I guess if I were to sum it up, my question is, how do you make community and interdependence meaningful, while respecting the boundaries and individual dignity and responsibility of each member of the household?
I think it's a given the non-parents will have *some* significant needs of their own. One thing that can happen in a shared household is that there's more slack—not everyone is in their period of deepest need at the same time (except when the whole house has stomach flu).
So the college student might baby sit or do daycare pickup some days, and, during finals, the parents might make a special effort to cook meals for the student as she works on papers/take her out for a cheerful walk/prep for interviews, etc.
Has anyone tried grocery shopping together? I've never done it, but I've been tempted more than once to call a friend (especially one without kids) for moral support.
In terms of the third year of other feminisms--well, more of the same would be good! That being said, related to the dependence question in particular, I have one thing that I struggle with a good deal, that I wish I saw explored more often, namely, how to navigate dependence when there are personality conflicts or other interpersonal issues.
I have had some experience of the isolation of modern society, and what happens when people assume or attempt independence. But as someone who comes from a background with a strong nuclear family as a child and now a strong extended family, along with plenty of close religious ties, I've also had the experience of dependence as a difficulty to be navigated. When people are simply and obviously toxic, the solution is painful but simple: just see them less or not at all. And when people are absent for geographical or other reasons, the solution is difficult to execute but relatively easy to articulate: build a community of friends. But what do you do when your preexisting community of family and/or friends is not so toxic that you need severance, but is just ... human enough that you need space? E.g. (hypotheticals to make this more concrete) ... How do you accept kid-watching help from Uncle Lester when you know he's more permissive/authoritative than you are with your kids? How do you engage in meal exchanges with friends who are more/less worried about Covid that you are? How do you sift through homeschooling advice from an aunt who had a mixed track record raising her own children? How do you accept graciously while also discarding what you judge will be unhelpful (or even harmful) to you and your own dependents--while at the same time not wounding the feelings of those on whom you depend (and who depend for affirmation, if not also practical support, on you)?
I would love to hear about the practical ways of integrating others into the otherwise very isolating stage of early parenting. My wife and I are expecting our first child in January, and here in Singapore, there's a practice of "confinement," which means that post-partum mothers are not supposed to leave the home for a whole month. Beyond that specific cultural practice, many families both here and in the States tend to withdraw from their communities to care for newborns, which for Christians often means skipping social engagements like church or Bible study.
This cultural practice would seem to be completely the opposite of the message of dependence upon community that you and others frequently voice. What does it look like to try to lean more into community during that early stage of parenting when many instead withdraw?
Congrats on your first baby! You are in an interesting cultural situation! I wonder if the women who go into confinement there often have a relative coming to stay with them? Usually their mother? I know several cultures practice some type of confinement, but I find that these cultures often live intergenerationally, or they often have family members come and stay with them during the period of confinement. So there is a sort of contraction from larger society, but there is also the deeper dependence on family relationships at home. I guess what I’m trying to say is, it might be a both/and situation Where a (temporary) social withdrawal doesn’t have to mean isolation, but may mean deeper and maybe more selective dependence on trusted relationships. Anyways, your question resonated with me because I have four children, and I found that I really valued a sort of social withdrawal during that time immediately after having a baby. And with each child I tended to take more time “off” from social functions like a church. (Up to about 6 weeks-ish) But I still think you can take time “off” while cultivating community. For example: like I already mentioned, do you have a family member or friend that can come stay with you for a while? One whom you won’t mind asking to cook/clean/and hold a fussy baby during any hour of the day/night- or at least be willing to do two out of three of those things! Or if not someone to come stay with you, then someone to regularly pop in for a few hours? People will probably offer to bring you food. Take them up on it! But you could also ask them to stay and eat the meal with you. You might find that it’s harder for you all to leave the house with the baby, at least at first, but that you can ask people to come to you. If it does feel overwhelming to leave the house with the baby, maybe ask a friend to come help you go to pediatrician appointments, etc. having an extra set of hands around can help. If you do skip church for a few weeks, when you can’t go to Bible study for a while, see if someone in your community can come to you and discuss the sermon/Bible study, etc. Honestly a lot of people will probably say “let me know if you need anything”. And if they do, tell them if you need something! Even if that something is that you want some company ( but also don’t hesitate to ask for other things, like bringing groceries by, or someone coming over to help you fold laundry, etc.) The thing is, also don’t be afraid to ask people to leave or to give you privacy. To get very granular: a few postpartum weeks still involve a lot of bodily fluids. I won’t elaborate except to say that If there’s breast-feeding involved then there are also privacy issues that people have varying levels of comfort with. I literally did not put on a shirt for many weeks and that has practical implications for relating to your community! You will both learn how to navigate this, but this is why I think there’s often a necessary reliance on fewer people, but in a deeper way. Everyone is different, and my personality is one that values more quiet and seclusion, but some people are able to get back out in the world very quickly. I think having a child might mean that you may have to make some adjustments to your community and the way you do it, but it does not have to mean isolation. It might be making new friends, and maybe not seeing some of your old friends as much. That can be hard. But it does not have to mean isolation. So reach out, but don’t hesitate to ask for privacy and blessings to you!
Thanks so much! In our personal circumstances, we do live very close (3 mins walk) from my wife’s parents, and her mom is planning to quit her job and be very involved.
More broadly in Singapore, there is an entire industry devoted to confinement, with professional nannies who will stay with you for the month and cook specific traditional meals (lots of ginger and vinegar). There are also meal delivery services (that charge exorbitant prices) for those traditional meals.
Reflecting further, I think that first month is not so much what concerns me, but the tone that seems to set for the next year or two. Our own community group had very involved families who largely haven’t returned 4-6 months after birth, and others who were less involved but who took at least 1-2 years away, sometimes never returning.
I think very small babies (pre-crawling) are the *easiest* babies to bring out into the world. I really like baby-wearing, because it makes it easier for me to just get up and go and walk with others. A small baby can chill on the floor at an adult gathering, while a toddler will want a lot of talk and attention.
It's also great if groups like bible studies have childcare available (whether paid for by the parish or pooled by parents). Our young couples group, part of a network of Frassati ministries, had volunteers to play with the small children while grown-ups talked.
When we hosted a game day at our house, we booked babysitters for our toddler and one other attendee's.
I agree, I have also seen young families pull away for longer, sometimes indefinitely. I do think the withdrawal to more intense dependence on fewer relationships can last for several years. It can be hard to have a lot of regular outside commitments when you have young children (they get sick, you lose a night of sleep, etc.). So the mindset of asking for help, asking for people to do things with you (go to the pediatrician, etc- there are a lot of well-baby checks in those first 2 years!), asking for people to bring food and eat with you, and using that as time to build relationships outside of more formal meetings can be used to cultivate community beyond the immediate postpartum stage. Goodness knows from now until kingdom come, there will be opportunities to ask for help with laundry. Ha! But I totally agree with you that I'd love to read about how to cultivate community in the early years of parenting. Even though I'm not there anymore, I believe that I have a responsibility to include young families. Fellowship with people in various stages of life is so important, and often hard to come by! And, I've noticed that being around babies is very good for older kids. One more thing: Have you read Find Your People by Jennie Allen? It may be tangential to what you're asking, but you may find some of her suggestions/mindset helpful.
What do I do alone that I could do together? This question called to mind so many things that I used to do together that I now do alone, and not particularly by choice! I used to swim with a friend one evening per week. She can't join me anymore, so now I swim alone. I used to make homemade jam and can it with a friend, she's no longer interested, so now I do that alone. I used to be in a Bible study, it stopped happening during COVID and when it was safe to meet in person the hostess no longer wanted to host, so it ended. I have reached out to several Well Read Moms groups in my city looking for a book club to join, never heard back from anyone. I keep feeling that the answer to all of these is to simply keep trying, to simply build what I want to have that I can't seem to find, but it's just tiring.
Anyway, not to end on a down note, but I do love Other Feminisms and I look forward to reading into it's third year and beyond! And I still want to read The Minority Body by Elizabeth Barnes with this group!
An experience that I never had and I am NOT SORRY about that! I am what has been referred to as an "elder Millennial" so online dating definitely existed when I was dating but it was not quite the all-pervasive influence that it is today. My stories of blind dates and speed dating literally horrify some of my younger colleagues :-D
These are all good! Subset of cleaning: washing up after a meal and doing laundry can both be communal activities--I often have my husband and/or kids helping (or in the case of the little ones "helping") with them, and guests are often at least helping with the dishes, even if handing them a basket of possibly intimate items to fold isn't really practical!
Sports: when we were kid free, my husband and I used to run together. I really miss that, but our kids are too little to keep up with either of us now, and they don't ride bikes well enough yet either to keep up that way. Still, I'm looking forward to the day when we can be running/biking as a family (again)!
Stuff I'd like to see in the 3rd year of "Other Feminisms":
"People and things that help you be brave and/or have agency" || "Things that help us to write" || "Overcoming Perfectionism" (or possibly a larger category that includes perfectionism) || "Slack/Margin." || Cultivating Nuance in Conversations or Writing.
Examples:
1. One thing that really helps me to be brave is reading blog posts on "The Last Psychiatrist" [1] Likewise, I have a specific sermon on Sloth from the book "Sinning Like a Christian" that I've read intentionally to kick me out of slumps-presenting-as-depression. Also, talking with (or reading the biography of) someone else who is in the throes of "fighting the good fight"--they don't even have to be laboring over / struggling over the SAME challenges as me; hearing someone else taking a stand is fortifying like little else! Lastly, I have specific songs I've played right after taking a costly action to walk away from a bad situation: "Burn the Ships," for example. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOVrOuKVBuY
2. There are a lot of people here who write. :) I probably have less formal training in writing than lots of others. And everyone needs to write at SOME point! Example: One day, to explain why he saw writing as an important skill to have, my Dad recalled a time when he had to write evaluations for subordinates. He was like "They never would give me enough space, so I'd always write REALLY small and add more lines to fit more in!" (Not where my mind first goes when I think of "writing," but i was delighted by his intention to cram in more detail for the important task of describing a person's ways!!)
3. I have a terrible time with perfectionism. My path to breaking out of it has had some twists and turns that I could not have anticipated. My favorite example was participating in a "Bad Writing Contest" with friends online; I love to laugh, so generating side-splitting groaners by choosing which rule(s) of good writing to gleefully violate--or choosing a topic to write on that no sane person would want to read--was fantastic. (At least twice, I concluded that nobody but me found the things that I came up with NEARLY as hilarious as I did--or possibly even got the joke. But it made NO difference to my enjoyment. I think that evidenced some of the kind of un-self-conscious-ness that shows up [2] in "The Great Divorce.")
4. Suggested reading: in "The Good and Beautiful God" by James Bryan Smith, there is a section about Margin, and it contains a story about a doctor who started to notice how stress was damaging his patients' health, so he counseled them to slow down and eliminate unnecessary things from their lives. Only after awhile did he notice that he had the same problem as them. ("Hey, I'm working 80 hours a week!") And this great warning: "When we lack margin in our lives we become tired and lonely and joyless, which seems to invite temptation." Archive.org link here: https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780830835317/page/128/mode/1up?q=margin
5. Interesting reading: Marshall McCluan's "Extensions of Man" or "Amusing Ourselves to Death." This FareFwd review started with the latter... connected TV/Social-Media/Globalized politics to Aristotles takes on politics and virtue (introduced me to the word "phrónēsis") ...and went on to make some hopeful hypotheses of what COULD be yet to come. https://mailchi.mp/7ed129019367/37-bradley-yam-on-amusing-ourselves-to-death
[1] I was thinking of not mentioning TLP's blog since he can be so darkly-cynical--but I just recently talked to a woman who cited it as having really helped her to get excited about the idea of having a family--and convinced that the corporate world's ways of bestowing-of-status upon its employees was very much "The System" just exploiting the fact if you praise women for their accomplishments, that's a really effective way to get us on your treadmill and steal our surplus.
[2] "Very cold and clear, between two green hills. A little like Lethe. When you have drunk of it you forget forever all proprietorship in your own works. You enjoy them just as if they were someone else's: without pride and without modesty."--C. S. Lewis, "The Great Divorce"
I love the ideas other folks have raised, especially bringing folks on errands and hosting game nights with babysitters. One I'll add is that it's fun to build/rebuild community around existing groups. A parent at my kiddos school has organized all the parents of the first grade class with playground dates and other activities - I'm plotting doing the same for our grade! I've also been hosting playdates for folks in my high school class who have kiddos (or who want to hang out with those of us who do!).
One idea I have for year 3 of your lovely substack is a series of interviews with folks who are living the kinds of values you discuss here. How have they managed to do it in practice? What do they wish they could have told themselves earlier on their journey? What was surprisingly hard or surprisingly easy?
Really love your substack and your way of thinking about our world! I pretty constantly live in community so dont do much alone. Id like to see more on the hows of sharing: how to share childcare, how to share meals, how to host bible studies, how to respond to big needs like refugees or sudden disability. I think many of us agree philosophically that women's lives could be better by sharing more, but what are the best practices? How do you avoid the pitfalls? And where do you find the people to do community with?
+1 to practical suggestions for best practices! Especially when money/space/energy for hosting dinner (or anything else at your apartment) is limited.
Also, Leah, thank you for all your work here!
Longtime reader, first time commenting. One of the (many) reasons I love this substack so much is that it regularly raises questions I’m already thinking about myself. (Or maybe I’m already thinking about them because I’ve been reading this substack…)
Both before and since Covid, my husband and I have become increasingly aware of the loneliness of those around us. (Ironically, our awareness of others’ loneliness has grown as our own loneliness has decreased, through our marriage!) While we want to provide respite for those who are lonely where we can, we are also busy people (who isn’t?!). So recently, instead of adding a *new* activity (like a game night) in order to spend time with someone, we have started trying to look for ways to fold other people into the activities we would already be doing anyway.
For example, my husband needed to go to the hardware store to pick something up for our new house. I suggested that he invite a friend of ours (a single guy who lives alone) to tag along. Another time I wanted to shop for some new pants (an activity I find very UNenjoyable), and I invited another friend, an international student, to join me. In both of these cases we were able to spend time with someone who would otherwise have spent the evening by themselves. This is not to say that we *never* have people over for dinner and games or other times of more *focused* togetherness. But we’ve been able to *increase* our ability to spend time with other people by simply inviting them into the already-happening-anyway parts of our lives.
Thinking about the third year of Other Feminisms, my favorite aspect of the substack is the roundups of reader comments. Whether advocating a different perspective to Leah’s original post or sharing their own experiences (as I’ve tried to do here), these are always super interesting to me. I don’t know that I want to see *more* of them this coming year — I think the current balance and rhythm is just right — but I definitely want them to continue, whatever other changes may come.
In terms of content, I’d love to hear about experiments in living arrangements that explore alternatives to the nuclear family or rent-sharing roommates models. Due to my own circumstances, I’m particularly interested in examples that combine both single and married folks, and ones in a suburban/small urban/“single family” home context rather than a rural or heavily urbanized one. But I’m curious about any and all examples that would help us imagine other ways of living in community. What does it look like when mutual dependence means not just helping one another here and there but actually living together?
One thing I really like about inviting people along on errands is that it makes it plain you simply want to *be* with them, rather than impress or entertain.
I’d also like to explore living arrangement experiments! I value community – especially Christian community, but also local neighborhood community. And in theory I would love to be open to living arrangements that combat our atomized/nuclear family style of living. But in other ways that is also my worst nightmare! I’m fairly introverted and having a lot of other people around can make me feel anxious/overwhelmed. I also struggle with inviting people into our often messy home. We have four kids, and truth be told I’m a less tidy person than I’d like! I don’t know… I can feel very anxious about people seeing the literal messiness in my house.
One approach that may help: do you think less of your friends when they have slightly messy houses? I think most people are harder on themselves than they are on people they like, and your friends usually feel the same way about you!
(This was also helpful for me in HS when thinking about breakouts. I wasn’t upset by someone else having a pimple so why should I assume they were distressed by mine?)
Yes, I too value intentional community (both with neighbors and with other Christians) in theory, but have a lot of questions about logistics. How does it work if there are single people and married people in the same household? (Actually that’s multiple questions in one!) What about small children? If the non-parents are good with children (and have the time and desire), you potentially have live-in babysitters; but what if the non-parents in the household have significant needs (physical, emotional, whatever) of their own?
I guess if I were to sum it up, my question is, how do you make community and interdependence meaningful, while respecting the boundaries and individual dignity and responsibility of each member of the household?
I think it's a given the non-parents will have *some* significant needs of their own. One thing that can happen in a shared household is that there's more slack—not everyone is in their period of deepest need at the same time (except when the whole house has stomach flu).
So the college student might baby sit or do daycare pickup some days, and, during finals, the parents might make a special effort to cook meals for the student as she works on papers/take her out for a cheerful walk/prep for interviews, etc.
Has anyone tried grocery shopping together? I've never done it, but I've been tempted more than once to call a friend (especially one without kids) for moral support.
In terms of the third year of other feminisms--well, more of the same would be good! That being said, related to the dependence question in particular, I have one thing that I struggle with a good deal, that I wish I saw explored more often, namely, how to navigate dependence when there are personality conflicts or other interpersonal issues.
I have had some experience of the isolation of modern society, and what happens when people assume or attempt independence. But as someone who comes from a background with a strong nuclear family as a child and now a strong extended family, along with plenty of close religious ties, I've also had the experience of dependence as a difficulty to be navigated. When people are simply and obviously toxic, the solution is painful but simple: just see them less or not at all. And when people are absent for geographical or other reasons, the solution is difficult to execute but relatively easy to articulate: build a community of friends. But what do you do when your preexisting community of family and/or friends is not so toxic that you need severance, but is just ... human enough that you need space? E.g. (hypotheticals to make this more concrete) ... How do you accept kid-watching help from Uncle Lester when you know he's more permissive/authoritative than you are with your kids? How do you engage in meal exchanges with friends who are more/less worried about Covid that you are? How do you sift through homeschooling advice from an aunt who had a mixed track record raising her own children? How do you accept graciously while also discarding what you judge will be unhelpful (or even harmful) to you and your own dependents--while at the same time not wounding the feelings of those on whom you depend (and who depend for affirmation, if not also practical support, on you)?
Tl;dr, charity and prudence are hard.
Keep going, Leah! Your essay "Dependence" remains one of my favorite pieces of writing from the last few years!
I would love to hear about the practical ways of integrating others into the otherwise very isolating stage of early parenting. My wife and I are expecting our first child in January, and here in Singapore, there's a practice of "confinement," which means that post-partum mothers are not supposed to leave the home for a whole month. Beyond that specific cultural practice, many families both here and in the States tend to withdraw from their communities to care for newborns, which for Christians often means skipping social engagements like church or Bible study.
This cultural practice would seem to be completely the opposite of the message of dependence upon community that you and others frequently voice. What does it look like to try to lean more into community during that early stage of parenting when many instead withdraw?
Congrats on your first baby! You are in an interesting cultural situation! I wonder if the women who go into confinement there often have a relative coming to stay with them? Usually their mother? I know several cultures practice some type of confinement, but I find that these cultures often live intergenerationally, or they often have family members come and stay with them during the period of confinement. So there is a sort of contraction from larger society, but there is also the deeper dependence on family relationships at home. I guess what I’m trying to say is, it might be a both/and situation Where a (temporary) social withdrawal doesn’t have to mean isolation, but may mean deeper and maybe more selective dependence on trusted relationships. Anyways, your question resonated with me because I have four children, and I found that I really valued a sort of social withdrawal during that time immediately after having a baby. And with each child I tended to take more time “off” from social functions like a church. (Up to about 6 weeks-ish) But I still think you can take time “off” while cultivating community. For example: like I already mentioned, do you have a family member or friend that can come stay with you for a while? One whom you won’t mind asking to cook/clean/and hold a fussy baby during any hour of the day/night- or at least be willing to do two out of three of those things! Or if not someone to come stay with you, then someone to regularly pop in for a few hours? People will probably offer to bring you food. Take them up on it! But you could also ask them to stay and eat the meal with you. You might find that it’s harder for you all to leave the house with the baby, at least at first, but that you can ask people to come to you. If it does feel overwhelming to leave the house with the baby, maybe ask a friend to come help you go to pediatrician appointments, etc. having an extra set of hands around can help. If you do skip church for a few weeks, when you can’t go to Bible study for a while, see if someone in your community can come to you and discuss the sermon/Bible study, etc. Honestly a lot of people will probably say “let me know if you need anything”. And if they do, tell them if you need something! Even if that something is that you want some company ( but also don’t hesitate to ask for other things, like bringing groceries by, or someone coming over to help you fold laundry, etc.) The thing is, also don’t be afraid to ask people to leave or to give you privacy. To get very granular: a few postpartum weeks still involve a lot of bodily fluids. I won’t elaborate except to say that If there’s breast-feeding involved then there are also privacy issues that people have varying levels of comfort with. I literally did not put on a shirt for many weeks and that has practical implications for relating to your community! You will both learn how to navigate this, but this is why I think there’s often a necessary reliance on fewer people, but in a deeper way. Everyone is different, and my personality is one that values more quiet and seclusion, but some people are able to get back out in the world very quickly. I think having a child might mean that you may have to make some adjustments to your community and the way you do it, but it does not have to mean isolation. It might be making new friends, and maybe not seeing some of your old friends as much. That can be hard. But it does not have to mean isolation. So reach out, but don’t hesitate to ask for privacy and blessings to you!
Thanks so much! In our personal circumstances, we do live very close (3 mins walk) from my wife’s parents, and her mom is planning to quit her job and be very involved.
More broadly in Singapore, there is an entire industry devoted to confinement, with professional nannies who will stay with you for the month and cook specific traditional meals (lots of ginger and vinegar). There are also meal delivery services (that charge exorbitant prices) for those traditional meals.
Reflecting further, I think that first month is not so much what concerns me, but the tone that seems to set for the next year or two. Our own community group had very involved families who largely haven’t returned 4-6 months after birth, and others who were less involved but who took at least 1-2 years away, sometimes never returning.
I think very small babies (pre-crawling) are the *easiest* babies to bring out into the world. I really like baby-wearing, because it makes it easier for me to just get up and go and walk with others. A small baby can chill on the floor at an adult gathering, while a toddler will want a lot of talk and attention.
It's also great if groups like bible studies have childcare available (whether paid for by the parish or pooled by parents). Our young couples group, part of a network of Frassati ministries, had volunteers to play with the small children while grown-ups talked.
When we hosted a game day at our house, we booked babysitters for our toddler and one other attendee's.
I agree, I have also seen young families pull away for longer, sometimes indefinitely. I do think the withdrawal to more intense dependence on fewer relationships can last for several years. It can be hard to have a lot of regular outside commitments when you have young children (they get sick, you lose a night of sleep, etc.). So the mindset of asking for help, asking for people to do things with you (go to the pediatrician, etc- there are a lot of well-baby checks in those first 2 years!), asking for people to bring food and eat with you, and using that as time to build relationships outside of more formal meetings can be used to cultivate community beyond the immediate postpartum stage. Goodness knows from now until kingdom come, there will be opportunities to ask for help with laundry. Ha! But I totally agree with you that I'd love to read about how to cultivate community in the early years of parenting. Even though I'm not there anymore, I believe that I have a responsibility to include young families. Fellowship with people in various stages of life is so important, and often hard to come by! And, I've noticed that being around babies is very good for older kids. One more thing: Have you read Find Your People by Jennie Allen? It may be tangential to what you're asking, but you may find some of her suggestions/mindset helpful.
What do I do alone that I could do together? This question called to mind so many things that I used to do together that I now do alone, and not particularly by choice! I used to swim with a friend one evening per week. She can't join me anymore, so now I swim alone. I used to make homemade jam and can it with a friend, she's no longer interested, so now I do that alone. I used to be in a Bible study, it stopped happening during COVID and when it was safe to meet in person the hostess no longer wanted to host, so it ended. I have reached out to several Well Read Moms groups in my city looking for a book club to join, never heard back from anyone. I keep feeling that the answer to all of these is to simply keep trying, to simply build what I want to have that I can't seem to find, but it's just tiring.
Anyway, not to end on a down note, but I do love Other Feminisms and I look forward to reading into it's third year and beyond! And I still want to read The Minority Body by Elizabeth Barnes with this group!
That is very hard! Trying repeatedly, waiting for a connection is a lot like the frustration of online dating.
An experience that I never had and I am NOT SORRY about that! I am what has been referred to as an "elder Millennial" so online dating definitely existed when I was dating but it was not quite the all-pervasive influence that it is today. My stories of blind dates and speed dating literally horrify some of my younger colleagues :-D
What do you do alone that you could do together?
What do you do in private that you could do in public?
Eating
Cleaning up
Dancing
Playing card games.
Talking, signing, laughing, praying
Watch TV, listen to music, make music
Make art, see art
Travel
Gardening
Hanging out with children
Sports
I’ll stop there.
These are all good! Subset of cleaning: washing up after a meal and doing laundry can both be communal activities--I often have my husband and/or kids helping (or in the case of the little ones "helping") with them, and guests are often at least helping with the dishes, even if handing them a basket of possibly intimate items to fold isn't really practical!
Sports: when we were kid free, my husband and I used to run together. I really miss that, but our kids are too little to keep up with either of us now, and they don't ride bikes well enough yet either to keep up that way. Still, I'm looking forward to the day when we can be running/biking as a family (again)!
Stuff I'd like to see in the 3rd year of "Other Feminisms":
"People and things that help you be brave and/or have agency" || "Things that help us to write" || "Overcoming Perfectionism" (or possibly a larger category that includes perfectionism) || "Slack/Margin." || Cultivating Nuance in Conversations or Writing.
Examples:
1. One thing that really helps me to be brave is reading blog posts on "The Last Psychiatrist" [1] Likewise, I have a specific sermon on Sloth from the book "Sinning Like a Christian" that I've read intentionally to kick me out of slumps-presenting-as-depression. Also, talking with (or reading the biography of) someone else who is in the throes of "fighting the good fight"--they don't even have to be laboring over / struggling over the SAME challenges as me; hearing someone else taking a stand is fortifying like little else! Lastly, I have specific songs I've played right after taking a costly action to walk away from a bad situation: "Burn the Ships," for example. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOVrOuKVBuY
2. There are a lot of people here who write. :) I probably have less formal training in writing than lots of others. And everyone needs to write at SOME point! Example: One day, to explain why he saw writing as an important skill to have, my Dad recalled a time when he had to write evaluations for subordinates. He was like "They never would give me enough space, so I'd always write REALLY small and add more lines to fit more in!" (Not where my mind first goes when I think of "writing," but i was delighted by his intention to cram in more detail for the important task of describing a person's ways!!)
3. I have a terrible time with perfectionism. My path to breaking out of it has had some twists and turns that I could not have anticipated. My favorite example was participating in a "Bad Writing Contest" with friends online; I love to laugh, so generating side-splitting groaners by choosing which rule(s) of good writing to gleefully violate--or choosing a topic to write on that no sane person would want to read--was fantastic. (At least twice, I concluded that nobody but me found the things that I came up with NEARLY as hilarious as I did--or possibly even got the joke. But it made NO difference to my enjoyment. I think that evidenced some of the kind of un-self-conscious-ness that shows up [2] in "The Great Divorce.")
4. Suggested reading: in "The Good and Beautiful God" by James Bryan Smith, there is a section about Margin, and it contains a story about a doctor who started to notice how stress was damaging his patients' health, so he counseled them to slow down and eliminate unnecessary things from their lives. Only after awhile did he notice that he had the same problem as them. ("Hey, I'm working 80 hours a week!") And this great warning: "When we lack margin in our lives we become tired and lonely and joyless, which seems to invite temptation." Archive.org link here: https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780830835317/page/128/mode/1up?q=margin
5. Interesting reading: Marshall McCluan's "Extensions of Man" or "Amusing Ourselves to Death." This FareFwd review started with the latter... connected TV/Social-Media/Globalized politics to Aristotles takes on politics and virtue (introduced me to the word "phrónēsis") ...and went on to make some hopeful hypotheses of what COULD be yet to come. https://mailchi.mp/7ed129019367/37-bradley-yam-on-amusing-ourselves-to-death
[1] I was thinking of not mentioning TLP's blog since he can be so darkly-cynical--but I just recently talked to a woman who cited it as having really helped her to get excited about the idea of having a family--and convinced that the corporate world's ways of bestowing-of-status upon its employees was very much "The System" just exploiting the fact if you praise women for their accomplishments, that's a really effective way to get us on your treadmill and steal our surplus.
[2] "Very cold and clear, between two green hills. A little like Lethe. When you have drunk of it you forget forever all proprietorship in your own works. You enjoy them just as if they were someone else's: without pride and without modesty."--C. S. Lewis, "The Great Divorce"