Find Space to do best for you and baby
Having their first child leaves a lot of parents feeling ‘‘quite miserable’’, says the co-ordinator of a weekly support group helping hundreds of families around the Waikato.
Space (Supporting Parents alongside Children’s Education) co-ordinator Catherine Polglase said navigating life with a newborn was not easy and it often failed to meet the parents’ expectations.
She said Space Waikato, which she and a team of volunteers started in 2009, had recently had its 600th enrolment, and she knew the parents (mostly mothers) who attended the two-hour weekly sessions in Waikato Playcentres found it beneficial.
‘‘A lot of women in our community are finding it difficult,’’ Ms Polglase said.
She said mothers who were having babies later, often at a different time to their friends, and mothers who were new to the region often found the transition to motherhood harder than they had anticipated. ‘‘A lot of women end up feeling quite miserable.’’
Ms Polglase said the sessions stopped the parents feeling isolated and, instead of preaching the ‘‘right way’’, facilitators discussed options and let the individual decide what was best for the baby.
Space had helped several mothers she knew of through postnatal depression and she in particular recalled one mother who she was ‘‘really worried about’’ the first time she attended the class.
Ms Polglase said she later learned the woman said her time at Space was ‘‘the only time she felt normal in the week’’.
Ms Polglase said the groups, which were capped at 17 parents, had a topic each week, such as sleeping or stimulation, and each group met for about a year, with ‘‘between nought and six weeks’’ the best time to start.
Kelly Mitchell and her daughter Scarlett, 41⁄ months, joined a Space group in January.
Mrs Mitchell, a former graphic designer for Waikato Regional Council, said Scarlett was a ‘‘challenge of a little girl’’ but the good times made the tough times worthwhile.
‘‘She’s never been a sleep-through-thenight kind of girl – at 3 months she was awake six or seven times a night.’’
Mrs Mitchell said a doctor had diagnosed silent reflux, and Scarlett’s sleeping had improved now to one or two wake-ups each night. ‘‘You’re constantly exhausted.’’ She said the weekly Space topics helped her to get ideas for Scarlett, but not in the ‘‘well-meaning’’ but unsolicited way that new parents were often barraged with.
‘‘For me, being here each week with other mums with similar-aged babies lets me get lots of little points or tips about things that might work.
‘‘It makes you realise all babies are so different.’’
Space has a joining fee of $40. For in- quiries and bookings, email Rose or Catherine at space@waikatoplaycentre.org.nz or call 847 1739.