Jump to content

Recommended Posts

Recent threads on having siblings, or how many children to have, prompted me to wonder if there is 'Only Child' playgroup out there? There are special groups for multiples, so why not singleton children?


How do you think being an only child affects your child, good or bad?


Personally I love being the mother of an only child. I feel like adding another child, at least at this age, would change my relationship with my toddler. I'm happy that we can just about give one child the standard of living that my husband and I had. Research does suggest that only children are not the stereotyped 'lonely onlies', but rather are well-adjusted and happy. I had an unhappy time with two abusive siblings, so I'm keen to avoid that in my own little family. Obviously my experience colours my choices. I'm just wondering what anyone else's experience/choices have been?



Are there any other parents of only children of any age who want to meet up?


xx

What a great idea!


I wish I was there to join, but as someone pointed out, am now back in Canada. I would love to meet some mothers of older only children so I could understand the next few years a bit better.


That said, I will be following this thread with interest and hope to read about others' experiences with this. I am really amazed at how few people I know, children or adults, who are only children. It's lonely being an only parent some times too!


Best of luck with finding a nice group Saffron, hope it works out.

HIya - I am the mum to an only child and given my age & personal circumstances mean it is quite likely to stay this way. I often worry about it as I come from a large family and love it, but, due to unusual circumstances I am by far the youngest. This means when growing up, I often felt a bit alone, especially on holidays etc as my sisters & brother are so much older. They love me very much but I was often jealous of the "group effect" they seem to have with each other (and our cousins - we are a large, close family). Because of the age difference, even their kids are a lot older than my LO (adults in fact) . DH is also from a large family, and has children from a previous marriage. His kids adore our LO but the age gap is even bigger than with me and my siblings. So even though he has siblings & cousins etc, I am worried history will repeat itself.

So I guess it is up to me to enable as much friendship and social companionship as possible - hence, if there is an Only Child club, I'm in!

Hi all- Glad to see there's so much interest already!


Somewhat surprisingly, I haven't found any playgroups for 'onlies' yet, so I was thinking to host at mine if numbers aren't too big. I'm in Brockley (se4), so not strictly East Dulwich, though I've noticed that forumites tend to be scattered over Dulwich, Nunhead, Sydenham, Peckham etc. Of course if anyone else wants to host, that would be lovely too. Maybe we can rotate?


Depending on the children's ages, perhaps we could meet once or twice a month for tea and biscuits, then maybe get a little more organised for a dayout sometime?


xx

Let's tentatively plan both dates then. :) You can't make too many new friends or have too much tea and cake*!!


Thursday 15th September, afternoon... from 2:30pm ish?


Saturday 24th September, also afternoon?


If the weather is nice, we can meet at mine, then take our LOs up to the park. If it's rainy, we can stay indoors and do painting or baking, or watch videos, or have dolly buggy races up and down the hall.


If that sounds good, I can PM everyone with more info.


Cheers all!





*(Ok, you technically CAN have too much tea and cake, but my cake threshold is very high.)

Great! So we're on for both dates (Thursday 15, and Saturday 24 September, from 2:30ish to 4:30ish at mine (se4). I'll send a round of PMs with address etc next week -- or sooner if Little Saff will get off the iPlayer and let me use the computer. Cheers, all! :)

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Latest Discussions

    • I went to France recently and in the city I visited there were large billboards on the main streets urging people to stop their dogs from messing on the streets and in a little park a sign said something to the effect that this park was built for your enjoyment not as a dumping ground for dog mess. There were also big signs about not fly tipping. I wonder if councils are too worried about offending dog owners by making a fuss about this major problem. I was a dog owner for many years, got free bags from the council and there were even bins around then.
    • I was also woken by this. It happened in two bursts, which felt even more anti social.
    • Surprised at how many people take the 'oooh it's great it got approved, something is better than nothing' view. This is exactly Southwark council's approach, pandering to greedy developers for the absolute bare minimum of social and affordable housing. It's exactly why, under their leadership, only a fraction of social and affordable housing has been built in the borough - weirdly Mccash chose to highlight their own failures in his 'near unprecedented' (yet unbiased 😆) submission. All the objectors i have met support redevelopment, to benefit those in need of homes and the community - not change it forever. The council could and should be bolder, demand twice the social and affordable housing in these schemes, and not concede to 8 storeys of unneeded student bedsits. If it is a question of viability, publically disclose the business plan to prove how impossible it might be to turn a profit. Once the thing is built these sites can never be used for social or affordable housing. The council blows every opportunity, every time. Its pathetic. Developers admitted the scale was, in this instance, not required for viability. The student movements data seemed completely made up. The claim that 'students are taking up private rentals' was backed up with no data. There is empty student housing on denmark hill, needs to be fixed up but it's there already built. The council allows developers years to build cosy relationships with planners such that the final decision is a formality - substantiated objections are dismissed with wooly words and BS. Key meetings and consultations are scheduled deliberately to garner minimal engagement or objection. Local councillors, who we fund, ignore their constituents concerns. Those councillors that dare waiver in the predetermination are slapped down. Not very democratic. They've removed management and accountability by having no nomination agreement with any of the 'many london universities needing accommodation' - these direct lets MAKE MORE MONEY. A privately run firm will supposedly ensure everyone that those living there is actually a student and adheres to any conduct guidelines. There's no separation to residents - especially to ones on their own development. Could go on... We'll see how many of the 53 social/affordable units that we're all so happy to have approved actually get built. 
    • I am looking for 1 unit which is working for £50 cash. Thank you
Home
Events
Sign In

Sign In



Or sign in with one of these services

Search
×
    Search In
×
×
  • Create New...