This is why we do it 

Do you know a mum like this?

Hello,

I want to share a story with you. It happened a couple of weeks ago at one of our newer groups, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since.

A brand new mum walked in. She looked relaxed, healthy, happy, baby was thriving. Nothing about her suggested she was anything other than a woman having a lovely time at a singing group.

At the end of the session she told us it was the first group she'd been to in several months. That she'd walked up to the door of many groups during that time, and walked away again because of anxiety. She was under the perinatal mental health team and had a family support worker. Everything I thought I'd seen when she walked in... I'd got it completely wrong.

She went home and sang the songs she'd learned that morning.

She came back the following week and told us what had happened during the week. Her baby was unsettled one night. Her partner had taken him to try to settle him - that was their arrangement, because she'd been too anxious to manage it herself. But her partner brought the baby back to her. He'd seen her singing the new songs at home, he'd seen the impact the singing had had on both her and her baby.

He handed her the baby and said: "I think he needs your songs".

She took him and sang to him. She settled him, for the first time.

She came back and told us. She was so proud of herself. Her partner was proud of her. And we were so proud of them both.

That was one song. One session. One woman who nearly didn't walk through the door.

I actually shared this story on Instagram this week if you'd like to hear it in my own voice: Watch here

This is the story we hear again and again across the Singing Mamas network, from thousands of women, in hundreds of communities. And it's the story that gets me out of bed every morning to make sure that every mama who needs this has somewhere to go.

There are still so many who don't. Whole towns, whole postcodes, where a woman like her would walk up to our website, find no group near her, and walk away again.

We're looking for the women who are going to change that. Our next Community Leader Training opens for bookings next month... and if you're on this list, you might just be one of them.

With love and song,
Kate xx