Reply to It takes a village and I have no village

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Reply to "It takes a village and I have no village"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I totally understand, OP, and I do have a village. My family is all on the west coast and I moved here as an adult, post-grad school, so my only close friend was DH. Although it is REALLY not in my nature, I forced myself to go to a new moms’ group when my first kid was just weeks old. I was so shy, but I ended up with great friends. Some of those people have moved away but as my kids entered elementary school and later middle school, i added to my “village” with parents from those schools. Honestly, it’s a village built on proximity and mutual dependence. [b]We all work and so rely on each other for carpooling, homework backup, and socializing[/b]. Pretty much all my close friends are both my neighbors (in the broadest sense of within a 2-mile radius) and my kids’ friends’ parents. We do live in a neighborhood where everyone is physically quite close and no one has a big yard, which helps. My only advice is to be helpful and accept help when it’s offered.[/quote]

Please explain the homework backup.

Carpooling I get but you hardly need a village to establish a carpool.

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Sure--when our kids started middle school, they sometimes forgot to bring a worksheet home for homework. We would text another parent or two with kids in the same class and they would send a snapshot of the assignment.

There are lots of other ways we support each other. It's so helpful to have someone to vent to about kid problems, to drop your kid with when DH is traveling and you need to get in to work early, to pick up your kid when you're going to be late to school. These are all the things that make my life easier and my kids' lives more pleasant and fun. [b]Why are you so resistant to the idea of a village[/b]?[/quote]

Because most times the “village” is women providing unpaid labor that the husband/father should be providing.  Case in point - OP’s husband should have canceled his trip instead of OP thinking a neighbor or friend should have stepped in to help with childcare/sick care.

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