I have a confession: I am a secret Mumsnet lurker. It started in the small hours, when my son was tiny. I had ventured on to it a little in pregnancy during moments of panic, such as when I thought I had caught toxoplasmosis from petting a stray cat in Greece. But it was only after actually becoming a “mum” that I started reading it regularly, desperate for sleep advice.
I write “mum” in inverted commas because sometimes it feels that being a “mum” is different to being a mother, or a “mama”, the online moniker of choice. An editor I worked with once said she hated the word “mum” in copy; there’s a socialised resistance to the idea of “mumsiness” that sometimes feels like ingrained sexism. “Mums” are seen as dowdy and humdrum and a little bit silly, and this makes me sad.
I had had dealings with Mumsnet before, visiting their offices and once even going to one of their parties (Boris Johnson was regrettably present and made a typically waffling, patronising speech). Yet, like many progressive women of my generation, I was sceptical about much of the discourse on the site. In the past decade or so, Mumsnet has become a bit of a byword for all that’s bad in the parenting world. The very funny X account Mumsnet Madness collates examples of particularly eccentric posts – surely everyone has heard of the infamous “penis beaker”? – and the comedian Daisy May Cooper borrowed the title of her comedy series Am I Being Unreasonable? from one of the site’s notorious boards. In some corners, there is a sense that Mumsnet is just a bit sad, a bit loopy, not to mention politically dodgy.
Some of this resistance is good old-fashioned misogyny, but some is valid. Mumsnet has, in the past decade, become a meeting place of choice for feminists with gender critical views. Some will argue that it has provided a forum for women to air opinions in a safe space, and raise concerns about issues such as puberty blockers and – an obsession on Mumsnet – public toilets. I personally steer away from reading these discussions, which seem to often descend into toxicity and bigotry. There is also a strand of petty, small-c conservatism that I find off-putting, a preoccupation with class and class signifiers (“which sort of chocolate is middle class and which sort is working class?”), property ownership and inheritance. Some users seem to be obsessed with hen do beefs and CFs (“cheeky fuckers” – anyone asking for a favour, ever, basically).
There reigns a latent conventionality that treats anything vaguely leftfield or unorthodox as deeply suspicious, whether it’s having taken any kind of drug – even in the distant past – or choosing a foreign language alternative for “nana”. One read of the forums and you will learn that these Mumsnet posters never raise their voices, ever, even when their husbands are useless, gaslighting chauvinists who do no childcare. This is a subset of users who will swiftly diagnose any woman who is worried about any aspect of parenting with an anxiety disorder; who do not take their children to A&E for fear of wasting NHS resources; who are very mean about Meghan Markle. Worst of all, they use the word “hubby”.
I was depressed recently by a thread about the Tories’ benefit measures targeting people with mental health conditions. It reconfirmed for me that political focus grouping and cynical divide-and-conquer tactics work on lots of people. However, alongside the nastiness about those with long-term depression were extremely patient and moving testimonies from women who had had breakdowns or who had loved people who had.
This is the beauty of Mumsnet. The wealth of life experience collected there has taught me more about mothers in the past two years than probably anything else. From fertility struggles, to preterm birth, to terminal illness, to allergies, to how to cut out a narcissistic parent, it is all there on Mumsnet, gut-punching you every single day, making you realise just how hard and lonely life still is for many women, women who mostly just love their kids and want them to be OK.
Most moving of all is the fact that Mumsnet acts as an informal domestic violence support group. Yes, it’s easy to take the mick when you see a kneejerk “LTB” (leave the bastard) post under a moan about how “DH” (Dear Husband) has taken the last biscuit, but I have no doubt that the space created on these forums saves lives. I have watched in real time as posters rallied to help women and their children escape abusive men. So many of them have been through it all themselves.
Friends also swear by the Send (special educational needs and disabilities) boards and the advice and expertise it can offer. Such community can be hard to find in the real world. Becoming a mother can be painfully isolating. It remakes your brain and your body. It underlines just how pervasive structural sexism is, how few men do their fair share. It puts you on the frontline of political policy. It is transformative and radicalising.
Mumsnet is a place to work through all that. It is also a place to have a laugh. I have cried tears of sadness reading about other women’s lives, but also tears of laughter. Threads about the funniest thing to have happened during childbirth, or the most damage a child has ever done, will live with me for ever. Like any social network, it has its extremists and cranks. I still use X, despite the fact that I saw someone on there the other day lauding Joseph Goebbels as an example of fatherly sacrifice, so why not Mumsnet? It’s not a monolith. And if you want a snapshot of what mothering in the UK looks like, there is no better place.
What’s working
My son has been through a biting phase – thankfully mainly me and his father rather than other children, but still, no fun. I’ve spent the last few months covered in little bruises and nips, so I wanted to take the opportunity to recommend the book Teeth are Not for Biting by Elizabeth Verdick, despite the title being a tad confusing (shouldn’t it be Teeth are Not for Biting People?). Other books in the series include Feet are Not for Kicking and Noses are Not for Picking.
What’s not
Bubble mixture. Has the quality really declined since the 1990s? I’m struggling to blow big bubbles that don’t instantly pop and it’s creating quite a lot of toddler tears during our games. If any readers have a lead on where to get the good stuff, I’d so appreciate it.
Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett is a Guardian columnist
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