One January morning, Rachel decided she was fed up with motherhood. The former career professional had spent three months at home with her newborn, and she missed the stimulation of her job as much as she hated the thought of changing another diaper.
“I had reached the point where I was going crazy,” she admitted to about 50 other women at a recent Mothers of Pre-Schoolers (MOPS) meeting. “Nothing before in my life had prepared me for this.”
So Rachel packed up her child and drove from her home in Palatine to the Wheaton Bible Church, the closest MOPS meeting to her and a dozen other northwest suburban residents who attend meetings of the south DuPage County chapter. (She had heard about MOPS from a friend and decided this was the kind of group she wanted.) There she enjoyed two hours of adult interaction while her baby cooed and gurgled downstairs in the nursery.
Ask the 100-plus MOPS members what brings them to the bimonthly meetings and some will point to the craft projects, others bring up the lectures. But they all agree that spending time with one another–and without their kids–is the main attraction.
“I just need to talk to an adult once in a while,” said Winfield resident Sue Raber. “I’ve been home since my 2 1/2-year-old was born, and I’m tired of Barney.”
Moms in the GLV Early Childhood PTA can sympathize. The 62-member group, centered in Glen Ellyn, Lombard and Villa Park, holds monthly meetings at Madison School in Lombard, also with a nursery for the kids. (The group is affiliated with the national PTA but not with any local school district.)
“I wanted to get out of the house and meet other parents of preschoolers who are facing the same issues I’m facing,” said Lombard resident Carolyn Hanes.
Although the two groups have similar aims, their approaches attract different types of moms. Most MOPS members are full-time homemakers, and the programs and newsletter offer advice on cooking, budgeting and other domestic topics as well as parenting.
“A lot of our moms came out of the workplace to take care of their families, and this is a whole new ballgame for them,” said Wheaton chapter coordinator Neleen Lehman. “They’re not finding any support in society, so that’s where MOPS comes in.”
The bimonthly Friday morning meetings offer the structured social environment many formerly employed members miss about their jobs. After a potluck breakfast, participants sit at their assigned tables and tackle a craft project, such as stenciling napkin holders or braiding holiday wreaths.
After the craft session, moms hear a speaker talk about spiritual growth in themselves and their families. Recent topics included “Siblings Without Rivalry,” “The Building Blocks of Marriage” and “Hardhat Health: Taking Care of Yourself.” Often the speaker is professional counselor and lecturer Ruth Gibson of Wheaton, one of the few members whose children are grown. Gibson holds the title of Titus Woman, a biblical reference to a community “wise woman” who serves as a mentor to mothers still raising young children.
“I’m not struggling in the middle of it anymore, so I have a wider perspective on child-rearing,” Gibson explained. “I really enjoy sharing my experience with these young moms.”
Members enjoy comparing notes with Gibson and each other. During one recent meeting, the air buzzed with conversations about toilet training, sibling rivalry and starting a family at age 22 versus age 32.
“I don’t think it matters how old we are or what we did before we became moms,” said Carol Stream resident Julie Shirin, a 23-year-old homemaker and pregnant mother of two, after pointing out several former professional women in their early 40s. “We’re all in the same boat.”
Although MOPS doesn’t promote any one church, religion does play a large role in the group’s activities. Members pray together at the end of each meeting, while toddlers in the nursery hear Bible stories and make Bible-related craft projects. “One of the things we do here is plug in to God,” Gibson said.
Proceedings are a lot more casual at the Early Childhood PTA. Members sit anywhere in the music room at theschool. Some arrive for the evening meetings still in their office clothes. “A lot more of our members work than don’t,” said Denise Cvikota of Lombard.
After some chatting and a quick round of committee reports, the dozen moms get down to the focus of the meeting: a workshop on science projects for preschoolers presented by Laurie Beaumont, an instructor at DuPage Children’s Museum. Laughing, they make “clean mud” for their children out of grated soap, Borax, water and shredded toilet paper while they discuss the museum’s programs.
“This group is a resource for information on what to do with little kids,” said Donna Busching of Lombard, a programmer-analyst with a 4-year-old daughter and 10-month-old son.
A big draw is the monthly weekend or evening field trips that bring members and their children together. Recent excursions have taken them as close as Discovery Zone in Villa Park and as far afield as the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. Sometimes trip organizers can arrange experiences that parents can’t provide their children alone, such as bringing preschoolers into a Pizza Hut kitchen and letting them make their own small pizzas.
“I like to call them magic memories,” PTA president Marilyn Jensby said of the field trips. “It’s hard for working parents to make time to do special things with their kids. This way everything’s already organized for them. All they have to do is get on the bus and go.”
The group also hosts presentations on issues such as pediatric allergies, kindergarten readiness and how to take vacations with children.
“You sit there and hear another parent ask a question, and you think, `I thought it was just me (who had that problem),’ ” Cvikota said.
For a while, Lombard’s Kathi Boor belonged to both MOPS and the Early Childhood PTA, until time constraints forced her to drop out of MOPS because it meets twice as often. “The GLV PTA attracts more working moms who want help spending quality time with their kids,” she said. “People come here because they’re interested in doing things with their kids. At MOPS, they’re more into raising their kids.”
———-
For more information about MOPS, call Neleen Lehman at 708-462-1391. For GLV Early Childhood PTA, call Marilyn Jensby at 708-629-0586.
