Friends enrich every stage of our lives, and as a mum, having mum-friends can truly enrich your life and offer much needed support.
Mum friends can relate to most of the things you are going through, they can reassure you about any parenting worries- and you never feel alone.
They can relate when you call to vent, or when you ask for someone to watch the kids for a few hours so you can get some alone time.
To have mum friends you can count on is such a blessing! In fact research has confirmed that good friendships are good for your physical and mental health.
But having such friends is not easy but is definitely worth it.
One mum who can totally relate is Cecilia (pictured right),She is part of Achievers group – all of them in the group are mums, with young families that they are doing their best for.
Their mum-friendship is quite unique, below she shares more…
“My name is Cecilia Mueni and I am part of Achievers Group.
In total we are 16- me, Alice, Adah, Brenda, Christine, Emily, Joyce, Linda, Lucy, Molly, Moureen, Racheal,Tinnah,Victoria, Rozzie and Rael.
One of the main unifying factors that bind us is that we grew up together.
When we became adults, many of us moved from where we grew up to start our own families. We realized how hard it was to start new friendships and worse still getting loyal, good friends was a hustle. So to stay connected we came up with the idea of forming the Achievers group.
This ensured that we stayed in touch with each other.
What we started as a way of staying in touch became an important pillar for all of us. We are there for each other through good and bad times.
We are together during family functions- birthdays, baby showers, weddings and in tough times including the loss of a loved one offering not only moral support but also financial support.
People wonder how we are able to keep it together – being 16 women in the same group is not easy as we are all different, look at things different and keeping the group in harmony does not come without conflict.
What we are all in agreement is that the group is important to us, so we have found a way to make it work.
One thing that is unique in our group is that we visit each other’s parents in our rural homes.
Certainly becoming a parent makes you look at your parents a bit more differently; somehow you tend to appreciate them more and you want to show it.
Our group purposed to visit each other’s home to honour our parents.
These trips have given us an opportunity to bond even more receiving blessings from each other’s parents.
The visits are so memorable and two visits that stand out for me are the 1st home visit at Brenda’s home (Sakwa-Kambajo) where all the members attended and we had a very warm welcoming and even did tree planting in honour of the day.
It’s very unfortunate that we lost Brenda’s dad – we had become very close to them.
The other memorable visit for me was to Joyce’s place in Kisii .Unfortunately we lost the dad too.
It was not easy for us because we had become close to them, their hearty laughs and advice.
These visits have been much appreciated by our parents as well and with each visit comes happy tears, laughter and plenty of love. So we have made 7 rural home visits in different counties.
Keeping the friendship and love going in such a large group is not easy.
Occasionally we have disagreements and the conflicts are handled in different ways depending with the issue at hand.
More often than not, these issues are often resolved and love restored.
There is always someone within the group who will strive to bring people together.
We make every effort to make the group work and truly value our friendship.
I know that women’s friendship can be tricky but, what I have come to see is that there are genuine lady friends who will always uplift you when you fall, advice you when you need some advice and always be there for each you.
Never force friendship let it flow and the right ones will stick around no matter your weakness or strengths.
Raising a family is never easy it needs a strong woman and a woman needs some backup which you get from your loyal friends especially mum friends.
It really helps if you have genuine close friends that you can laugh, eat, cry and drink together with.” She concludes.
