My Moms’ Group Was a Blessing from God

God guided Hillary Ibarra to form a moms’ group, and the blessings were greater than she imagined.

When my firstborn, Berto, wriggled on my stomach moments after his birth, red and bawling, I was in awe of how abundant and miraculous life became with his arrival, but I was oblivious to the support I would need. It takes a village to raise a child, but our family lived hundreds of miles away. We had just moved for my husband’s job, so no one came to the hospital to celebrate our precious boy, born after 24 exhausting hours of labor. No one helped in the lonely weeks after my husband returned to work.

When my daughter Ana arrived less than two years later, my loneliness became crushing. Desperate, I literally prayed for friends. My husband, son, and daughter were a great gift from God, but I needed a community of fellow moms.

One day in our church’s social hall, I pounced into conversation with another woman, my baby daughter’s car seat swinging on my arm. I overheard her say she sang in an opera chorus. I liked opera; friendship was inevitable!

But she had no children. I craved conversations with fellow moms who understood my struggles with nursing, potty-training, and sleep deprivation, so I asked the parish office if I could start a moms’ group, and they placed an ad in the church bulletin.

Right away I experienced the benefits of community. Two fellow moms and I agreed our fledgling group would gather in the church nursery on Wednesday mornings. However, my husband commuted for work in our only vehicle, and the church was miles from our house. Devastated, I told one of the women that I couldn’t attend. She insisted on driving 20 minutes past the church to our home where we wrangled three car seats into the backseat of her sedan before returning to the church. She took us home afterward, giving more than an hour of her day to build our friendship. Her kindness was the first of many blessings.

In the beginning our moms’ group was tiny, but friendship with the opera singer was inevitable; she joined after giving birth to her first child, a son. Soon there were 10 of us. We didn’t have regular museum field trips or guest speakers on child-rearing. We didn’t even do Bible study. We just talked and laughed and sometimes cried, supporting each other during the crazy, exhausting, amazing journey of motherhood as our children played.

One milestone at a time, our moms’ group built a chosen family: with first teeth, first words, first steps, first days of kindergarten. As our children grew, we celebrated birthdays, trick-or-treated, enjoyed “Friendsgiving” and Christmastime together. We supported each other during health crises or after a birth, babysat each other's little ones in emergencies, and enjoyed moms’ nights out.

When my daughter Gabriella was on her way before Thanksgiving, my opera friend met us at the hospital and entertained her son and our children in the hospital cafeteria as I gave birth. A week later, the moms’ group delivered Thanksgiving to our family as my newborn nestled in my arms, the aroma of the warm dishes filling our home, the incense of friendship. A few months later, my singer friend became my daughter’s godmother, and a few years later, I became her daughter’s godmother.

My gratitude was tremendous when my friends cared for my children when another vehicle T-boned our minivan at an intersection, sending me to the hospital for five days when my youngest, Daniel, was only two. One beautiful friend scooped up our younger children, unharmed, from the hospital, and another picked up our older kids from school, allowing my husband to remain with me during surgery. More moms gathered, and they ordered pizza and comforted our children in the company of childhood friends who were like cousins. My hospital room filled with bright flowers, books, cozy socks, and magazines from my fellow moms, and I thanked God for our community, for women who sheltered, consoled, and embraced my children in my stead.

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One milestone at a time, our moms’ group built a chosen family: with first teeth, first words, first steps, first days of kindergarten. #catholicmom

Years passed, and families moved away, including my singer friend, but we remained bonded by beautiful memories of raising our children together.

Three years ago, our family moved again for my husband’s career, and we ended up in the same town as my opera friend. We miss the rest of our moms’ group, but three families visited us during the summer, and it felt like we had never been separated by months or miles. Our kids are in middle school, high school, and college now. The moms watched our tweens and teenagers playing foosball and table tennis and reminisced about days in a church nursery as we gazed up into their grownup faces, acknowledging fresh challenges in new seasons of motherhood.

In answer to my prayers, God guided me to form a community in a parish nursery when I was a young, lonely mother. He gave me friends for a lifetime, and I have never felt alone in the joys and struggles of motherhood since.

Copyright 2022 Hillary Ibarra
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