As a native New Yorker, I thought my move to Tennessee was temporary. But deep down I’m a country girl.

Starting out more than a thousand miles away from loved ones is a challenge, especially when a new mom is no longer of childbearing age. My daughter Violet longed for friends and so did I. But we couldn’t find any.

I tried to go to things even miles away

I joined every mom group on Facebook within a hundred miles, driving 50 minutes for coffees, walks, playgrounds, gymnastics, and mom play centers.

The cafes and walks were unique; I got lost in the city park looking for little kids and melted while my daughter swayed happily. The play center was fantastic, but the families came already paired up. Gymnastics was amazing but antisocial.

My heart broke every time Violet yelled, “Look! Kids!” on our playground, just before they left. Just like story time, there were close and united families everywhere. One invited us to a stream, but canceled. Like an awkward fourth grader scanning the cafeteria, I kept coming back. Every trip North to visit my cousins ​​was bittersweet; She loved them so much that I questioned starting a life on the other side of the country.

Little by little I found community

A flyer on the library bulletin board featured a Friday playgroup 40 minutes away. Twelve mothers chatted awkwardly while 30 children went crazy. Violet clung to me. When playgroup ended two months later, we were just starting to warm up.

Another mom also wanted community, so she reached out. Our smaller group was less overwhelming and grew very slowly and organically. The children loved each other. We moms do it too, bonding over stories about the fears of new moms and the difficulty of finding friends.

Now six families with 12 children meet for four hours several times a week, more time than I’ve spent with anyone besides my husband since high school.

Meeting other moms helped my mental health

Just before Violet was born, my husband became disabled and my mother died. In making a sudden career transition, I also navigated the new terrain of motherhood and loss. The denial and demands of the newborn helped me not realize how alone and scared I felt. I picked up the phone to call my mother when Violet didn’t latch on right away or to ask her for suggestions on safe bug sprays.

After I jumped out of bed in the middle of the night to trim 1-year-old Violet’s tiny nails, convinced she would scratch her eyes, and then woke her up again an hour later to change her bedding, certain she would choke on a nail clipping, my husband gently suggested postpartum depression. I insisted I was wrong.

Finding a community of other moms brought joy and confidence back into my life, and I didn’t know I’d been missing it. They gave me a perspective that no one else could, helping me relax and enjoy motherhood. Violet sang her friends’ names all day long. Another mother said her sons recite their friends’ names in the car, and a third shared that her daughters say them along with their bedtime prayers.

Then the ice storm came. Our area of ​​Middle Tennessee was the hardest hit, losing power for six days. When my phone reconnected on the third day, I discovered a string of concerned text messages from “The Moms” (as my husband called us). The family closest to us took us in and turned our disaster into a fun sleepover.

Our relationships deepened as we shared how deeply we appreciated each other, and not just our children, and how, from a small library pamphlet, this group of mothers had improved all of our lives.

We support each other

Our ages range from 26 to 43, but I don’t feel old. We are from all over the country and include a former engineer and a pandemic nurse. They all plan to homeschool their multiple children. I am the only mother who is still working and with only one child.

Our group’s unspoken motto is that different families have different rules and we support each other. Whenever new moms come to the library, we welcome them.

As the birthdays progressed, Violet eagerly awaited hers. When we asked him what he wanted, he shouted, “All my friends!”