Mums are in hysterics over an Instagram post about the 10 types of NCT mum.
The post, shared by The Mum Club, charts the various types of mother you might find in your NCT group, from late mum (who’s living in a constant state of lateness and all-round chaos) to competitive mum (while your birth took six hours, hers took six minutes) and nice mum (who actually happens to like her husband).
One parent commented on the post: “I know them all but also feel like I’m a little bit of them all, apart from the one with all the money.”
Another added: “This is excellent, made me laugh out loud hiding under my duvet while my husband is sleeping! Hilarious!”
Lauren Webber and Jessica Lawes are the founders of The Mum Club, which hosts local events for mums. They tell HuffPost UK the Insta post, which has over 1,700 likes, “is there to show mums that we’re all a bit of everything”.
It’s also – let’s face it – a bit of comic relief for women to share with their mum mates on Whatsapp when their little one’s having a nap and they’re drinking a cold coffee made three hours ago.
“We wanted our mums to read it and go ‘oh god yeah, I’m the late mum and the Wikipedia mum’,” they said.
“Motherhood is messy as f*ck and we think that’s why so many people resonate with our content because we are brutally honest about that. We are that friend who says exactly what you need to hear when you need to hear it.”
The pair want to help mums feel less alone in their struggles. “You are expected to have your shit together all the time and that just isn’t the case,” they said. “That’s why we strive to make The Mum Club a place where you know you aren’t alone.
“It’s ok to drop all the balls and laugh – or cry – about it.”
Anyway, here are the 10 types of mum you’ll meet in your NCT group. Which one are you?
Wikipedia Mum
No need for a GP appointment when you have a direct line to this expert diagnostician, with an MD in paediatrics from good old Dr Google. There’s not a rash, gash or bash that she hasn’t seen before, which you find reassuring given everyone else seems to think the slightest red spot is a sure sign of meningitis (‘DOES IT DISAPPEAR WHEN YOU PRESS A GLASS AGAINST IT?!’). Despite her highly suspect credentials, you find yourself sending her pictures of your child’s unusually luminous excrement, just in case.
Honest Mum
Think Sharon in Catastrophe, Julia in Motherland. Honest Mum arrives with three bottles of wine and a much-needed dose of unflinching honesty. Whatever parenting disaster you’ve recently suffered, she’s done much worse, and she’ll happily share in a charitable act of self-deprecation that never fails to make you feel better.
Gym Mum
Gym Mum turned up to the first class eight months pregnant looking like she’d just eaten a large lunch. Postpartum, she rocks the type of leggings you’ve long since sold on Depop, as just looking at them seems to give you a yeast infection – and your vagina has been through enough. She sips green tea, lamenting about ‘those last pesky four pounds’ despite the fact you can see her abs underneath her Lululemon sports bra, while you’ve been diagnosed with diastasis recti the size of the Watford gap.
The One With Loads Of Money
She opted for an elective C-section at the Portland and employs a night nanny, which is probably why she looks fucking fabulous whilst you still resemble an overcooked jacket potato. Her baby bag is Fendi, her pram cost more than your first car, and she makes Christine from Selling Sunset look like she’s let herself go.
The One That Wants To Be Best Mates
She treats all meet-ups like a Tinder date, texts the group daily to see if anyone fancies meeting up and ends every sentence with ‘oh my god, me too!’. She’s new to the area, and her husband works away, so at this point she’ll take any form of adult interaction to keep her sane. The first to say yes to anything, you could probably invite her to your baby’s six-week jabs and she’d tag along, as long as you could go for coffee afterwards.
Competitive Mum
Your birth took six hours? Hers took six minutes, with no epidural and zero tears. Your baby said ‘Mama’ for the first time? Cute! Hers is fluent in three different languages and can ask for a babycino in Latin. Despite not deliberately wanting to make you feel like shit, you leave every catch-up feeling like a giant mothering failure because her baby eats kimchi and kale whilst yours survives on a diet of Cheerios and chocolate croissants.
The Earth Mother
You listen with a mixture of wonder and scepticism as Earth Mother describes her ‘orgasmic home birth’ as ‘magical’ whilst breastfeeding her baby in an organic cotton sling. She detests the word ‘routine’, thinks Gina Ford is the antichrist, and is a big advocate of co-sleeping, reusable nappies and a purely vegan diet.
The One That Constantly Panics
Spends the entire class interrupting the teacher to ask pointless questions that would have been answered three seconds later if she’d just shut the f up. Permanently in a heightened state of anxiety, which only ramps up once the baby is born. Shares a constant stream of kid-related horror news stories to the group chat, including one at 3am demanding everyone cut open their bath toys to check for mould.
Nice Mum
Hasn’t got a bad word to say about anyone, thinks being a mum is ‘the best thing ever’ and is just generally happy to be here. Recounts the story of her three-day-shit-show-of-a-birth (complete with forceps, episiotomy and a postpartum haemorrhage) with a beaming smile on her face (‘well technically I nearly died, but apart from that it was totally fine!’). Doesn’t drink, never swears and, most alarmingly, seems to genuinely like her husband.
The Mum That Is Always Late
The baby did a poonami just before she left, the sat nav took her to the wrong postcode, and the health visitor turned up unannounced. Late Mum rocks up five minutes before you’re all about to leave – stressed up to the eyeballs, looking like she’s been dragged through a hedge backwards – with dramatic tales of woe.