Back in 2009, when I was the mother of a chubby one year old, I went away on my first ever ‘girl’s trip’. I’d love to say that after two blissful days in the Tudor town of Shrewsbury, I made these weekends away sans children and better half an annual fixture on my calendar. Sadly, it took me eight years before I planned my next weekend away with friends. I have just returned from Goa, where I spent three blissful days giggling, eating and attempting to dance to techno music. While the first two were an unabashed success, the third was not. The less said about it the better.
Here is my fool proof mother’s guide to planning a trip away with friends. Make plans and finalise them before someone (YOU) changes their mind Before this trip, I was one of those mothers who spoke wistfully about taking a trip with friends. We would be the female, older, non-botoxed version of Dil Chahta Hai.
I constantly see parents (especially mothers) tagging their friends on Facebook posts called ’10 places to visit with your girlfriends’ and saying ‘one day’. It can be hard to coordinate work and school calendars, but it’s not impossible (it’s easier to coordinate this with smaller groups, so don’t try and do this with your 100+ member Keto Diet WhatsApp group.) Once everyone says yes, just book the tickets and accommodation before anyone thinks of an excuse (‘It’s Chotu’s jal tarang concert that weekend’) to back out.
Prepare the children
Tell them where you’re going, for how long and where to find the milk. Then put one earplugs and stare at the wall so you can’t hear them whining or see their tears. My six year old was outraged that I would not be there to help with homework over the weekend. Even after convincing him that his father was capable of performing single digit addition.
Have a cheat sheet of answers ready
Brace yourselves for questions from everyone. Your ironing lady, the cook, the bus stop mom who thinks she’s Mother Teresa incarnate. ‘Who will look after the children?’ ‘Oh they’ll be fine on their own. That year they were lost in the Atacama desert really taught them to fend for themselves.’ I just have one request: Please DO NOT describe their other parent looking after them babysitting. Unless you plan to come back from your trip and pay your partner an hourly fee plus tips, it’s not babysitting. It’s being a parent.
Lay ground rules
No talking about children, International Junior Squash rankings, the best online classes for math, IB versus IGCSE. Yes talking about art, philosophy, books and which Ryan in Hollywood has better abs.
Have fun!
Once you have pre-packed three days of outfits, underwear and socks for your children (please draw the line here and do not do it for the other adult in the house), watered the plants, ordered groceries online, run the washing machine enough times so that no one will put the red socks with your whites, written down the number of all your friends, their parents and the Centre for Venomous Snake Bites, pre-packed their snack boxes and left cute adorable messages for your kids in their snack boxes, LEAVE. And have fun.
Menaka Raman
Twitter@menakaraman
The writer’s philosophy is: if there’s no blood, don’t call me