Local Ambassadors.
Do you want to raise awareness of the support MAHM offers to mums in your local area?
We want to ensure no one feels alone in their motherhood journey – but we need your help!
Could you do one or more of the below? If the answer is yes, we’d love to hear from you!
Distribute MAHM flyers and posters to your local library, family hub, health visitors, churches, community centres and noticeboards
Be the local point of contact for mothers who want to meet others and find support and friendship
Help to organise meet-ups with local mums if there is a need in your area
Contact local media and radio stations to help spread the campaign aims of MAHM
Attend relevant conferences and meetings, ask questions on behalf of MAHM and feedback to the committee on the content (expenses covered)
Help us on social media by sharing, liking and engaging with our posts
As a local ambassador we will provide you with:
A MAHM tote bag
Pack of MAHM flyers and posters
Be part of a WhatsApp group of other local ambassadors for support and sharing ideas
Ideas for what you can do in your area to fly the flag for MAHM
Template emails for contacting libraries etc
“I am thankful that MAHM is helping to raise the profile of motherhood. I am thankful that MAHM lobbies and campaigns to this end. I want to play my part!”
Many of our local ambassadors also lead local support groups, but this is an optional part of the role. Each group has a life of its own, responding to the needs of the local members. Some groups meet regularly on Zoom, some meet for playdates at the park, for a walk in the woods, or meet at a pub in the evening for some child-free chat! Many of our groups catch up between meet-ups by using WhatsApp or Facebook groups.
Anyone is welcome to join our groups, you don’t necessarily have to be a stay-at-home mum. If you’re passionate about caring for your children and share the Mothers at Home Matter values and ethos, please do come and join one of our groups! You also don’t have to be a MAHM member although we think there are lots of perks for this and it’s only £12.50 a year! Read more about that here.
Click on the link below to find your nearest ambassador and contact them to see if there’s a group you can join.
If there’s no ambassador in your local area and you’re interested in taking on that role please do get in touch with Becca on groups@mothersathomematter.com as we’d love to hear from you.
It doesn’t matter if you’ve never done anything like this before, or even if your children are now grown up. We will support you in this vital role of spreading the news about MAHM and the support we offer.
Meet Stella, Local Ambassador.
Stella, Local Ambassador for Chelmsford
Stella, MAHM member and grandmother, explains why she wanted to support MAHM by being a local ambassador.
My name is Stella Tidman and I have recently become a local ambassador for MAHM in Chelmsford. This is a little about myself, and why I decided to volunteer.
I am a mother of 2, grandmother of 7, and great-grandmother of 1. I retired as a Practice Nurse in early 2023. I was a stay-at-home mum until my youngest was 5, when I returned to work part-time.
While I was a mother at home (mid to late 1980's) I thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience. Back then it was rare for anyone with under 5s to work outside the home at all, and not very common with children under senior school age. I loved my full time mum years, it was a very happy and fulfilling time. I had lots of friends who I met around and about, at mother and toddlers groups, church and among family. There were lots of other mums about at parks and during walks, swimming classes etc, and it seemed quite easy to meet up and make friends for play dates and coffees. I never had to justify my existence, and I was never asked when I was planning to return to work!
From 2013 I committed to 2-3 days a week grandchild care. My daughter-in-law desperately wanted to be a stay-at-home mum from the outset, but financially this was impossible initially and she worked 2 days a week, with childcare shared between me and the other grandparents. The thought of using nurseries was instinctively horrifying to all of us for a child of only one, and later a sister too. When maternity leave finished, using grandparents made the wrench of leaving them just about bearable though still hard. (She finally managed to get her wish to be a full-time mum when baby number 3 came along.) As a grandparent of course, there were no funds available to help... only funds for "professional" childcare, which is one of the anomalies MAHM campaigns on.
I fully expected my "grandma years" to be as enjoyable as my mum years. However, sadly it was not so simple. I had found that the social landscape in the intervening years had changed beyond recognition, and not for the better sadly. I could find no "mum and toddler" groups which were not full of childminders. When I went out to the park or shopping, there were very few other mums about who were free to stop and chat. At the same time, I did hear from mums that I met that they were going back to work not for financial reasons, but out of loneliness, when other mums they knew came to the end of maternity leave. I found this terribly sad. When I took my grandchild one day for a check-up appointment, on looking at the waiting room notice board, I saw nothing advertised apart from CV writing advice and nursery adverts. The message everywhere seemed to be that working is worthwhile, while being a mother is an interruptive phase to be over as soon as possible.
In my job as a Practice Nurse, which involved administering child vaccinations, I was regularly meeting women who were dreading the end of their maternity leave, and very unhappy about using nurseries but who felt there was no choice. The expectation, by employers and often partners, was that getting back to work ASAP was normal.
But to many mums I met it felt anything but normal, and I know that at the same stage in my life I would have hated the thought of it too. I had heard a few years previously of MAHM from a relative and had even attended a conference once, but it has only been since retiring that I have been able to get involved.
I would love women everywhere to enjoy motherhood as much as I did. I believe (and evidence is available) that children thrive best when with their mothers, and this bond is mutually beneficial and necessary.
I want to enable mums to enjoy being mums, and for their children to benefit from the close and natural bond that until very recently in our history, was not questioned as being necessary and normal. I want young children being cared for by their own mothers to once again be considered normal. For those who are doing so, I want to see a supportive community.