Children at recovery meetings. What's your opinion?

We know a couple who has been bringing their 1 year old to every damn meeting since he was 3 weeks old. It is now extremely distracting but no one will say anything to them. How would you handle this, especially when you like the parents but at this point want to strangle them.

that person should explain to them that the child is distracting and it would be more appropriate for them to not bring it with them. If it is a group that has no "formal" leadership, perhaps researching some potential child care options for the time period in question and providing that with an honest statement that "hey, your kid is cute (or whatever) but we are having some difficulties with the work that we are here to do. Could you please try one of these options so we can all concentrate on what we are doing?"

Trust me, I think half the group is wallowing in a nice comfortable resentment. LOL.

Well, older, but still a kid getting dragged along to a parent's meetings, I heard a lot of shit a kid really doesn't need to hear. My mother had some sort of goofy "scared straight" idea that hearing about people's low bottoms would keep me away from that sort of thing, as if seeing the fruits of her addiction wasn't enough... :eyes:

Adults need that space to talk about their addiction, that talk is naturally going to enter a lot of territory that isn't really appropriate for younger ears. They need to make other arrangements for the kid before the kid is old enough to understand much of anything, and sooner if the child's presence is disruptive.

I was just wondering yesterday why one rarely/never sees meetings with a childcare option. I used to earn extra money by handling childcare for the local H&I/PI training, but I don't recall ever hearing of a regular meeting that a volunteer or paid childcare option. I'm sure that's a major obstacle to participation for a lot of people.

especially since this child's attendance has opened the door to other people bringing their kids to meetings. Sometimes we have 3 crying children at a meeting.

or the families that need childcare could work out some sort of cooperative arrangement and take turns. Personally I'd suggest the former, less liability if the group just hired from a service or whatever for that time period- that way they'd be background checked, up on their shots, etc.

IMHO

Oh, wait. That's not what you meant?

:D

In all seriousness, I brought my kids every now and then when I had no choice.

It annoyed me, so I could imagine how it annoyed others. So I stopped.

RL

And he smokes like a chimney.

But on the plus side, he's not out there doing lines of powdered Enfamil with the other babies.

Not that, but he does like to unbutton his mom's shirt at the meeting. Talk about losing focus at what's being said when everyone in the room is staring at mom's chest.

and when they're older they inhibit the conversation- or else they hear too much.

I think it's great if they understand that Mom or Dad are getting help for a problem, but I don't think they're ready for all the details.

Live and let live.

Until you can't hear the speaker

I go to a rough first step hall, where the kids behave better than adults at times. We request that the children be supervised. What I see, if a child is being noisy, is kind of a tag team event of helping the (usually) single mom out. Of course, we also get women from Peri-natal treatment center with limited choice in meetings. I do know of a group that doesn't want kids, and has a volunteer to assist the person to find another meeting. I don't go to that one.

I'd give them a list of meetings with childcare in this case though

:shrug:

then no prob.

do some discernment of the group conscience about issues. Not this one specifically, but about people consistently coming late, cross-talk, that sort of thing. We just took some time at a meeting, and talked about the issue. Of course, the problem is that you'd have to talk about this in front of the kid's parent(s) and the kid him/herself. You can gently raise the issue, but it's a good idea to know you have an ally or two beforehand.

You can remind the parent that "group well-being comes first" or whatever similar saying you have in your program.

Not much help, I suppose, but my experience. Good luck!

We may need to have a consciousness meeting

:rofl:

However, I would think that would be a big, fat NO. On many levels.