How is it that San Francisco is not represented, in and of itself?

[Dr Bee]

Hi Beloved All,

I am new to mothering.com. Thanks for making such a great site available and thriving!

I am wondering why San Francisco does not have its own go to spot in this forum.

How is it that California and Nevada are lumped together?

California is the eighth largest economy in the world, with a GDP of +/- 2 trillion dollars—I'm quite sure SF is a significant part of that.

Perhaps I don't know where to look?

Please advise.

I would be happy to create a subdivision in this forum, should it be possible, and should anyone else express interest in having that happen.

Best,

Rebecca, nom de plume Dr. Bee

co-author: Alphabet Living

http://www.alphabetliving.com

where A is for Authentic, B is for Beauty, & C is for Courage!

Inspiring Heart & Meaning Since Now!

[lauren]

You may want to search for a thread of San Francisco mamas. I bet there is one.
 

Also please see our advertising policy.

[lauren]

Here it is:

http://www.mothering.com/community/a/advertise-at-mothering
 

[Dr Bee]

Dear Lauren,

Thank you so much! I appreciate the feedback. It certainly wasn't my intention to break any rules. I would be happy to pay for the advertising signature, and will do so. 

Best,

Rebecca

[Pookietooth]

There really arent that many MDC mamas in San Francisco; way more in Portland! In my experience, anyway, the Bay Area is way spread out, and many of the moms are working moms (many around here consider 40 hours per week part time) who don't think that they have time for attachment parenting or online forums. At least, after a bit over 9 years, I have yet to see much of a presence here.

Edited by Pookietooth - 9/19/12 at 11:31am

[Dr Bee]

Thanks for your response. I thought it strange. I guess, unfortunately, that makes sense.

Best,

Rebecca

[lauren]

Originally Posted by Pookietooth 

There really arent that many MDC mamas in San Francisco; way more in Portland! In my experience, anyway, the Bay Area is way spread out, and many of the moms are working moms who don't have time for attachment parenting or online forums. At least, after a bit over 9 years, I have yet to see much of a presence here.

Pookietooth, I'm sure you didn't mean it how it sounded, but it is a bit of a stereotype to say that working moms don't have time for attachment parenting (or online forums). Many of the moms I know who are working moms (including myself) are solid AP moms.

[Viola]

There has always been a lot of talk about why things are divided as they are.  As a northern Nevadan, it makes sense to me to be lumped in with the Northern Californians. The No NV area is so small we really don't need a forum alone, but parts of rural Northering California have Reno as their metropolitcan area.  It might work better to have So CA and So NV together and keep them separate from NoCA and NoNV, but really, we can all fit together in one forum.  The more rural westerly and northerly parts of Nevada might be more at home with Idaho or Utah, but I honestly don't know how many people there are in those parts of Nevada.  

I know people in other state groupings find theirs not to their liking either.  I'm originally from northern Virginia, so I tend to think of Virginia, Maryland and DC as one big metropolitan area, but Virginia is in with West Virginia and Kentucky.  I've visited parts of Virginia that are close to North Carolina and Tennessee, and have cross traffic back and forth, but Kentucky was just never on my radar, I've never been there.  There were people at my last job in Virginia who actually commuted from West Virginia, which just seemed crazy to me.  But West Virginia was more affordable.

Anyway, you just kind of get use to it, but I admit there is a lot of California traffic here. :)

[Pookietooth]

I wasn't saying that working negates Attachment parenting, or even that staying home allows for it (since there are plenty of stay at home moms that don't follow AP principles at all), just that at least around here, the working moms I have known (pre-kids) told me that breastfeeding, co-sleeping, bonding with baby etc. were too time-consuming and demanding to allow for the kind of working that is expected for many careers, including high tech, financial, legal, and academia. There is a real workaholic culture in these fields, at least around here (and probably elsewhere too). When I was working full time, most of the moms I knew didn't have a thing positive to say about attachment parenting, and the CIO, etc. methods were pretty common. One workplace had a lactation room, but I never saw it used. Perhaps its more a perception that attachment parenting is somehow trying to put women back in their place that makes working moms, especially feminist ones, reject it. Not that I agree with that idea but I think it is common. One of the only two moms who brought her baby to work was the wife of the founder/CEO of the company I worked for, who was the bookkeeper and didn't work the usual crazy hours that the other executives did. I also worked with another mom who mostly worked from home, bringing her baby with her, but her baby was so mellow she could just leave him in his carseat and he would sit and smile through a meeting, no problem. But otherwise, we never saw children in my work place, and moms generally kept their kids in daycare for long hours. When you work 10+ hours a day on average, it's kind of hard to take time to parent and still use online forums.

Back to the topic of why California doesn't have its own forum, I would think that no/so is a better division since the geographic difference is pretty huge, but again there really aren't that many different threads on a regular basis. But still, the way Portland/OR mamas massively outnumber Seattle/WA mamas is way more of an issue, and those two areas still manage to share a forum (though who knows whether separating them would be better or worse).

Edited by Pookietooth - 10/16/12 at 4:38pm

[trekkingirl]

I am a bay area APish mom! And, wait for it...................I work two jobs!

Seems to me that if any SFers are interested, why not create a SF Bay Area Group in the groups section of MDC??????/

[Melaniee]

I haven't seen much of a presence here, either, but it doesn't mean they're aren't plenty that I have run into, IRL. At one point there was  thread talking about play dates. However my kids are, sniff sniff, kind of beyond that now.

Good Luck to you!

PS - I like the grouping the way it is. ;)

[rightkindofme]

We probably don't get our own area because we aren't special snowflakes and this is an international board. We speak up when we want to find one another in a system that already works.