Building a Fire Wife Community

If there's anything I've learned online, it's that other firewives crave a community as much as I do. We're up odd hours, we work odd hours and everything about our lives is just odd to “normal” folk.

I know I've been lucky in the fact that I have an amazing group of friends in our dept. Believe me, I do treasure it. I've talked to so many of you that don't have other local wives to walk to. It's a big piece of a sanity puzzle for me.

I remember the volunteer years when the wives barely looked at each other during annual events. A lot of the wives didn't even know names of anyone else in the dept. I was so engrossed in raising little one's and just surviving being a volunteer wife, that I didn't put myself out there either. I was fully into his life as a firefighter even then and I knew the names of those he worked with even if I didn't know faces, but wives, not a one until right before our dept went paid. If I could do the volunteer years over I'd change so many things. I'd absolutely reach out and force us to get together with other couples. Hindsight's pretty easy to look through isn't it?

I'm excited at how fast this site is growing. I bought the domain and created the facebook group at 9:57pm PST on August 10. We immediately had some chatter. The next day it blew up right away with familiar faces and the group is growing steadily.

Keeping in Touch

I kept in touch with a few of the ladies I'd met from the old site. They were on my fb wall but we really didn't talk about anything fire related. Just regular stuff like football rivalries lol

Once the group got going and people were inviting their friends it really started hitting me. Just how many gals I'd lost contact with and how fun it was to chat all hours of the day and night. In fact I was spending WAY too much time chatting because I'd missed it so much. I'm still waiting to find the balance and am spending too much time in the group.

Here the community grows

Not only did the ladies love getting back in touch with “old” friends through the group, but they were quick to want to post here as well. I LOVE IT!

I love how there will be more than just my voice for you to listen to. I love that there will be other views and opinions for how to deal with situations. I love that there will be different life experiences for you to read. I'm a firm believer in it taking a village and that doesn't just have to do with raising kids. We learn and grow by surrounding ourselves with a supportive community and I'm excited to see it happening here from the very start.

I challenge you to work on building a local firewife community. Put yourself out there next time at the station or department event. Talk to that other gal that looks uncomfortable. You just might be missing out on the friendship and camaraderie you were craving and that perfect girlfriend to have dinner dates with on shift nights!

Our Wife Behind the Fire facebook group is always here for you to join. We are a wives only group. Yes, I know that's odd…odd cool lol

Do you hang with a firewife locally?