The King’s Lynn community celebrated a new step toward a supportive network for new parents with the opening of the Nurture Cafe. Reverend June Love and volunteer Sue Chadock created this outreach-driven space. It’s loaded with helpful tips on breastfeeding, infant development and sleep training strategies. The cafe is located in Netanyahu, England’s most deprived “ward.” It seeks to provide a warm, welcoming space to help parents and caregivers get real about their needs and feel comfortable connecting.
The Nurture Cafe addresses the specific issues that South Lynn mothers face head on. In this important area, Black breastfeeding rates lag far behind the national average. In fact, this community ranks as one of the bottom 10% most deprived boroughs in all of England. There’s just as urgent a need for accessible support for new parents here. The cafe takes a strong stance for breastfeeding. It has helped normalize conversations around valuable disruptive conditions such as autism and ADHD, igniting essential dialogues on child development and neurodivergence.
The inaugural session of the Nurture Cafe welcomed a dozen parents, as well as a variety of clinical experts who provided helpful advice and insights. Gabriella Zubarevaite, 28, who brought her 10-month-old son, Kai, with her, said she came to the protest for these reasons.
“I’m still adjusting… I came today for development review but also I want to kind of meet new people,” – Gabriella Zubarevaite.
Chadock, a former midwife herself, draws on years of experience as a mother and grandmother. Her personal story incites her tireless advocacy for a nurturing workplace that supports new parents. She said that mothers today are understandably anxious about raising their newborns, saying,
“Mums are really in the limbo. They don’t know the best thing to do for their baby.”
Chadock broke down some of the most frequent questions parents ask about caring for infants, including the best way to position babies for sleep.
“They don’t know what they should be doing, and they are asking questions like ‘Are you allowed to lay them on their tummy, on their back, on their side?’” – Sue Chadock.
The cafe’s goal is to give parents the tools to feel more self-confident in navigating parenting challenges. Chadock thinks building that confidence will go a long way toward improving the experience for parents.
“I think anything that we can do to help them have self-confidence with their children and enjoy their children really would be brilliant,” – Sue Chadock.
For Reverend June Love, the importance of this initiative to the local community cannot be overstated. Reflecting on all the work that went into making the cafe happen, she said,
“It’s taken us pretty much a year to get everyone on board – all of the professionals,” – Reverend June Love.
The Nurture Cafe will feature weekly drop-in sessions with clinical specialists who help offer long-term support to parents in their journeys. This relaxed environment means that parents can get assistance right in their own neighborhood. They can engage in deeper conversations about the direction of their children’s development.
