Letters to the Editor
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yes, I needed professional help to breastfeed.
I do not know what would have happened before the bottle and/or lactation consultants were invented, but thankfully for my beautiful baby, I live in a world where my $110 bought me the ability to feed my baby. It may be "the most natural thing in the world" but it did not come easily to me or my son. I feel lucky that I don't need to find out what would have happened. Thanks for being snide, though. I'm sure you've never needed help with anything.
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Question for tom payne...
>There was one particularly offensive bear, which we referred to as the pedophile panda, that was seriously creepy.<
Oh, I'm dying to know--what was the deal with this bear? Did it say weird stuff or was it dressed in a raincoat or...? Yeesh. Strange.
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Shoot, my grandmother was ahead of her time...:)
>The fact is that they may even have gotten more from "Days of Our Lives" than they would from Baby Einstein, because it was actual human faces emoting, as opposed to these random blaring images.<
My grandmother was a hard-core DOOL fan and she took care of me when my moms had to go back to work. I practically grew up on this soap and for a while there could discuss the characters and plots with a critic's expertise. It's probably the reason I'm so good at analyzing bad TV...:).
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deering
The bear itself, physically, was innocuous enough. But it had a repertoire of creepy "I like you, do you like me" remarks in a tone of voice that made you anticipate the next question: "would you like to see the back of my van?" It just weirded us all out, so we "lost" the nine volt. Now, it's just a stuffed bear. It wasn't just me; all the adults felt that way.
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Was it Teddy Ruxpin?
We took a hammer to the voicebox of the thing. It always had that Chuckie vibe to it.
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pedophile panda
I honestly don't know the brand of the bear; my wife's mom bought it for one of our granddaughters. It did have kind of a Chuckie vibe. It's mute now, and it's gonna stay that way.
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@CarolH
Not wanting to pile on you specifically, but you expressed (no pun intended!) a sentiment that many share: that since breast feeding is "natural" lactation consultants are a superfluous affectation of the well-off (you didn't say that exactly, I know).
The human species has gotten this far because the majority of women throughout history lived in communal/village circumstances where experienced elder-women taught and supported them: mothers, grandmothers, aunts etc. The chances of successful nursing for women with no such support were grim, and of course, many babies did not survive for this reason. Often, if a mother couldn't nurse her infant for whatever reason, another women in her family who had recently given birth would step in. My grandmother didn't produce enough milk, so my father was nursed by his aunt. And women who were well-off had wet-nurses to do their nursing for them.
Breast feeding may indeed be "natural," but it is still largely a "learned" skill, both for infant and mother. Lucky that human beings are social animals whose survival depends on sharing information and learning from others. In the modern world absence of the extended family, tribe, or village, we hire.
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Hello Ms. Pot...
Does anyone else find it ironic that an article about buying things we don't need was basically an ad for a book we don't need? It even included a link to Amazon?!?
And to all the "I grew up just fine without..." letters, billions of people also grew up fine without seat belts, car seats, and lead-free paint, do you have the same ire for these scourges on society?
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What surprises me
is that anyone has to pay for lactation consultants. When I gave birth--90, 93, and 97--our hospital(s) had lactation nurses on staff who were assigned to individual moms. I think in each case they volunteered to make free home visits if I needed, and come to think of it, there were follow-up groups specifically to discuss, encourage breastfeeding. Not to mention, what ever happened to La Leche League? That's free, isn't it? Just asking.
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ParkSlopePop
And to all the "I grew up just fine without..." letters, billions of people also grew up fine without seat belts, car seats, and lead-free paint, do you have the same ire for these scourges on society?
Do you really put $800 strollers and Baby Einstein into the same category as seat belts, car seats and lead free paint?
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About fooling the people
I think the 'parenting industry' has well learnt its lesson from the saying: "You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time - but you can't fool all the people all the time".
The underlying message is that you don't really need to fool all the people all the time! Just those that you can fool whenever are quite enough to get you all the big bucks that you'll ever want. In the political arena, GW Bush has done it all too successfully for many, many, MANY years!
GSC
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What's worked (so far) for us
Boo turns 1 tomorrow. Looking back, we probably went overboard with our 400 euro stoller-system (frame, bassinet, car seat, older seat). We thought we would use it until Boo turned 3, or with a second child. At chrismas we bought a 80 euro ultralight Maclaren stoller and haven't looked back.
I'm grateful to live in France where I did need the help of the postpartum doula on breastfeeding. I'm pretty sure I would have given up if she hadn't come a couple of times those first two weeks.
We didn't baby-proof our house. At all. And it's a small open space. I defiantly refused to give into the "wall of death" and all the fear, guilt, etc. that implies. My husband and I both work, me four days a week, so we're only home half the time. I just keep a close eye and try to (slowly) teach Boo the things that are off-limits and block access to areas of the house, like the bathroom, that would be troublesome.
We don't watch TV with Boo except the occasional weekend afternoon rugby match. I'm generally against it -- it was important to me in choosing his nanny that she didn't plop them in front of the TV during the day. If I need that shower, I let Boo play with a couple of toys in his bed.
I do buy things for Boo that are for me, like the retro avocodo-green plastic chair that I spent 100 euros on because it was exactly the same as I had as a child at my grandparents'. I probably buy clothes that are too expensive.
Hey, I'm winging it just like everybody else and have my good baby-consumer moments and bad.