Ramble Ramble

Perpetua over at Our Lady of Perpetual Breadcrumbs has started a weekly “thing” called ControverSunday, wherein those of us who are interested can all talk about controversial things–we’re starting with parenting stuff for the time being, but may branch out into other topics. This is my attempt at sounding even 1/2 as intelligent as the ladies over there.

This week’s topic is on television. Which, as luck would have it, is on my mind a lot lately. See, a few weeks ago, someone we know mentioned that they had read that exposing infants to television could lean to brain damage. Any kind of television, any kind of exposure.  Something about their brains not being able to process the speed at which the images move, or something like that. I’ve heard a lot of theories about television and kids, but actual brain damage was research I hadn’t heard about. And if so, Jackson is pretty much screwed.

At 5 months old, Jackson loves to watch TV*. He will stare at the TV, pretty much no matter what is on–sports, cartoons, Lost, you name it. But we don’t put TV on for him. There are no Baby Einstein videos, no PBS, no Nickelodeon. He watches what we watch–because he is where we are, and we like to watch tv.

I’ve mentioned before that I am a TV junkie. Well, having a baby didn’t change that. When he was a newborn, and eating every two hours for 30-45 minutes at a time, TV was a way to help keep me entertained and/or awake. While I was on maternity leave, it was a companion to help keep me from feeling isolated from the rest of the world. As he’s gotten older, we watch TV while he plays on his mat, or in his chair. And while I’ve begun to limit when we watch certain things, it’s usually more due to the loud/explosion-y nature or the “Mommy and Daddy need to concentrate to understand what’s going on” (hello, Lost) syndrome, than to any thought that we’re corrupting the kid, or harming his little brain.

Now, let me clarify here, just for my own sake. Despite what it sounds like in this post, the TV isn’t constantly on around the kid. Often, it doesn’t come on until after he’s in bed (see the aforementioned Lost reference). It’s rarely on during the day when he’s with his dad. And he doesn’t always care when it is on, as he’s too busy being tickled, or playing with his music box, or watching the cat or trying to eat his feet.

But, when it is on, I really and truly don’t think that the 2-3 minutes here and 5 minutes there of TV that Jackson sees is damaging. I pretty much think he likes the colors, light and movement–which, really, doesn’t seem that much different than a LOT of the baby toys I’ve seen. We don’t turn on the tv as the babysitter while we do stuff at this stage, but honestly I don’t think there’s any harm in Baby Einstein** when he’s a little older so dinner can get made or laundry done.

As the kid gets older, I fully anticipate that my thoughts on television usage will adapt and change. But in a generic, overall kind of sense, I don’t think that TV is inherently dangerous or bad. I think, like with most things relating to kids, it really kind of depends on how you use it, what kind of kid you have, and how you monitor it. But I reserve the right to change my opinion completely if the kid someday wants to watch Barney.

 *To be fair, the kid also loves to stare at my iPhone screen, the computer screen, the laptop screen, and just about anything with light and color. So, you know, there’s that.

**For the record, I don’t think Baby Einstein has any genius making properties. However, I think it’s age appropriate and visually interesting to babies. So while I think the claims to intelligence are bullshit, I think they’re fine for what they actually are–entertainment.

There is a moment, every morning, that lifts my spirits and sustains me through much of the rough day ahead. It’s a moment that is all mine, a connection between Jackson and me that is just mom and baby with no outside world to encroach on us.

In the morning when the kid wakes up, N.C. brings him to me so I can nurse. He’s often frantic for food–ravenous after sleep, he grunts and squeals and pulls at me until he is actually eating, when he continues grunting and slurping and gulping. I call him my little piggy pig, he sounds as if he’s never eaten before in his life. Finally, when the edge of hunger has been dulled, he moves to a more…reasonable form of eating. Slower. Calmer. Quieter. He slows down and enjoys his breakfast, and being awake, and being near us. He eats and looks around and plays with his feet and is a happy, calm baby.

Sometime during this time, this calm and enjoyable eating, my little boy will look at me, take a pause, lock eyes with mine, and smile. Directly at me. A little, sly smile, like “Hey, I know YOU.” It’s an instant, a few seconds in a long day of hours and minutes that wear me down. It’s over before it could be recorded or memorialized. He smiles, and then he’s back to the task at hand, eating and grabbing his feet and getting distracted by everything around him. It’s a moment that could be missed or glossed over, but one that I savor and enjoy.

I already love being his mom more than I could have ever imagined, and I always knew that I would. But I didn’t know that he would help get me through the rough stuff. I didn’t know that my soul would be healed by a few seconds of a baby’s smile. I didn’t know that in a mere moment, he could sustain me.

The beginning of the end from Ginger @ RambleRamble on Vimeo.

P.S. Ignore my scary laugh–who knew I sounded like that?

I’m completely done with today.Work is officially trying to kill me. I’m trying to launch 4 websites by the end of this month, completely overhauling one e-commerce shopping cart, updating our database, planning our big conference for February, running a contest, getting 3 catalogs created and oh yeah, all the day to day crap that apparently no one else can do. I’m toast, and thus, you get blogging by bullet point.

• I feel like I’m the only blogger on the internet who doesn’t consider herself a writer. I mean, I write (obviously) but I have no great drive to write the next great American novel. I’d rather read it. Honestly, I’m sure those of you who ARE writers come to this site and feel assaulted by the over (and incorrect) usage of hypens, em dashes, ellipses, and commas. I’m sorry–I tend to write the way the voice in my head sounds–but since I have no inclination to be a Writer with a capital W, that’s how I roll.
• There are a lot of blog posts about privacy, and boundaries and such rolling through my reader. It seems like this comes up en masse every few months. It always makes me think, but I’m pretty happy with where my own privacy boundaries have been drawn. Do I sometimes wish I could unload my deepest darkest thoughts for the cathartic release that might provide? Yes, of course. But I’m pretty much a peace keeper in real life, so I would never want to put something on the internet that might result in upset or angry confrontation in person. But DAMN would I like to sometimes.
• To that same end, password protected posts irritate the hell out of me. Honestly, I get the purpose, but every time I see one I always just think “Why even bother to press publish?” I get writing it–you should see my drafts folder full of things I want to get off my chest–but why publish if you’re not going to make it available to everyone? It also has that whiff of clique-ness, like hey this is only for my REAL internet friends, not the rest of you. It doesn’t bother me enough to stop reading someone, but it does bother me.
• I’m full on bombarded by mommy guilt this week (which has a lot to do with the work situation I know). I kind of feel like I’m not making any of the right decisions, or that I’m making them for selfish reasons, or that I’m not in-tune enough with the kid. All of which is crap, I know in my logical mind. But shit if it’s not killing me anyway.
• Why have we made some of the “simple” things in our kid’s lives–like eating and sleeping and playing–so damn complicated? Everything must be researched, and weighed, and what is so and so doing, and is this ok, and shit if I do this will he grow up smart, and ARGHHH I’m going to permanently damage my child if I do/don’t do X. I’m totally guilty of it myself, of course, I just don’t know WHY we make it so hard. I have to tell myself to shut off my brain after a certain point, and just do what feels right for my kid, in this instance, with the knowledge that I have and what I believe.  I just wish I didn’t have to tell myself that, I wish I just did it.

And to round out this blog post, YAY, a baby photo!

Being a mom has led to some pretty strange situations already, and I’m only 4 months into this gig. I seriously have found myself in situations, and doing things that I could never even have fathomed 4 months ago. Let me share a few:

• Spending up to 1 1/2 hours a day with my boobs exposed at work (yay pumping!) (and, um hi random Google searches!)
• Examining a dirty diaper intently to determine color and consistency
• Sitting on the floor of a Von’s bathroom, with my sweater under the baby as some sort of barrier/padding as I change his diaper
• Breast feeding in a Melrose Winchell’s Donuts at 10pm on a Friday night
• Pumping in the backseat of the car on the freeway (I’m sure the truckers got a kick out of that one)
• Breast feeding in a dressing room while my husband tries on clothes. I’m still wondering what the employees at that store thought of us.
• Changing the baby in his carseat because there was no where else to put him

It’s been an interesting four months, to say the least. I wonder what this list will look like in a year?

As always, more lists can be found over at Anna’s at abdpbt!