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You've got questions, she's got answers. Be among the first to read Elise Mac Adam's new etiquette guide.
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So the American Academy of Pediatrics revised its sleep recommendations, which it hadn't done in about five years, and has managed to anger everyone with its rather bland and not-remotely-shocking protocol.
Why is this report surprising? Since 1999, Pampers diapers have had "Back to Sleep" written across them. All over the New York City public transit system one can see public service ads about a number of child-related issues. (This campaign, called "Take Good Care of Your Baby" has a list of PSA issues that includes a host of topics including but not limited to: "It's Safest for Baby to Sleep Alone" "Child Proof Your Home" "Water Safety," "Window Guards Save Lives!," "Don't Shake Your Baby," "Don't Leave Children Alone," and "Get Help for Drug and Alcohol Abuse") Now, I realize that many people don't use or read disposable diapers, and that in many cities public service advertisements on mass transit are useless, but I also got stacks of pamphlets about these issues when I left the hospital and when I got Felix's birth certificate in the mail. There was no escaping these suggestions.
Of course, deciding to follow them, or being able to follow them is another story entirely, and it is astonishing how persecuted so many people feel at the hands of the AAP. SIDS is frightening, and I've written here about how often I check on Felix in the night, but I tend to look on these things the way I have always regarded the food pyramid, instructions on condom packages, gym recommendations, and pregnancy warnings. They are guidelines, not rules, thank God.
But some people claim to have been "sickened" by the press release, feel victimized and furious. . . and all of a sudden, a MOVEMENT is born. I have no patience for the over-politicization of parenting choices, which seem to me to be quite private matters and yet, people go around online and on the street proclaiming themselves with strings of bumper-sticker announcements:
Anti-Vaccination
Co-Sleeping or Nothing
No Cheerios
Anti-Circumcision
No Branded Toys
Organic Only
Not In My Bed
Attachment Or Else
No Rayon
TV Never
Pro-Breastfeeding
No Spiders
Mostly Mozart
What is the point of so rigidly defining oneself? If it is helpful or comforting to shout one's tendencies from the rafters, you'd never guess because the proclaimers get so incensed when forced to even imagine someone questioning their choices or doing something other than what they would choose.
Then again, I feel oppressed by the weather, by the way of the world, by bad technology, occasionally by my mind. I don't need to any help in the beleaguered department. When I was pregnant, I tended to keep my mouth shut. I didn't care to be questioned about things like coffee drinking and sushi-eating. With Felix, I feel the same way. I have no interest in making his life political, and while I'm often self-conscious (as when I took him out to a late dinner last Saturday) I would rather think that I'm just a citizen, not a poster girl for parenting or anything else.
Or is the real problem for people not the prospect of the tyrannizing "recommendations" but the possibility that no one cares what they do in the first place?
posted by Elise at 2:57 PM
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