Dr. Mr. Reiser,
I have been a fan of your show since the first episode.  Last night was
the last episode I will ever watch.  I understand creatively what you
were trying to do.  I believe your concept to stay focused on the couple
instead of the baby is a good one.  However choosing child abuse as a
vehicle for humor sickened me.

I believe you could have taken your concept of no commercial, huge
parenting issue, one shot camera and picked something less polarizing.
You could have picked the first time Jamie and Paul went out and left
Mabel with a sitter and a bottle of expressed breast milk.  It could
have been shot in the elevator with them arguing about whether to leave
or not leave, have Jamie's breast's start leaking, have the elevator get
stuck so their night out is spent in the elevator instead of a
restaurant.  Anything other than abuse Mabel.

If you had bothered to read the clinical research on the topic of infant
sleeping you would have seen that there is much scientific research to
support meeting the emotional needs of a baby in the night.  I know you
have a child.  I think it is a girl but I am not sure.  If tonight you
and your wife heard her screaming in terror at the top of her lungs what
would your response be?  Would you let her cry it out?  All children of
all ages need their nighttime issues met.  Fear, over heating, thirst,
hunger, teething pains, loneliness.  I am always amazed the the biggest
bravest most mature people in the family sleep in pairs and force the
youngest most vulnerable both physically and emotionally to sleep alone.
Why is that?  Do you sleep alone Mr. Reiser?  You certainly seem to be a
big brave man to me.  Why do you sleep with another adult? You could
have sex and then move to your separate beds.

I am not alone in my abject horror of what happened last night on the
show.  Many parenting list serves on the internet are buzzing with this
topic.  Please know that you are losing many viewers.  We just don't
know what harm you will inflict on Mabel next.  Throw her in the kitchen
and tell her to fix her own food?  When she has teething pains, tell her
to buck up?  You can't "turn back the clock".  The show is done (with I
am sure a record number of viewers).  So you probably are counting it a
success.  A comedy that makes mothers weep for an ignored child is not a
success.

Debi Lanning
St. Petersburg, FL.
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