I describe it to parents like
this:  "Imagine you have been living in an increasingly smaller
room.  After noticing the walls closing in on you over the past
weeks, now they are repeatedly squeezing you even tigher.  Soon you
find yourself pushed or pulled through a tiny door and suddenly find
yourself on another planet!


In my classes, I use a similar image. I have people close their eyes
and imagine that they have been living on a space ship for 9 months.
Everything they needed was there without even having to ask for it.
Then, one day, the ship lands hard on a new planet, the door opens, you
step out and, with the exception of the hum of the engine of the space
ship, everything you hear, touch, taste, smell and hear is new an
unfamiliar. What would your reaction be?
Answers are usually things like, cry and "I'd want to crawl back in."
then everyone laughs and I explain that this is a one way trip, once
the spaceship door closes it won't reopen.

Then I talk about how much babies learn in their first year and how
much mental energy it all takes and that is part of the reason they
sleep so much. I ask people to think about the last time they started
new job, moved to a new community, went to a new school. When my
daughter switched school mid year in 7th grade, she came home from
school every day for the first month, completely exhausted. It wasn't
the academics that was hard, it was learning about bells between
classes, where her classes were, where her locker was, how to us a
locker lock, where the bathrooms and water fountain were, etc. etc.
It always makes for an interesting discussion and hopefully helps
people understand their babies a bit better.
I like the image of the space getting tighter and tighter over time.
I'll have to add that one to the space ship image. Thanks,


Naomi Bar-Yam
--------------------------------
Naomi Bar-Yam Ph.D.
[log in to unmask]

Researcher, Writer, Educator
in Maternal and Child Health
--------------------------------

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