I totally freaked out about this catalogue a few weeks ago in a private
e-mail to someone! Sure, there's lots of "nice stuff", I guess - well, they
have nice cosy polarfleece garments for babies - but I have never in my life
seen so much stuff being marketed to replace various functions of parents.
The feeding "devices" just go on & on, and what especially got me was the
incredible array of stuff to enable you to put your baby down to be
"soothed" or "lulled to sleep" or "entertained" or "stimulated" or
"educated" by.

Obviously having & raising a baby is a lot more complicated than I thought
23 yrs. ago when I started out. And a HELL of a lot more expensive! I gotta
say, I'm really glad about the way I did a couple of things when I had
mine - I had them relatively young, I was as poor as you could get (we used
to have to "save up" for a 3-pack of rubber pants, which I think cost about
$1.69), and I had no car. The not-having-money thing wasn't exactly on
purpose, but in my experience (and actually in the opinions of my
young-adult children, surprisingly) it actually served us well in some ways.
(Like no way could we have lived in an apartment large enough for us to do
anything more than laugh hilariously at the concept of getting far enough
away from the babies to even *think* of a "baby monitor". We wished!
Nowadays you can get them that not only monitor sound, but have video. And
you can get a thing that goes under the crib sheet to alert you if the baby
stops moving/making noises for more than 20 seconds. **NOT** disparaging
"real" monitors for those who need them - just distressed over the idea that
these things should be seen as necessary or desirable for most babies!)

I guess I should get out more - this catalogue *really* distressed me!

Cathy Bargar RN IBCLC Ithaca NY

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