Baby Gloton: The Breast-Feeding Doll Who Will Scar Your Daughter For Life

So, last week I'm diddling around on Facebook, reading the updates from every person I've ever shared a zip code with, paying little attention to "Judy McCullen Walsh is ready for the pool!!!" and "Alex Sanchez can't believe it's August already," and checking to see if anyone has a baby that rivals mine in cuteness when I see a post that actually interests me. A girl I went to high school with wrote something about a new breast feeding doll and leaving motherhood to mommies while letting kids be kids. Well, y'all know I am pretty much a shoe-in for Breast Feeder of the Year (very prestigious) and couldn't believe more in this particular cause (is breast feeding even a cause?) so I have to check out the comments, and, naturally, put in my two cents. Well, all the women that have commented up to this point, probably 5 or so, are all in agreement that this doll is "disturbing" and "goes too far."

Since I haven't seen the doll, I Googled it to see why this particular toy is so creepy. This is what all the fuss is about:





Wow--scandalous, huh? I mean, the way that little girl is pretending to nourish that doll, what is the world coming to? A bunch of sickos, I tell you. What I'd really like Violet to have is yet another baby doll that comes with a bottle to shove in her mouth. I mean, that is wholesome pretend fun for a kid. Playing Mommy crosses the line from sweet and innocent to deviant when you bring nursing into it. Breasts are for sex, kiddies, don't you forget it!

Seriously, though, the reaction of the public to this doll makes me realize that breastfeeding is still a cause that needs to be supported because there is such an incredible slew of misinformation out there. Just look at what the DOCTOR (he's an MD for Crissakes!) who acts as managing health editor for Fox News.com says about what trauma could be unleashed on a child who plays with this toy:

Dr. Manny Alvarez, said although he supports the idea of breast-feeding, he sees how his own daughter plays with dolls and wonders if Bebe Gloton might speed up maternal urges in the little girls who play it.

“Pregnancy has to entail maturity and understanding,” Alvarez said. “It’s like introducing sex education in first grade instead of seventh or eighth grade. Or, it could inadvertently lead little girls to become traumatized. You never know the effects this could have until she’s older.”

WTF? WTF? WTF? Pardon my eloquence, but did I mention WTF? Did Dr. Manny really use the word TRAUMATIZED? Oh, yes, this is a direct quote and he really did use the word TRAUMATIZED to describe what might happen to a child who PRETENDS TO NURSE A BABY DOLL. Now, I can't help but wonder if Manny's daughter has a dolly that came with a bottle, or a doll who has a diaper to change or maybe a doll who even has a lifelike cry? I certainly hope not because surely, these dolls, too, would "speed up her maternal urges" and lead to a knocked-up 3rd grader. I bet Manny buys his daughter dolls that serve as role models, like those sweet Bratz girls or, of course, all-American Barbie dolls. You know, the dolls that can show her what tits are really for!

The crying shame in all of this, though, is how far away we have gotten from what is natural human behavior. Teaching young girls that breast feeding is a shameful act, an act that they need neither knowledge of nor exposure to, is, I believe a grave mistake. All the lip service that the medical community gives to breast feeding is for naught if kids grow up believing that the nice way to give a baby milk is through a bottle and that nursing a child is somehow dirty.

Now, where do I go to order me a Baby Gloton? Violet's first Christmas gift is coming early this year!

So what do you think? Is Baby Gloton going to give kids the wrong sort of ideas or is she a good toy to promote breast feeding? This blog really upset Megan, my Facebook friend who started the thread that got me thinking about this, which was absolutely never my intention. (I'm sorry you felt attacked, Megan!!) But, it is obviously a controversial topic and I'd love to hear your comments!

Away I Go

After luxuriating at home for the last month, I am headed back to work this morning. It's funny how quickly I got used to having all 3 members of our little family unit at home everyday. I think we would have eventually gotten bored, but 30 some days was not enough to do it. Waking up at 9 or 9:30--yes, Violet sleeps that late!--eating breakfast together Leave-It-To-Beaver-style, and then tackling our house chores for the day--it was a pretty nice little bubble we were living in. We made some progress on the house, not as much as I'd hoped, but not totally worthless, either. We took some bike rides, got to the pool a few times, walked around the new 'hood and met some neighbors, visited with family, and generally enjoyed life. The rigorous exercise regimen that I was going to follow EVERYDAY never materialized, but fortunately I was able to stick to my Twice Daily Dessert program which I'm sure will offset any workouts I missed. Yum pie...

Shawn has another 2 weeks off before school begins again for him so my two partners in crime will be ending the summer the same way they began it, with some quality Daddy-Daughter time. Having this extended chunk of time off has done wonders for Violet's relationship with Shawn. She still has her moments when no one but Mommy will do, but she is becoming far less discriminating when it comes to whose leg she'll nuzzle into to hide from strangers. They have developed their own games to play together and Daddy is the only one thus far who has been able to elicit a certain high pitched shriek of pleasure from Violet during rumpus time. I'll miss them today!

Next weekend is going to bring about another Violet and Shawn milestone: their first solo overnight together. I'll be heading to Nashville, TN for my future sister in law Steph's bachelorette party so the other two Pierces will be holding down the fort. I am excited, but a bit apprehensive about leaving Vi overnight. She sleeps like a champ for us, but when she does wake up, she usually nurses for a minute or two to drift back off. The night nursing doesn't bother me a bit; quite the opposite actually. It's such a snugly time and has become so instinctual for both of us, I frequently don't even fully wake up to do it. I know that Daddy's loving arms are just as capable as mine, and I also know that if I never give them a chance, then Shawn won't ever be on call at night. I'm sure they'll be fine, they always are. And, after a few gin and tonics in Nashville, I'll be fine too! Who knows, maybe I'll even enjoy my ME time...

DANGER

Violet is a baby living on the edge. She literally teeters on the edge of steps, sofas, Rubbermaid boxes, and any other surface that she can climb on top of with her limited upper body strength. Though Shawn and I have both been off work for the last month, I'll admit, we haven't supervised her 100% of that time. There haven't been any cases of egregious neglect--she hasn't been found wandering in the street clad only in a soiled diaper--but she's definitely been out of line of sight from time to time. It was a little bit of a shocker the afternoon I darted outside to ask Shawn a question and found my sweet little girl, crap loaded in her diaper, crouched on the floor eating the remnants of a peanut butter sandwich she'd scooped from the trash. My little baby bum is a toddler now and nothing brings her more joy than toddling away from her Mommy and Daddy.

Because I know that there is no way to make sure she will never get hurt, I have learned how to pick and choose the hazards I'll allow. The first thing to sort out was hazard vs. annoyance. A hazard would be Violet getting into the cabinets under the kitchen sink and sampling the cleaning products we store under there. An annoyance is Violet getting into the cabinet under our bathroom sink and chewing on the ends of every tampon in a Costco-sized box before she scatters them from one end of the bedroom to the other.

There are a lot of real hazards in the world and even these aren't all easy to protect her from. For instance, the stairs are still largely no-no's for Violet. I have seen her crawl up and now (be still my nervous heart!) I've now seen her back her way all the way down our flight of stairs. I know that she knows how to descend on her belly when that is her goal. I've also seen her roll a ball down the hallway and then sway ever so gut-wrenchingly, over the top stair as she watches it bounce down, step by step. The thought of her tumbling down the stairs scares the bejesus out of me so I'm *mostly* always diligent about gating her on one level. This morning, as I was ------ing (making the bed or drying my hair or putting laundry away or doing one of the other zillion things I do that keep me from focusing all of my attention on my 14 month old), she made a beeline for the stairs. I jumped in front of her to put the baby gate up and turned her around hoping she would find something to while away the next 2 (or 5 or 10 or 12 or 20) minutes so I could finish making/drying/putting/doing task. Unless she's wrecked tired, she's usually fairly easy to re-direct.

She did an about-face and rather than f-ing with me by going down the stairs, she went toward the tools that hang next to the fireplace in our bedroom. These are long, metal shovels and pokers--definitely not approved for baby. But they are also heavy and hard to get out of their holder. So I watched Violet slam them against the brick hearth over and over and I went about my business. There was no imminent danger to her from the fireplace tools, but if she pulled the same shit at someone else's house, I wouldn't let her do it. It doesn't look good, safety-wise, and the metal poker slamming on brick sounds even worse. But, she was entertained by them for a while and that is more than I can say Elmo did for me this morning. And, once I finished my hair/laundry/bed making, it is a lot easier to pick up some tampons out of the fireplace than take the child to the ER for falling down the stairs. That's how I play risky behavior roulette.

CoExisting

Violet is 14 months old. Not a major milestone for most kids, but 14 months is a number that has some significance for me. See, Violet missed my Dad by just 14 months. Had life moved faster for me, or slowed down for Daddy, he might have gotten to meet his first granddaughter. 14 months--just a wrinkle in time, really.

Violet and I spent Friday at my friend Leslie's lakehouse. I hadn't seen her parents for years and it was nice to catch up with them for a bit. Talking to her father, the way he called me "Kiddo," reminded me so much of my own Dad. I suppose Mr. Ryan and my Dad were contemporaries so no surprise they'd use the same lingo. Hearing his voice transported me briefly back in time.

The most fascinating and appealing part of the idea of heaven, at least for me, is the togetherness of everyone. People who missed each other in life, like my Dad and Violet or me and my own Grandfathers, get to overlap in death. Of course, getting to see those who passed on before us is a huge comfort, but it is those initial meetings that really captivate my imagination. The logistics of heaven start to get messy when you think about how many generations of ancestors may be waiting there to say hey, but, I guess with all eternity to play with, I can spend plenty of time with Great-Great-Great Aunt Maude and not worry to much about what else I'm missing. Ahhh, yes, heaven. What a splendid idea!

I feel that heaven is likely an idea created by humans as a salve for the deepest losses we suffer so I can't just rely on Violet meeting up with my Daddy "someday." I have to do what I can during life to make sure Violet and my Dad do overlap. So I've been trying to remember the details of the "Hairy Green Toe" story he told me so I can share it with her. And I've been making sure to call her toenails "sock sabers" and refer to her as "Little V" every now and then. I'll call her Critter and of course Kiddo in case there isn't a light at the end of the tunnel. Because if there isn't a heaven where Bill Schroeder and Violet Pierce get to meet each other, part of my job as a Schroeder and a Pierce is to see that she gets some sense of who her Grandpa was and how much he would have loved her.

The Lost Month

So June is over and I managed to post only once. Guess I'm not ready for professional blogging yet after all. I swear, I do have a good excuse. Several excuses really.

The first and grandest excuse for my absence from the world wide web is that we Pierces moved to a NEWWW house on June 24th. After a hellava negotiation process to unload our other house, we finally arrived at an acceptable deal with the buyers (thanks in large part to our realtor, Sussan O'Brien, who I'd recommend to anyone in a heartbeat) and we were able to move forward with buying a NEWWW house!!

The new place is palatial by our old standards, dwarfing our previous house. We went from 2 bedrooms to 4; 1 bathroom to 2.5, no garage to a 2-car attached; a postage stamp yard to a respectable romping ground for all of us. Needless to say, we are loving it. I don't know if I have an absolute-hands-down favorite part of the house yet (I love it all, really) but I am pretty enamoured of Violet's room. It was already painted the perfect shade of--you guessed it--Violet--when we moved in and is easily twice a large as her old room. It has plenty of space for her growing toy collection, her little kid library, a smelly diaper pail, and, her newest addition, her big-girl bed!

In our old house, Violet's room was still The Nursery. It was an idea of a baby's room, The Nursery was, an idea hatched in my mind upon finding out I was pregnant. Babies r Us and Pottery Barn Kids showed me photos of how I was supposed to house a baby and I thought, "This is good, this is cute, my baby must have this." I shopped and I researched, I poured over catalogues and safety guidelines, I deliberated--I shit you not--DELIBERATED FOR DAYS--over what the baby's crib bedding would be. The crib bedding was key of course, because, much like Ohio during a national election, the crib bedding is a bellweather for the rest of the nursery. A proper nursery theme begins with the crib bedding and goes on from there. I chose the Penelope bedding from Pottery Barn Kids and I am lead to believe that the price of the bedding must be inversely proportional to the baby's desire to lay on it. It was damn expensive and Violet spent ZERO nights sleeping on it. Not a one. She much preferred the Target sheets on Mommy and Daddy's bed. Or maybe she preferred Mommy and Daddy...

Anyway, we set up Vi's big girl bed, a double mattress and box spring on the floor, on our second night in the house and, wonder of wonders, she has fallen to sleep in it every night since. She is also logging 1-2 naps in her bed every day allowing Shawn and I to get shit done around the house. It was never possible for me to lay down with her while she drifted off when the crib was her bed and she woke up instantly every time we went to lay her in it. Now I can go lay down with her and nurse her to sleep. She hasn't made it all night in her own bed yet, but I'm fine with that. Even though Shawn and I had discussed how much easier it would be to put Violet to bed once we moved, the reality of her being in her own room didn't hit me til the night we made her bed up. I think moving her has been a bigger deal for me than for her. So when I hear her on the monitor at 2 or 3 am, I am always happy to go grab her and bring her back to our bed for the rest of the night.



Other bonuses about our new house: we are .8 miles from my brother Andy and his wife Aly. This means extra playtime with Vi's cousins Jack and Charlie. We also moved into a great little well-established neighborhood with an active homeowners association. We got here just in time to be a part of the 4th of July parade complete with a marching band and a flaming baton twirler. The neighbors we've met seem wonderful--the couple next door has lived in their home for 40 years and brought us over a lemon poppy seed cake to welcome us. My guess is that Charles and Lorraine will not have the same sort of alcohol fueled late night spats and loud make-up sex like our previous neighbors...Seems we've landed squarely in Pleasantville.

Finally, perhaps my most favoritest part of this new house is the thing we just turned on today...our wireless router! No more hunching over a desk in the wee hours to get a blog posted! I am writing this in the comfort of my own bed! Love it!

The Smackdown

Violet raised her tiny hand in anger at me this morning for the first time. I say "for the first time" because I realize that we have 2+ years of toddlerhood left to live through and I am not naive enough to think it won't happen again. She had just woken up and I took her right from her bed to the kitchen where I was busy doctoring up my morning coffee. Violet likes to suck on my empty Splenda packets (the child loooves paper of all sorts) and was reaching out for the box when I went to put it away. I had already thrown out the empty packet before retrieving her from bed so I didn't have any packets for her to gum. Adding insult to injury, I then put the lid back on the gallon of milk without even so much as letting her attempt to close it. Naughty Mommy, right? Well, wee sleepy Violet thought so. She howled a terrible whine and reached for my face to smack and pinch it! What a turd! I put her on the floor so fast I don't think either she or I realized what I was doing. Part of me was laughing because--how ridiculous that this mini-person clad in bubble gum jammies was throwing an A.M. tantrum directed at me--I just wasn't equipped to handle such a bizarre start to the day before I'd had even a sip of coffee. The other more forward-looking Mommy wasn't laughing at all. She was thinking of all the potential bratty shit I could have staring down the next 10-20 years of my life. I don't care how cute her jammies are, how adorable her little dimply rear is, how sweetly her Johnson & Johnson's washed hair smells...I'm not prepared to deal with a brat. I'm just not. I'm too bratty myself...I'm afraid we'll cancel each other out. Cringing all the way to work, I thought of the kind of bullshit I used to do to my own Mom, never thinking twice about her feelings. I'd roll my eyes at her music, giggle at her clothes, explain with exasperation for the 10th time why the New Kids on the Block were called the Fab Five. It didn't have anything to do with the Beatles. Sheesh. Danny, Donnie, Joe, Jordan, and John were soo beyond my Mom. She would never, could never, get it. Mom--did you know that someday I'd get it? You must have hoped that day would come. I'm not ready to have some tiny girl making fun of my Stevie Wonder songs or my Chaco sandals. I'm not ready to surrender my coolness to someone so much younger than me; someone that I made! I know this morning's smack wasn't the same as an intentional eye roll and I know we're probably several years off from that kind of shit. Violet's tiny temper was tweaked just enough this morning that she needed to release it on someone, and I was the only one within striking distance. It was just a little glimpse of the big personality she's been working so hard at growing. The little dancing, laughing, penguin-walking, sweet-dolly-talking, doggy-patting, Mommy-snuggling, car-vrooming, swing-squealing, cousin-loving, one-year-old Violet also happens to have a short fuse in the mornings. Duly noted. And, if this is a peephole into the future with Violet, I'll keep the naked pictures handy for blackmail. Just in case. And, yeah, Sweetie, you are naked in the tub with both of your cousins.

Let Them Eat Cake Twice

I swear, this is my last post in which I will wax nostalgic over Violet turning the big -1-. I make no promises about what I will do when she turns 18 months or 2 years, however, and I fully reserve the right to ooo and awww publicly over each new milestone if I so desire.

Anyway, the last week was full of fun birthday celebrations for Violet. First, on the 12th, we had a family dinner of spaghetti, her current fave, and of course a birthday cake to ring in the actual day. Then, despite the fact that Shawn and I agreed there had already been quite enough fuss made for a person who didn't even realize it was her birthday, we had a party with all of "Violet's Friends" on Saturday. I'm glad we did the friends birthday party, too, because it gave us a chance to see people we don't usually see and Vi got to visit with the Pierce side of the family.

Violet had a great time at her party which we held at a park. She definitely did a better job making a mess of herself on her second go-around with cake. The first time, on her actual birthday, she picked tentatively at the frosting and barely made a mess at all. She seemed way more into it on her second try, smearing frosting everywhere and licking her palms and the table regularly. I'm sure it was just the result of having a little practice, but I'll attribute it to the fact that she prefers Mama's homemade cupcakes (no mix, the real deal!) to the store bought cake we'd had on Tuesday. The paper wrapper surrounding the cupcake probably didn't hurt either. Paper is the base of Violet's food pyramid on many days.



The weather was sorta yucky but we made due. None of the kids seemed to mind the cold temps or intermittent drizzle. When do those things start to bother you? Must be after the age of 6...The park was still better than doing it at our house for a lot of reasons not the least of which being I didn't have to clean up smashed cake when it was all said and done.

I am going to have to remember to put "NO PRESENTS!" on any future party invites we send out, however, because after a certain number of parties in your honor (wedding showers, wedding, baby showers, 30th birthdays, all in the last 2 years!!!), I feel like a lot of our lesser-seen friends only see us on occasions when they feel required to bring a gift. Hopefully, we'll get to reciprocate for all of our friends and their kids if we haven't already.

The other reason we need to adopt a strict NO PRESENTS policy is because we are out of space. Playskool and Fisher-Price have taken over our house and I am starting to think I should have gone with a decorating palette featuring more primary colors so all the molded plastics would fit in. It is pretty hard to disguise the ball poppers and bubble mowers (both toys that she loooooves, by the way) among our current theme of muted earth tones. The good news on that front is, we just accepted an offer on our house so it looks like a move is in the works for us this summer. Priority #1 in the next house: PLAYROOM!!!