"Don't Let's go to the Dogs Tonight-"This book is really good. I read it awhile ago, so the details are not fresh in my mind,but here is the gist of it. It is about a young girl's memoir of growing up in southern Africa. Alexandra Fuller is a very descriptive writer. She makes you feel like you are in Africa with her.. only you don't want to be, because many crappy things happen in her life. I think that I am done with depressing books for awhile since I have a tendency to be drawn to them... but if you don't have a book to read, go check this one out.
"On Becoming Babywise-" I will preface this by saying that I didn't finish the book.. I just couldn't. Since I have probably offended several people already in the last month, I will try hard not to go on about this book. I am not so much a fan of the parenting style advocated in this book. It's just not me. There are some very helpful suggestions that I will try (like trying to make nursing sessions longer so your baby doesn't eat as often.. I will try this next kiddo), and it also talks about how a healthy marriage is very important in parenting. Like any parenting book, you take the ideas you like and that will work for you, and you throw out what won't.
What I didn't like about the book was the negative tone it had. I feel like the authors were extremely caught up in ripping on other parenting styles (specifically attachment parenting). If their style is so great, why do they have to spend the whole book ripping on another style of parenting? Also, I feel like this book does not take temperament into account very much, and it is kind of a "one size fits all" approach. I have friends who have used parts of this approach (not to an extreme), and they have had success with it... but like I said.. overall,this style is not for me. I am not sure exactly what my parenting style is.. maybe a mixture of a lot of different styles?
9 years ago
6 comments:
My neighbor gave me a copy of this book when Trevor was born. Yes, it seemed helpful...who doesn't want their six week old to sleep through the night? I did a little research on the author and the information in the book...turns out skinny underfed babies were coming into pediatricians' offices with parents who read the book without a grain of salt...oh yeah and the author got kicked out of his church, I can't remember why. I especially enjoyed the part about the playpen, a "structured learning environment."
There's another mom in my ward who does AP, I just didn't know. She was nursing her 18-month old so we started talking about it, and turns out they have 4 in a bed too.
That is interesting that the dude is sketchy. Now it makes sense of why they have all of these charts in the back where you are supposed to track every single bm and pee your baby does. As I was reading that, I was thinking that unless you have a baby who is a preemie or other weight concerns, it is so almost funny to track on your fridge their bm's (although that hanging on my fridge may help me lose my apetite.. which wouldnt be that bad :). I guess I will continue not being baby wise :)... which makes me.. I don't know what .... baby stupid :).
I never finished Baby Wise either! My attention span was up after chapter one. But in my brief experience with the book, I agree: there's no one-size-fits-all. Parents have to give a little, take a little. But you can't expect your brand-new-to-the-world little baby to accomodate everything you want, just like you can't accomodate every minute need they have. It's been awhile since I picked that one up though, so I may be misrepresenting...
We just started babysitting a little boy from a very different background than us and I really appreciated your post on spanking. To spank or not to spank -- this kid is naughty. And troubled. My kids have their independent days, but here's someone who's seen the real world and is not worried in the least by me threatening to take away his cookie or put him in time out. This is a babysitting job with a learning curve!
well I just bought baby wise off amazon so we'll see if I like it! :)
Sam,
You are Abby's friend who looked at our house right? (Bye the way.. if you want to buy our house.. you can for $10,000 less than our original asking price). You might end up liking the book. You will just have to figure out what feels right when you have your baby. How far along are you?
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