Just in case you haven’t seen it yet, you need to go over to McSweeney’s and read “Hello Stranger on the Street, Could You Please Tell Me How to Take Care of My Baby?” Okay. Did you read it yet? I wasn’t joking. Go read it. One of my favorite paragraphs from the article is below:
Yes, he IS crying, isn’t he? You are right. He’s probably hungry. Should I feed him? And if so, where do I put the food? His eyeball? His butt? What kinds of cuts of meat do babies like? Should I not give him hot peppers? How much salt is too much, and when can I expect him to use a knife? If he spits up, should I have him put to sleep? There are just so many things I need to know, and that is why I rely on total strangers like you who happen to be experts on child care.
I love this. Really – could it be said any better?
Now, to be fair, I often do go to Facebook and Twitter with my parenting and baby questions. And I do often Google random things about babies to just make sure that he isn’t dying or anything…but you got to love the random, unsolicited, advice that you get from strangers sometimes…huh?
And not even strangers. Friends. Family members. Whoever. Everyone has advice on how to raise your baby. And sometimes it’s helpful. And sometimes it’s not. The total bummer is that you never really know which is which. Oh, the Nap Nanny worked miracles for your baby? He slept for hours and hours in it? Sweet – guess I should get it! Oh! That specific brand of sippy cup worked for your daughter? I assume it will work for mine!
Granted it goes both ways. Sometimes it’s easy to assume, especially when you’re at your wits end, that because something worked for one baby, it will automatically work for yours. If only it was that easy. So that’s probably why we ended up with a Baby Björn, Moby Wrap, Kokopax baby carrier and Ergo (btw, the Ergo worked the best for us and will do WONDERS for your child – GET YOURS TODAY!).
What is some of the best/worst advice you’ve received from strangers? Any good stories to share?
I’ve thought a lot about the unsolicited parenting advice, mostly because I tend to be the one giving it. Sometimes the unsolicited (and even the solicited) advice is incredibly annoying and makes you want to smile crookedly and hurl some sarcastic retort back at the stranger (or friend). But, I also think that a lot of times what seems to be unsolicited advice is actually the stranger (or friend’s) way of saying, “Parenting is the most important thing I’ve ever done in my life. It is also the most consuming thing. Therefore, I think of us as having this shared experience and I want to talk to you about it.” Sure sometimes, the advice can seem or be judgmental but I (want to) think most of the time people are just trying to reach out and engage in a shared experience.
Woman in the park sees me with my two kids. “You know, you can rent bikes over there.”
Me: “OK.”
Woman: “You should go there.”
Me: “My kids don’t ride bikes yet.”
Woman: “Then you should teach them!”
Me: “OK.”
A somewhat related experience…After I had surgery which diagnosed & removed endometriosis, my OB/GYN said to me, “And this is GREAT time for you to get pregnant.” I was 23 and single. Nice advice doc.
Not really the same thing but there is another thing that just kills me about strangers’ behavior. When they come up and ask what’s wrong with your kid. The expletives that i *want* to SCREAM into their face cannot be uttered here, nor uttered infront of my child, who has a large scar resulting from an emergency surgery (that saved her life) on her head.
I don’t see the scar much anymore. It’s just part of her beautiful little head. And i get that it might be shocking to some people. But for them to come up and just ask, as if it were their business, “what happened to your kid?”
“Thanks for asking, stranger. I would love to relive those 2.5 months in the NICU and all of the painful memories of when my daughter almost didn’t live. I would love to take a walk to the park and explain it all to you over tea and crumpets. It just so happens that I already don’t like you and I think you are an @$$hole.
To be fair, other strangers have noticed it and handled it much more gracefully, and even gotten a brief explanation out of me without raising my blood pressure or disrespecting my daughter.