Excellent Advice

One of my friends, who will remain nameless, texted me today to tell me to get off my ass and write a new post (in nicer words than those), so here I am.

I've come to realize that with all of the time I have to myself, thinking my thoughts, a lot of wisdom cycles through my brain. I would not be acting like a dutiful citizen if I were to keep that wisdom to myself, and not share it with you people. So for all of my mommy readers (all of you. all 3 of you), and those that might be future mommys, this tidbit is for you:

Take any advice you get with a grain of salt.

As a new mom, you receive a lot of advice. Some is useful, and some is just useless, senseless, and downright annoying. Like the following:

1. NEVER feed your baby fruits before vegetables.

Let me start off by recognizing how hypocritical I'm being, and admitting that I don't really care. I realize that telling you not to take advice about parenting, is in fact myself advising you. But my advice is realistic, and everyone else's is not.

As the gullible person that I am, when I was told that feeding a child fruits before vegetables is basically a deed of the devil, because a child could NEVER like vegetables after they taste the sugar of the forbidden fruit (literally), I actually believed the theory. I came to find out that it was completely unfounded, and a huge overreaction. Taking this advice was my own fault though, because the informational sheet I got from the pediatrician's office specifically says to introduce fruits THEN vegetables. I also just should have known, by the way that Harrison is a hippopotamus, that he'll enjoy and scarf down any food. It is also a commonly known fact that two foods that are very easy on the digestive system are bananas, and apples, in the form of applesauce.

Knowing all of these facts, I still chose to listen to the shoddy advice that was given to me. The first non-cereal solid I fed Harrison was sweet potatoes.

But wait, I wasn't finished, I love deez potaters

I think you know where this is heading, because I've mentioned in the past that the sweet potatoes gave Harrison a wicked rash. And the new mom freak out gene then told me to hold off on ALL solids for weeks to let his system get back to normal. I also have an obsessive need to make sure that Harrison is on par developmentally. For example, babies are supposed to roll over in both directions by 6 months, and he has yet to roll from back to tummy. If he has not accomplished this by the 6 month mark, I'm sending him back.

I'm just chillin'

Anyways, the fact that the rash delayed the eating process by weeks, really got on my nerves. Harrison needs to be trying a new food every 5 days, not waiting weeks in between foods and falling behind every other baby his age.

I finally felt comfortable reintroducing solids, had some ripe bananas, so bananas it was. And what do you know? He hates them. He chokes them down because he would never choose not eating over eating. Wait, what? The advice that babies always, always prefer fruits over vegetables, is wrong again??

2. Keeping your baby up as late as possible will help them to sleep later in the mornings.

I have a short explanation as to why this is false, for Harrison at least: He'll go down at 7pm, and sleep until 7am (you are crazy if you think I'm saying he doesn't wake up during that interval). If I can put my child to bed at 7pm, and have at least 3 uninterrupted hours of time to do whatever I please, including indulging in an adult beverage, why in god's name would I try to keep him up later?

My personal favorite, 3. Give up caffeine completely because it is the cause of your child's fussiness.

No. No, no, no and no. There are a lot of sacrifices that I would make for HDawg, but caffeine is not one of them. Also, please tell me why he is fussy at 6pm, when my only caffeinated beverage is consumed at 8am.

I LOVE THE CAFFEINE 

And here's just some advice for the rest of the population:

4. Selfies are not as cool as you think they are. Unless it's a baby selfie.

Wad up, ladies