love at first sight

Lately, I seem to be spending my Sunday afternoons meeting with babymakers.  Definitely a lovely way to spend a Sunday as these are some of my favourite people :)

Today, during one such meet up, I found myself giving the 'love at first sight' speech. (lucky for me, I was singing to the choir!) Often new parents, or about to be new parents, are advised, by well-intentioned friends and family, to avoid letting baby 'run their lives'.  "Don't adjust your schedule", "Don't cater to the baby", "Don't let the baby be in charge".  

This sort of talk kind of makes me crazy.  Just a little.  Here's my reply in short;

When a human being (not a baby by the way, a whole entire human being, who will grow up to be an adult, just. like. you.) is born, he/she is born with a brain that is about 25% of it's potential adult size. Compare this to most other mammals that are born with brain sizes of 60-90% of their adult brain size.  What is this 25% doing?  

Surviving.  That's it.  

A baby is not born with some evil plot to come along and change your world, or some devilish desire to piss you off.  It's learning how to see, smell, move it's limbs.  Basic stuff.  A baby that needs to eat or be cleaned, or be rocked to sleep in the manner to which it has been accustomed for nine months, is not trying to 'be in charge'. 

It's surviving. 

If a baby is crying, it needs something.  That is all. So when we bend ourselves to answer that need, we are not being 'controlled', we are parenting.  When we choose not to answer the needs of our babies, we don't 'win' some power struggle between ourselves and our child.  We only let them know that we can't be relied upon, that we may not answer when they need us.  Do this enough times and their tiny little brains will take note of THAT.  There is no power struggle to be had with an infant, it doesn't have the capacity for some complicated emotional battle.  It's too busy surviving. Breathing.   

And if that line of thinking isn't enough to squash the fear of being controlled by an infant, think about this:  When we meet our newborn for the first time, we fall in love.  We fall in love like no other time that we fall in love. (oh I know that there are bunches of people out there who are saying 'nope not me, I didn't get that ooey-gooey feeling.  I'm not talking about that)  

Define love however you like, whatever your definition of love is, that happens when you meet that newly born offspring of yours.  On sight.  Sure some of that is all the yummy oxytocin swimming around in your body, some of that is a basic instinct to protect our own.  Some of it is something we probably can't/don't need to define.  Whatever it is, however it looks, from the moment that person is born, we would throw ourselves in front of a bus to save it's life, we feel compelled to create a perfect space for this being. 

Think about any other time you have fallen in love.  What does the typical new love look like?  Do we not adjust ourselves?  Change our schedules, bend and move to the needs of the other?  Find compromise and concession for each other?  Is it with begrudging? Or is it with joy and excitement? 

When we fall in love any other time, we want to spend all our time with that person, learn all about them, discover them.  We, for sure, 'cater' to them and let that really powerful and delightful feeling of love 'control' us.  Why wouldn't we?  What the heck are we all doing here anyhow, if not loving each other?  

Why would it be any different when we fall in love with this amazing new person 

that we have created? 

Go ahead and love your kid, says I.  Pick them up, love them and joyfully adjust yourself to be able to meet their needs.  Change your schedule, give some things up, take some new things on. Adding a whole new person into your life isn't something that needs to be managed or controlled, it's a time for growing and for exploring places you've never gone before.  

Do it with wild abandon and enjoy the ride!