Friday, July 20, 2007

Flawed Logic

Something I was reading the other day pointed this out, I thought it was rather interesting.

We're told to be careful how we treat infants because we don't want to set up bad habits. For example:

Don't sleep with your child - you'll never get her out of your bed.

Don't respond to every little noise - he needs to learn to self soothe.

Don't always carry her around - you don't want her to get used to it.

and so on.

And yet....

We never hear anyone say:
Don't let your baby pee in his diaper, you'll never get him potty trained.

In fact, we EXPECT babies to eliminate where ever and when ever in their diapers for two years (or more!!!) and then learn how to use a toilet when they're developmentally ready. Too bad that attitude can't be transfered over to some of the other situations.....

(and some would argue that's it's completely backwards and it's the diapers that aren't necessary and cause problems...)

2 comments:

Owen said...

You're right Steph. Babies shouldn't be expected to do things until they are developmentally ready to do them.

The question is when are they?

Steph said...

THat's a good question too Lindy.
My daughter is right now sitting on her potty (after going 2+ hrs with a dry diaper), and she's 9 months old. Some people would say that's woo long to learn where to potty.

Nothing with development is written in stone. Hana could sit unassisted right around 5 months, some babies can't do that until they're over a year (usually 95+%ile babies), and it's still considered normal. If you're aware of your child and read your child, not what anyone else says, you'll know.