TV and Me

There are so many many people out there who tell you that it’s not okay to let your children watch tv.  They tell you that it stunts their learning, turns them off from reading, and messes them up socially.  They tell you that if you let your toddler watch tv you are a bad parent.

So what does that make me?

My child watches an hour and a half of tv per day-and I wouldn’t change it for the world.  Every morning at 10 am my son sits down with his morning snack [cheese and and a juicebox] and watches Blues Clues, Yo Gabba Gabba, and Wonderpets all in a row.  Sometimes, when I want to get rid of some especially pesky brain cells, I even let him watch Baby Einstein or Veggi Tales after nap.

What does that make me?

In my opinion, that makes me normal.  It makes me human.  I think a lot of people expect parents to have super-human patience and nerves of steel, but the fact is that just because I a mommy doesn’t make me Mother Teresa-or Wonder Woman [no matter what my son thinks].

I cannot make the house clean if someone else is simultaneously destroying it.  I do not possess the super lightening speed to do that.

I cannot make lunch, pay bills, call the doctor, clean the kitchen, and amuse my child at the same time.  Unless he is amused by multitasking….which he happens to find insufferably boring.

And finally I cannot spend 24 hours a day 7 days a week completely ignoring my own need for quiet time.  I have already forsaken alone time [every mom knows you cannot even pee by yourself when you have a 3 year old]-I simply do not have the super-human mental abilities to stay sane without a break. 

So if making lunch, paying the bills, calling the doctor, cleaning the house, and enjoying some relatively quiet time while my son is entranced by superhero classroom pets makes me a terrible parent then so be it.  I don’t think I’d want to be different anyway.