Third Culture Kid(s)

The evidence:

1. TV.  As much as I always go on about how I’m letting the TV raise MM, the truth is so much more awful.  Since I have a hard time turning the damned thing off myself, it’s on an awful lot of the time.  Programs that MM watches are (in no particular order, especially since Noggin has been changing their schedule once every two weeks lately): Oobi, Maisy, Dora, Sesame Street, Jack, Upside Down, Backyardigans, and, recently, Little Bill.  That’s four hours of children’s programming a day.  She’s two.  The American Academy of Pediatrics would have me strung up by my thumbs if they knew.

Now, for the record, these are shows that I approve of.  Yes, even Oobi (for those of you not in the know, Oobi has the lowest production values of any children’s show out there, since the main characters are hands.  But MM loves this show - she seriously identifies with Uma, the baby sister preschooler hand - and, frankly, it has its moments.  And Uma, in particular, has come in quite handy when we’ve tried to get her to, say, try new food (which features in one segment) - if Uma can try new things, the reasoning goes, so can MM.

I also keep us on a pretty strict diet of Noggin; which is to say, largely commercial-free television.  In my book, commercials are the real devil - hell, the snippet of McDonalds promotion at the beginning of Sesame Street pisses me off more than anything they slip onto Noggin (mostly Nickelodeon promos, which are also odious).  But, at the end of the day, it’s still four hours of children’s programming, and I feel very guilty about it.  Not guilty enough to turn off the TV, yet, but guilty.  And this, even though I feel, deep down, like it’s more how you allow your child to interact with screens than amount of time spent in front of them.  We sing the songs, we talk about what’s happening (she’s seen most of the episodes so many times that she knows exactly what’s coming next, but that doesn’t take away from her interest in discussing what’s going on), and she uses the shows to role-play with her own toys (seriously - she’s a pirate, she digs for buried treasure, she uses chopsticks, she’s a cowboy, she tries different food - you name it).

Still feel guilty, though.

2. I have little idea what to do with her on a day-to-day basis.  If we had the money, I’d have her in preschool now, even though she’s still a little thing.  She loves playing with other kids, she loves playing on the playground (wherever it may be) - so much so that she likes to turn her little Ikea chair over and use it as a slide (first for herself, then for all her Little People minions).  She’d love it, but we simply can’t afford preschool right now; the only one we could afford is cooperative, and she was signed up, but pregnancy and the anticipation of complications in a month or two put that on hold.

So, I’m six months pregnant, 40-going-on-41, dissertating, and I seriously don’t know what to do with her during the day.

3. She got wounded for the first time today, on my watch.  Or, rather, NOT on my watch, since I had my back turned to her when she slipped and fell right onto the corner of a wooden chest.  She now sports a pretty impressive fat lip, and I feel just terrible.  There was blood everywhere, and I had to figure out whether she had knocked out a tooth or not; looks like it was basically just a lip bang, and nothing more serious, but I didn’t like seeing all that blood coming out of my baby’s mouth.

To her credit, after understandably wailing for about four minutes, she shook herself off, sucked her thumb, and got on with life.  With repeated assurances that “I’m okay, Mommy” (which usually is code for “that really scared/bugged me, and it’s going to be with me for a little while, and I’ll probably start talking about it in a day or so, but I’ll live”).  And repeated questions: “Are you okay, Mommy?”

In the meantime, 2.0 seems to move around all the freaking time.  Which, compared to the sleeping fetus that was MM, is kind of reassuring, but it does conjure up all kinds of images of knotting umbilical cords…