Today I was out with my lo doing some shopping & I noticed a dad who was baby wearing. As we got closer I noticed it was a baby bjorn type carrior & the baby was 2 weeks old at the most. He/she was facing outward not towards the parent with both of his/her little legs pulled through ONE leg hole. His/her little face was also smushed up against the front of the carrior and his/her little neck was all bent with the head bobbling around.
*cringe*
I couldn't help but gawk considering how painfully obviousit was that a. it wasn't being worn properly & b. that child is way too small for the carrier. No wonder baby wearing & carriers get such a bad name. This is why infant injuries and deaths occur. How do people not educate themselves on such simple things?
Re: I judged a parent today
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I really really wanted to. But I didn't feel like it would be well received & I am super non confrontational. =(
What's scary is that I believe they pulled both legs through one hole due to how small the baby was.
I would have said something, but I wouldn't have been confrontation about it at all, I think you could have said something like
"What a beautiful little girl!"
Pause, wait for response, yadda yadda, then:
"Oh, it looks like she's a mover too, somehow she's gotten both her legs through one leg hole"
Hopefully he would have realized it and fixed it, maybe it was just a result of sleep deprivation.
Actually, the "taco" carry for the Ergo has you using both legs to the side. I can see how a new parent may have seen a carry like this out and about and thought that was what you are supposed to do with a newborn, regardless of the brand of carrier.
Being a brand new parent is hard! I think I would have tried to say something non-confrontational to this man, in a very "it's-so-confusing-I've-been-there" kind of way. But I certainly don't fault you for not feeling comfortable enough to approach him. You never know how someone is going to react.
I judge parents all the time ... how can you not every time you see someone smoking next to their stroller or pouring some of their coke into their toddlers bottle or buying cheap formula because they not only dont care enough to give there baby the best but also want to cheap out and buy crap and i cetainly judge every time i hear a pregnant woman say something like breastfeeding f*** that i dont want my tits around my ankles
that being said i judge quietly in my own mind but i probably would have said something polite and non confrontational maybe they would have lashed out in embaressment but next time they went into the bathroom they probably would have looked in the mirror and realised what a bad job they did
also i realise there are valid reasons not to breastfeed but those arent as common as women would like you to believe
Okay, seriously. You've got to lay off the FF vs. BF crap.
AND formula is formula. It all goes through the same testing and has to have the same basic components. Sure there is more expensive hypo-allergenic formulas that some babies need to be on, but otherwise Up & Up brand formula, or Member's Mark, Parent's Choice is just the same as their Similac or Enfamil counterparts. Soy and lactose-free formulas are generally more expensive and they also usually contain HFCS -- so your logic doesn't make sense there. Dr. Sears says we should avoid giving infants anything contains HFCS, therefore (if you subscribe to Dr. Sears methods) those expensive formulas are worse for baby than the "cheap" milk-based name brand or non-name brand knockoffs. Expensive does not equal better.
To the OP: I would have been to shy to say something either! I hope someone did or dad realizes at some point he was wearing him/her incorrectly!