Bringing up baby

I sit on the couch and watch it, alone, with Al in Hobart for work. I am frozen with horror at the 1950s approach. It doesn't ring true, this pitting of baby against parents in a battle for control, and it seems very cruel to me.

But more distressing is the mother of twins, weeping at putting her newborns out in the cold for hours, to 'blow the cobwebs off them', weeping because it seems so wrong and being told by partner and nurse to do as she's told. When both my kids were born, my self was disassembled, my confidence gone. But there was no-one standing by to tell me I was foolish, that I needed to back off, shut up, and let go of any last shreds of belief in myself and my knowledge. I was surrounded by people who trusted me.

It was painful to watch that woman so firmly put in her place.