My Perfect Child

Quick intro: I have been having atrocious bilateral knee pain climbing stairs and getting up/down from the floor and chairs for the past 3 weeks. So bad, it has negatively affected my care for Lili and ability to clean the house (OH NO!) so I finally saw an Orthopedic Surgeon. Great Doc, minimal treatment available since I’m pregnant, and will probably do PT. During the visit, the doc asked me how old my other child was, and I told him “11 months.” To which he replied, “Well, if that isn’t hard enough…wow you’ll have two of them soon, that will be challenging.” I was a bit taken a back and said, “She’s perfect, so I’m not worried.” He then said, “Wow, I have never heard anyone say that about their baby or toddler. That’s amazing. Good for you!”

There are a lot of things that left me puzzled from this exchange. First of all, children do not have to be horrible experiences, and I really wish people would stop treating them like that. Sure, they are not easy but that does not mean they are miserable creatures worth complaining about to your knee doctor. Second, why am I the first person in his 20 years of practice and 50 years of life, to ever say their child is perfect? That troubles me because his 50 years spans quite a few generations of child “rearers” and his expertise has him exposed to a wide variety of people from rich to poor and old to young.

This brief conversation really made me wonder what people think of their children and what they tell others…I knew my generation was one of the complaining type, but shoot…can we all please just praise our children and love who they are!?!?