CNN) -- A movie? A meal out? A haircut?
Were those events even possible right after my daughter was born?
The news of a 3-month-old among the injured
at a late-night showing of "The Dark Knight Rises" has already led to
online criticism of parents who would bring a baby to such a movie.
Some of the comments at
CNN.com included: "What kind of parent takes a three-month old child to a
midnight screening of a movie?" "Bad parenting!!!"
Photos: Shooting at Colorado movie theater
To which I say: Back off
on the judgment. Do you think anyone -- a parent or not -- would go to a
movie if they could predict there would be a mass shooting?
"Judging parents at a
time like this is unbelievable to me," says parenting expert Laura
Markham, a psychologist and founding editor of AhaParenting.com.
"We are always so quick to judge other parents when their child gets
hurt, because if we can make ourselves different -- if we would never
have done that -- then our child is safe.
"If the baby drops off to
sleep while you're walking him outside, but you know he will be up in
two hours, and he can still sleep through anything, I can certainly
understand why a parent might decide to catch a movie."
Police: 71 people shot in movie theater
Listen to theater shooting 911 calls
Witness sees shots through theater wall
The comfort of other
moviegoers is a whole other consideration (and conversation), but when
it comes to bringing a baby to a movie, it's not necessarily harmful to
the kid. Plus, it can be a vital pick-me-up for an exhausted and
culture-deprived new parent.
All sense of day or
night seems to disappear with the arrival of that wiggly munchkin.
During those first few months after the birth of a child, parents sleep
whenever we can, wear whatever is clean (and maybe not so clean) and
(for the mamas who breast-feed) eat with one hand while holding the baby
to breast-feed at the same time.
That's because babies
emerge from the womb having slept mostly during the day and staying
awake during the night. It takes at least four weeks for their melatonin
production to kick in and for babies gradually to switch to nighttime
sleeping, says Dr. Ari Brown,
author of "Baby 411" and a pediatrician in Austin, Texas. A 3-month-old
might be feeding at midnight, but the baby would not be expected to
sleep through the night.
"From zero to three
months, when it comes to sleep, you do what you gotta do," Brown says.
"The concept of having a schedule or real sleep pattern is an oxymoron.
It's just not there."
That's why parents tend
to become nocturnal creatures, feeding, changing diapers and doing
laundry whenever we can. Everything else takes a back seat to meeting
the basic needs of a human tadpole. Scheduling a daytime haircut
requires precision military planning, lest parents are away when the
little angel is hungry and lets loose with his or her piercing cries. I
would have tried to go to a late-night movie if I wasn't trying to
sleep.
When Atlanta mother Leah
Case's daughter was 3 months old, Case and her husband would join
friends for dinner, bringing along their soundly sleeping baby in a car
seat. "I am an extremely regimented, scheduled parent, but if I thought
my child would sleep through a movie at that age, I absolutely would
have taken them," said Case, whose daughter is now 10 months. "She
honestly slept like a rock anywhere we went until she was about 5
months."
It's true that several
movie theater chains have capitalized on the cries for help from
movie-deprived new parents. California-based Krikorian Premiere Theatres offers "Mommy Movie Mondays" with amenities such as stroller check-in and changing tables. The "Crybaby Matinee" at Hawaii's Consolidated Theaters
lowers the volume to protect babies' sensitive ears and brightens the
lights so parents can easily come and go for feedings or tantrums.
With her 8-week-old son
sleeping no more than three hours at a time, new parent Katie Feeney
said she couldn't imagine having enough energy to make it to an early or
late movie with or without her son.
Feeney, a stay-at-home
mother in Brighton, Massachusetts, tends to stay awake during the day so
she's exhausted by day's end. When her son wakes up for nighttime
feedings, a duty she shares with her husband, she simply watches
whatever she's recorded on her DVR to get her through the night.
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