Commandment 3 Avoid Experts
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Did you read What to Expect When You’re Expecting? Of course you did. Or your spouse did. Everyone did. I did. I found it very helpful. And horrible.
Note:IL LIBRO
Note:IL LIBRO
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as the introduction to the fourth edition cheerfully proclaims, “More symptoms and more solutions than ever before.”
Note:MAREA DI SINTOMI
Note:MAREA DI SINTOMI
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Let’s take a glance at the twenty-nine pages on “eating well.” (Not to be confused with the brand extension, What to Eat When You’re Expecting—a whole book. By the time you’re done reading it, the baby’s in law school.)
Note:MANGIAR BENE
Note:MANGIAR BENE
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“Each bite during the day is an opportunity to feed that growing baby of yours healthy nutrients.” Not each meal. Not each day. Each bite has to be carefully considered
Note:OGNI BOCCONE CONTA
Note:OGNI BOCCONE CONTA
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maybe the slow class at school for junior. Maybe weight problems for life. Or worse.
Note:SE MN CURI OGNI BOCCONE
Note:SE MN CURI OGNI BOCCONE
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“better birthweight, improved brain development, reduced risk for certain birth defects. . . .”
Note:I BENEFICI
Note:I BENEFICI
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she is left to feel that she’s a horrible person.
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“Lose the guilt, hold the deprivation, and allow yourself a treat every once in a while.” A treat that will make “your tastebuds jump for joy.” And what exactly would that fantastic treat be? “A blueberry muffin.”
Note:INCITAMENTO
Note:INCITAMENTO
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on the one hand, it’s hard to argue with a book that says pregnant women should be eating well. On the other hand, it’s hard not to argue with a book that drives pregnant women crazy.
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AMBIVALENZA
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As an obstetrician who teaches at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York City, this is the sum total of his dietary advice for expectant moms: “Just eat like you have your whole life, but eat a little more.”
Note:RICETTA ALTERNATIVA
Note:RICETTA ALTERNATIVA
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(Aren’t the people who think about the consequences of each bite generally referred to as anorexics?)
Note:ANORESSIA
Note:ANORESSIA
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hyperconsciousness—the
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you would fail or at least forget the million particulars that you’re supposed to do. And then you’ll feel bad.
Note:SENTIRSI INADEMPIENTI ########## SU FACEBOOK FIN QUI
Note:SENTIRSI INADEMPIENTI ########## SU FACEBOOK FIN QUI
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The Happiest Toddler on the Block—ah yes, let’s compete for whose kid is happier—teaches
Note:COMPETIZIONE TRA I GENITORI
Note:COMPETIZIONE TRA I GENITORI
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What if you want to encourage good behavior in your child? Saying “Yay!” is no longer enough. Happiest Toddler suggests rewarding moppets “with a pen check mark on the back of their hands when they have done something good.”
Note:TIMBRINI
Note:TIMBRINI
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“First, my Lord, you woke up and did proceed not to throw your binky across the room. Huzzah, huzzah. Then, my Lord, when it was time for the day’s morning repast, you did splendidly wield your spoon like a big boy . . .”
Note:LITANIA DA RIPETERE OGNI SERA
Note:LITANIA DA RIPETERE OGNI SERA
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not just basic advice like “Try not to yell very much.” No, they tell you the exact words, like you’re a bumbling amateur who needs a script to say the right thing.
Note:OGNI PAROLA
Note:OGNI PAROLA
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in a book with the really promising title Am I a Normal Parent? there’s a whole section on how not to quash your child’s will to live when he asks if you like the picture he drew.
Note:I SUOI DISEGNI
Note:I SUOI DISEGNI
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“One way to help your child trust your response would be to take a minute or so to really look at the drawing and then, instead of commenting on the final product, say something about the process. For example, you might say, ‘I like the way you drew a black circle around the sun to make it stand out. I also like the red shirt on the boy in the picture. It reminds me of the shirt you wore to your last birthday party.’
Note:COME REAGIRE
Note:COME REAGIRE
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So I guess “That’s beautiful, hon!” makes them think we’re total liars and the world is a stinking cesspool of phonies?
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That same book has a whole page about whether to tell your child the tooth fairy is hooey—a
Note:LO GNOMO DEL DENTINO
Note:LO GNOMO DEL DENTINO
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Why do we suddenly need an expert telling us how to broach this touchy subject?
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“What books and videos should I choose for my child’s potty library?” Her what?
Note:SCEGLIRRE I LIBRI
Note:SCEGLIRRE I LIBRI
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Is your child studying for an advanced degree in Potty Studies?
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But when an author starts telling you not only to read potty books aloud to your child but to “extend your child’s favorite potty stories and songs into everyday play situations” and to “use hand puppets, finger puppets or spoon puppets to have a conversation about potty
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Where did this bizarre reliance on these folks come from? And can we wean ourselves off of it? Jillian Swartz, editor in chief of the online magazine Family Groove, believes it all started the same way the Food Network did, sort of. “Every ten years or so,” says Swartz, “a new, once-mundane job becomes deified. Think: Chefs in the nineties and handymen and home decorators in the two thousands.” About twenty years or so ago, another lowly job suddenly became chic: motherhood.
Note:LAVORI DI MODA. CUOCO DECORATORE... MAMMA
Note:LAVORI DI MODA. CUOCO DECORATORE... MAMMA
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fetishization of every last mother-loving detail of parenthood, and an ever-burgeoning breed of experts to propagate this often mind-numbing minutiae.
Note:FETICISMO
Note:FETICISMO
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The avalanche of expert advice—and nonexpert advice on nonetheless very enticing Web sites—undermines our belief that we are equipped with enough common sense
Note:IL DUBBIO SUL SENSO COMUNE
Note:IL DUBBIO SUL SENSO COMUNE
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That battered confidence, in turn, leads us to look ever more desperately to the experts wherever we find them.
Note:PAURE E VENDITORI DI RICETTE
Note:PAURE E VENDITORI DI RICETTE
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we feel like failures.
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Then when—surprise—our kids turn out not to be perfect, we know who’s to blame. We are!
Note:SAPPIAMO CHI ACCUSARE: NOI
Note:SAPPIAMO CHI ACCUSARE: NOI
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If only we’d put aside that deep-fried Oreo in our second trimester, she’d be in the gifted program at school. And if our child is cranky? Uncommunicative? Headed for five to ten years’ hard labor? That just might be because we told her, “Look, sweetie, a broken cracker is not the end of the world!” instead of saying, “Oooh, your cracker broke. Sad sad sad sad sad!” and respectfully relating.
Note:IL LAMENTO DELLA DISPERATA
Note:IL LAMENTO DELLA DISPERATA
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So what’s the alternative? Reading every book and article and trying to do absolutely all the stuff they recommend? (She asked rhetorically.) Or avoiding the experts entirely and perhaps missing out on some good advice? Well, it’s obviously somewhere in the middle,
Note:SOLUZIONE
Note:SOLUZIONE
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Barrett says, “Look for credentials.”
Note:CREDENZIALI
Note:CREDENZIALI
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ask your doctor to recommend a reliable book.
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They’re more ready to believe the ones who say, “Whatever you’ve heard is fine, isn’t.”
Note:VOGLIA D INCONSUETO
Note:VOGLIA D INCONSUETO
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fear sells?)
Note:LA PAURA FA VENDERE
Note:LA PAURA FA VENDERE
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Most of us came of age right alongside the consumer protection movement. As kids we learned that car companies knew about brake problems but hid them from the public, even as the cigarette manufacturers knew they were giving us cancer but pretended that they didn’t. Understandably, we grew up pretty cynical. But over the years, as we stopped trusting additives and preservatives and pesticides and saccharine and Western medicine and government and pretty much anything that wasn’t an organic potato wrapped in a recycled paper bag from Whole Foods, some of us just threw up our hands and decided it was impossible to trust anything or anyone. (Except Oprah.) The minute we heard something new and nefarious about a time-honored product or practice, a whole lot of us were ready to embrace it. Shampoo gives you cancer? We knew it!
Note:DEGENERAZIONE DEL PENSIERO CRITICO
Note:DEGENERAZIONE DEL PENSIERO CRITICO
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But as Barrett points out (knowing full well he will sound like just another “establishment” source not to be trusted): most companies really do not try to sell us deadly or defective products. Even if they have no corporate conscience whatsoever, doing wrong is still not worth it to them, because if they harm a single child, they’ll have to recall millions of products.
Note:MULTINAZIONALI
Note:MULTINAZIONALI
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So we have a choice: we can trust the self-proclaimed experts warning us that our body wash is toxic—and by the way, so is everything else—or we can just be glad we’re living in a highly regulated society that truly isn’t teeming with killer products.
Note:L ALTERNATIVA
Note:L ALTERNATIVA
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Dr. Spock famously began his baby care book with these reassuring words: “Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.” The mantra of today’s experts—“Trust us.
Note:FIDATI DI TE
Note:FIDATI DI TE
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remember that the best child-rearing advice boils down to the old basics. Listen to your kids. Love them. Keep them out of oncoming traffic.
LE BASI
LE BASI
