I must be defective.
I think I’m missing that vital gene in womenfolk that causes us to ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’ at newborns, and to want desperately to hold them and make nonsense words at them.
Today at work, the woman who’s currently out on maternity leave decided to come visit and bring her firstborn for everyone to see. Nothing against either of them, really, but I couldn’t have cared less. All the womenfolk cooing and awwing over the baby girl actually started to grate on my nerves after a few minutes.
Sure, when I signed out for lunch, I passed by the group of ladies ogling the baby, and I took a look at her… and, sure enough, it was a baby. Asleep, to boot, which I think is the very best kind of baby. I looked at her for a grand total of about five seconds, and then I was done. I may have smiled, to be polite. No oohing or gooing or other general cutesiness from me.
Maybe it’s a learned reaction. Every time I get near a very young baby and try to hold it, it invariably intimates from my general attitude that a.) I am not its Mommy, and b.) I am not, in fact, a Mommy at all. At which point, of course, the child becomes disenfranchised with being held by some interloper and demands a real Mommy. Loudly.
It’ll be different when it’s my kid. I hope. Maybe my ga-ga goo-goo genes will activate… or maybe I’ll lose my fear of looking stupid and/or overly sappy in public.
I often wonder about the same thing, well, not so much the mother part. As of right now, holding babies freaks me out. I guess I enjoy looking at them and getting them to either laugh and/or drool. I think that once you have a child of your own, all the associated behaviors and feelings will kick in. Word.
i couldnt stand babies until my sister had one o.O the idea that they might spit up on me sent me into fits of gagging.
now i’m totally stoked for my other sister to deliver. DELIVER ALREADY. pop that kid out! i wanna play with it!!
I think there’s an obstacle you have to get over with babies. When you first start being around them, you tend to think of them as “things” with mysterious maintenance needs. Once you get over that you can start thinking of them as little people that want to be played with and stop thinking of them as little drool factories that just want to wipe their spit on you. As for the goo-goo-ga-ga crap, that *has* to be learned. I’ve never felt like goo-gooing at any baby. I assume they’d benefit more from hearing real words than a bunch of gibberish anyway.