baby disorder

[originally posted on myspace on March 23, 2010]

So, yesterday, during the glorious day off, I watched some Dr. Phil (yeah, I know). It was an odd show about "kid obsession." The first segment was this sad stage mom wanting her three year old to make it in Hollywoodtown. Everyone told her, "don't waste your money, lady" and she nodded and smiled but did not listen. Poor three year old.

The second segment was about this very young (early 20s) married lady who really wants a baby. Really, really wants a baby. And not just any baby, but a "perfect" baby and, heck, make that three "perfect" babies. Um, ok. That's perfectly "normal." But this lady had bought thousands and thousands of dollars of baby stuff...and not just 'oh, that stroller's on sale, let me pick one, or two, up.' No. Toys and clothes and assorted baby stuff. She has a whole room devoted to future baby and all of future baby's stuff. A room that will not be, while she's alive, turned into a guest room or anything else.

Yup. That's perfectly.normal.

So, that combination...obsession with a "perfect" baby and hoarding (yes, hoarding) all that baby stuff before she has any true need for it...surely, Dr. Phil will tell her, "lady, this is crazy...you need to stop spending/wasting your money, go volunteer to hold some preemies down at the hospital if you really need to have a baby in your arms (and maybe that'll get you over the whole "perfect" thing)...because even *if* (yes, if, because not everyone is just promised a baby) you have a kid, who is to say that all the crap you've bought is "outdated" (even if it's not) by then...who is to say that you won't have a perfect baby or you may have a perfect baby who then grows up into a not so "perfect" kid...who is to say that buying all this unnecessary stuff for your future kid may actually bankrupt the kid for when he/she actually needs the money (doctors, schooling, etc)."

Please, Dr. Phil, please tell her something along those lines.

He turns to the camera to address the "women" watching at home. All the women who are watchign at home who absolutely, surely must be screaming at their TV sets (because, that's what ladies do, huh, they scream lots coz of their periods) that there is nothing insane or worrying about this, that the "biological clock" urge to have babies is absolutely normal, says women watching at home (according to Dr. Phil), so don't dare get after her about that...

I was so annoyed at the giganitc, sweeping gender stereotype made by a pretend doctor in the year 2010 during daytime television...that I turned channels and never looked back.

That's what I get for watching Dr. Phil.