Goodnight Moon

I was cleaning out bookshelves in my son's room the other day. He's in high school now, and while many of his books are on CD or access via the computer, there are still textbooks in use, big, thick books, which need space on his bookshelf. While I have certainly done a lot of weeding out and donating through the years, there are a few favorites I have from his baby days that I will always keep, just need to find a new place for.

Guess How Much I Love You, all of the Erik Carle books and Goodnight Moon are among the treasures. All these years later, there are still sections I have committed to memory! I know that there are always new and wonderful children's books being published, but these seem to be timeless.

A few years back, one of the moms who attended a new moms group I lead sent me a link to an updated version of Goodnight Moon from the New Yorker. It was after one of the many group discussions we’d had about just how overwhelming it was as a new mom to sort out all the information that new parents are constantly bombarded with especially in our efforts to keep our kids safe and healthy. We could all share a laugh that it wasn’t so long ago that children were raised without the use of car seats, bike helmets, and exposed to all kinds of second hand smoke- not that we would advocate any of these things. Absolutely not! But simply, how hard it is to keep straight and sort through all the information that comes our way, or that we find when doing a Google search at 2am! It often feels overwhelming.

I have always found humor to be a good way to deal with stress and in fact, there are studies that prove it. I often ask moms, as they “graduate” from a new moms group, as they look back on their first year of motherhood what wisdom they might pass on to the newest moms in the group, and the response is almost universal. They wish they didn’t worry so much in the beginning.

We all do it, to varying degrees, based on our inborn temperament, but it’s pretty hard to be completely immune to anxiety, as in my personal opinion, much of this anxiety is imposed from external forces. So here’s a link, enjoy some good humor and healthy perspective!

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/daily-shouts/goodnight-nanny-cam