Trade-Offs: Raising a Baby in the 21st Century
Editor’s Note: Allison Wolff is the Founder of Vibrant Planet, a company that provides strategy and communications for companies and nonprofits focused on social and environmental innovation. She was also lead strategist and writer at Stone Yamashita Partners and former Director of Marketing for Netflix. This is her first contribution to GO Media.
I am the mother of a 9 month old little girl named Emerson. I struggled for years—almost to the point of having the age window close on me—with the question of whether or not to have a kid because of planet’s likely dismal future. Emerson is a “we didn’t try not to get pregnant” baby and, because she dropped into my womb with only one unprotected “oops”, I tell myself that she was fated to be here given all the trials and tribulations my other 40 year old friends have gone through to have children. A friend who is a climate scientist/astrologist/string theorist convinced me that she is likely one of the planet saving souls who has been waiting to arrive on Earth.
Since I found out I was pregnant, I have struggled deeply with what kind of mom I ideally want to be versus what is realistic given a number of difficult, well…realities. I grapple with everything from sleep and food introduction philosophies to vaccinations and what products to buy or accept from friends as gifts (i.e. I have been very particular about what I allow to enter my daughter’s mouth). I can’t wait until I have to start thinking about discipline and potty training.
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I have worked in the corporate and nonprofit sustainability/green/environmental space for five years and, thanks to clients like Bill McDonough*, know way too much about what is in our products, our homes, our cars—everything man made around us. Like all conscious humans, I am a walking eco-dichotomy—I’ll preach to others about why a farmer’s market chicken deserves to be priced at $19 yet I go get my hair highlighted every three months.
With regards to all the stuff needed for baby Emerson, I have been faced with weighing more trade-offs than I imagined possible in figuring out a) what’s necessary, b) what’s safe, C) what can we afford, and, c) what Emerson will actually like. “Safe” for me goes way beyond the question of choking. I can’t agree more with McDonough’s* statement “What kind of society would make something like this to put into the mouths of children?”* In fact, I apply it to every toy and clothing item I buy or accept (gifts and hand-me-downs)—however, sometimes, I give.
This type of hyperobsessiveness is why IMHO moms who have more than one kid are better parents. When one has multiple children, one simply does not have the time or energy to overthink every single little thing.
Do I make a serious effort to live simply and be a good steward of God’s creation? Absolutely! Am I a total control freak about it? No. I don’t need to run myself ragged trying to be “perfect” when I’m living a much more eco-friendly lifestyle than the overwhelming majority of American moms.
Environmental safety is as important as food and shelter for a child. Green isn’t a “nice-to-have.” Often, not always, buying safe products amounts to simply making a choice between quality and quantity. Whether you have one child or five, better to think about long-term health and do everything you can to protect it. Being green isn’t about being a perfect parent. It’s as basic as food, water and air.
I love your point of view! Maybe because I don’t have children yet…
But I think Crimson Wife doesn’t explain why she thinks moms with “hyperobsessiveness” are worst than other moms. Because she let her child cry in the car? Children need love not tons of toys.
I love this post!
In response to Crimson Wife, she explains why she is going into detail. She’s been working in the eco-business sector so she “knows to much” thus leaving her with all these voices in her head as she makes decisions for her child. And yes, we all know that with our first we tend to have extra time to think more, but is that necessarily a bad thing. I’m not thinking CW gets the extremity of the eco-system we are dealing with.
I just saw Bill McDonough speak yesterday at Cornell and it was amazingly uplifting. I’m just so happy to hear that people in the business sector are hearing this message.
Good for you Allison, your the type of mom we need to help elicit change that supports health for every person, animal, plant on this planet.
There’s a lot of doubt surrounding which methods/products are truly sustainable and which are just green washing. Sometimes we need someone to get to the “bottom” of it all - Check out our myth-busting video “What’s Your Big Green Lie?!” which gives a taste of the widespread ignorance of green issues including cloth VS disposable diapers at http://www.biggreenlies.com.
Of course I don’t think hyperobsessive control freak parents are the worst ones out there. The worst parents are the ones who simply don’t care about their kids. It’s obviously better to care too much than too little!
But I feel strongly that parents should strive for the “happy medium”, trying to be a “good enough” parent rather than obsessing about every single solitary little thing in a futile attempt to be a “perfect” mom. The big stuff is what is most important to the health of our children and our planet. Freaking out about 100% of the small stuff is not likely to make a significant difference in the long run- just think of all the awful stuff we were exposed to as kids and we turned out just fine. And frankly I don’t think it’s good for a child’s mental health to be raised by an overly anxious “helicopter” mom.
I’ve never met a new mother who isn’t a bit “hyperobsessive” about their first child! I certainly fell under that category with my first and, similar to what Crimson Wife seemed to say, was more relaxed and a better parent to my kids after I had my second child.
Allison’s blog was a great starting point for those of us hoping to make better (greener) choices for our kids and hardly sounded like a helicopter mom “freaking out about 100% of the small stuff”. She courageously admitted her shortcomings and her worries - not unlike my mother who was a nurse obsessing over unlikely accidents that could befall me or my kids. She had seen too much! Let’s be grateful for being privy to the journey Allison is on and the work she’s done and willing to share with us!
And a word about what we were exposed to and how we turned out just fine: why do I see so many 40-somethings getting cancer? Prostate, testicular, breast, the list goes on and on of people in my life who are in their 40’s receiving these diagnoses. I wouldn’t count on that for my kids!