"Elizabeth Reid" <eliz_reid@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:c3338aa8.0307080637.746283fe@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> "JG" <jg030103@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:<1GhOa.10498$Hw.7698515@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>...
> > Another article for the "Well, DUH!" file. Amazing how some people
> > manage to walk without someone else (a physician?) telling them
> > (headphones?) how ("Left foot...right foot...left foot...right
> > foot...left foot...").
> > How many fights do you imagine this one little piece of
advice--"Back to
> > Sleep"--has caused? Husband: "Aaah, honey? The back of Bubba's
head
> > is gettin' as flat as a pancake. Whaddaya say we let him sleep on
his
> > belly for a while to see if it helps?" Wife (in a high-pitched,
panicky
> > voice): "NO! !! No, no, no, no, NO! He'll DIE of SIDS if we do
that!
> > Dr. Imdeexpert said babies should sleep on their BACKS! So what if
> > Bubba looks like some sorta weird doofus; at least he's ALIVE!!")
> Right. How ridiculous. I'd much rather my son live fast, die
> young, and leave a beautiful corpse. A round head would look so
> much nicer in the last pictures I'd ever have of him. (As it happens,
> he never had any flattening problems, although he did have a bald
> spot on the back of his head for a while. The horror!)
The chance of an infant dying as a result of being placed on his/her
stomach to sleep are *extemely* remote. (Indeed, I think the "BtS"
campaign has gotten too much of the credit for the reduction in SIDS; a
"campaign" advising parents to clear their infant's sleeping area of
toys, pillows, etc. has been concurrently conducted, and no doubt should
also be credited for many "saved" lives.) If a child sleeps *much*
better on his/her stomach (falls asleep faster, stays asleep longer), it
makes much better sense, IMO, to let him/her do so.
There's a trade-off to be made in the case of kids whose heads become
pronouncably misshapen: Are the costs (financial and other) of having
the deformity corrected worth the benefit (very, very small) of forcing
an infant to sleep on his/her back? Likewise (alternatively), are the
costs of *not* correcting a noticable deformity (teasing, ridiculing,
name-calling, ...[= bullying, these days]) worth it?
> From what I've read, in the majority of cases the flattening resolves
> itself over time. Even if it didn't, though, what possible
implications
> would this have for 'our country's future'? Millions spent on
> hat redesign, plunging us into an economic crisis? Increased
> incidence of mosquito-borne illness because the little vampires have
> a nice flat surface to fasten upon? Round-headed aliens arrive and
> exterminate us all because they think we look silly? What's the
> doomsday scenario here?
"Doomsday," IMO, is already upon us (the US). The point of my posting
the article (along with my comments) was not to lament the creation of a
society with weird-shaped-head kids (hell, some of the kids whom I tutor
have deformities/conditions that they'd undoubtedly trade for a
flattened head in a heartbeat), but to deplore the existence of a
society in which parents apparently can't discern and resolve problems
for themselves. I'd like to think parents who notice a flattening of
their child's head could figure out how to alleviate/solve the problem
themselves (such as by employing some of the suggestions in the article,
or by--MY GOD!--placing the child to sleep on his/her stomach), but
apparently many are either too stupid or too blindly obedient to
authorities/"experts." (Stupidity and blind obedience to "experts"
aren't mutually exclusive, of course.)
> I think there are decent reasons to ignore the recommendation, and
> obviously the risk to any one child is probably low. Fear of
> flat-headedness is silly though.
I agree.
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