During a recent wait in my doctor’s office, I browsed through Maclean’s magazine. I found a two-page article by the Canadian journalist Rebecca Eckler. The article was an excerpt from her book, Wiped! Life with a Pint-Sized Dictator, in which she chronicles her first two years as a parent.
My reaction was visceral. I’m sure my blood pressure rose and my face flushed. Here is an apparently healthy woman with one, apparently healthy child. She has a committed partner and a nanny. Yet she seems completely dumbfounded, bored and exasperated by parenting. She calls her daughter “Devil Child”.
I know this is supposed to be hip and funny. Maybe I’m neither, but I found her portrayal of parenting irritating, sad, and not particularly newsworthy. I haven’t read the book, to be fair, but I sent Maclean’s a letter. They may not publish it, but I will.
To the editors,
Rebecca Eckler (April 2) seems all but defeated by parenting her only child. She has a nanny and a partner who is engaged, yet she can’t seem to manage an average day with her daughter, or “Devil Child” as her baby is now known in Canada. I have a few suggestions that may help Ms. Eckler.
First, she might speak with single parents, especially those who cannot afford a nanny, to understand how much more difficult her life might be without hired help or a partner to call a half-dozen times each day. Ms. Eckler might also check with members of Multiple Births Canada to learn that parents successfully and, yes, happily, raise more than one baby at a time. If she really wanted insight into being “wiped”, she should visit a children’s hospital. Parents of sick and special needs kids could surely teach Ms. Eckler about exhaustion, perseverance, and perhaps even unconditional love. That Ms. Eckler’s experience of parenting should gain so much press is both infuriating and sad.
