No Love for the Lovey

Baby showers are wonderful things. Yes, the purpose is to equip the parents-to-be with the necessary equipment for successfully caring for a baby. But let's be honest. The only true necessities are a car seat, a place to sleep, and some diaper rash cream. The other 99% of the gifts consist of stuff that makes caring for a baby easier. Or more fun. Or stuff that is just so freaking cute that you can't pass it up. And merchants are onto this. They know that one sure fire way to get a baby item to sell is to put a baby animal on it. Another way: make it soft. And what is the magical combination of these two impossible-to-resist traits? That's right. It's the ever-popular, perfect-baby-shower-gift lovey.

We got a lot of loveys. Smooth loveys, textured, loveys, rabbit loveys, bear loveys, cow loveys, loveys that are pastel and loveys that are vibrant shades of pink and green. And with each one, I oohed and ahhed and imagined my sweet baby girl carrying one around the house, snuggling with one in her bed, the familiar soft fur and satin helping soothe her to sleep. We had such a variety that I took the tags off and washed them all, wanting to give her a choice in styles--would she prefer the long-eared bunny? The yellow cow that jingles? The cloud-soft textured bear? I stacked them neatly on the bookshelf in her room, waiting for the day I could give one to her and melt as she her chubby little fingers gripped the fabric, as she wrapped her sweet arms around it in the simple and honest embrace of baby love.

When she started daycare at 15 weeks, I slept with one of her loveys tucked into my nursing tank. Like all daycare mommas, I was worried about her and how she would feel being in a strange new place surrounded by strange new people all day. What better way to provide some familiar comfort than with a soft baby animal blanket that smells like mom? I put it in her cubby the first day . . . and there it stayed, day after day, week after week, month after month.

Around that same time, I started giving her a lovey at home, in the mornings when she was fed and dressed and watching her daddy and me rush around like crazy people trying to get us all out the door on time. She showed about as much interest in it as she does the burp cloths we have strategically placed around the house. She grabbed it, lifted it over her head, pulled it off her face, and pushed it aside in search of toys that sing or spin or bang when she whacks them on the table.

Eventually we brought the daycare lovey home. Eventually we stopped giving her the cow lovey in the morning. We never let her have any loose blankets in her crib, so there isn't even that exposure. Her plethora of loveys, of cute, soft, cuddly baby animals with blanket skirts, sat on a shelf in her room. I just figured loveys weren't her thing. Kind of like pacis. Some babies dig 'em. Some babies need 'em. Others never do.

It wasn't until talking to a friend that I started to wonder if I should be encouraging some lovey-love a little more enthusiastically. Her son had apparently "forgotten" how to suck his thumb--he had been congested and needed to mouth breathe for a week or two, and so had gotten out of the habit. She was wondering if she should introduce a lovey to him to give him a new way of self-soothing. After talking to her, I started thinking about my friends' kids. Most of them have some kind of attachment to some soft item--a lovey, a favorite stuffed animal, something. But not baby girl. In fact, I haven't really noticed a preference for any one item other than Sophie, her so-very-worth-every-penny chew toy giraffe that she throws her arms out for, grabs, and then ruthlessly gums into submission.

That's not a problem, right? Is "forming attachments with toys" some kind of emotional developmental milestone that I'm supposed to be watching out for? Somewhere in the back of my mind I think I remember reading one time that sociopaths tend to have been children who had difficulty making emotional connections. Am I making that up? Is this the first red flag, the thing that we'll be talking about on the news 30 years from now, "Well, she always seemed like such a happy baby, but she never did like her loveys. We should have known."

I think I'll pull some of them back out and give it another go. Well, at least the ones that are left after I gave a bunch away to Haiti orphans. Anything to make sure that my baby doesn't grow up to be a sociopath, right?

And if she still prefers her toys that sing and spin and bang when she whacks them on the table, well, that's fine, too. I guess that counts as an attachment, doesn't it? And her poor, much-nommed Sophie--lord knows she lunges for that anytime she sees it. (sidetrack: sometimes I think about what her toys would say if they could talk, a la Toy Story. I don't think Sophie would have a very happy tale.) And really, it's just one other thing that we won't have to wean her off of in the future.

Gah. This parenting thing is tough business. It's such a fine line between "emotional crutch that you'll have to break them of in the future" and "emotional development so that they don't turn into sociopaths." Tough business I tell you. Tough.