You Come First

Many years ago, when my son was an infant, I had a conversation with my grandmother-in-law, Nana. I was talking about my morning routine and feeding the baby. She told me about one of her friends and how she handled bringing up her children. The friends philosophy was that she always comes first. While in a lot of instances in life, it is important that you come first, I do not think that this should be the case with an infant. It seems that this woman would get up in the morning and totally take care of herself, before taking care of her child. She would get washed and dressed and have a full breakfast. Then she would attend to her baby. If the baby was crying, she would let him cry, until all of her needs were met. She felt that she needed to have all of her strength and have everything done, so that her baby could have her full attention. She just let the baby cry, until she was ready. I wonder if that made any difference in the baby's personality when he grew up. I will never know, but I have a feeling it did.