Parenting... sort of...

Last spring, slogging through the mire of required courses for my high school age son, we discovered that every student is required to take a half credit parenting class. Trying to be proactive, we decided to get it out of the way during the second semester of this, his freshman year. We were presented with two options: Child Psychology and Parenting. We knew that in one of the courses, a weekend with a computerized baby was required. Logic dictated that the baby would be part of the Parenting class, so my son signed up for Child Psychology.

Apparently logic has nothing to do with high school courses, because my son was assigned a weekend in April with “Wing Lee”, his Asian baby. In preparation for our guest, my son cancelled all of his plans. He ditched the movie with his friends, declined to sing in the choir at church, and planned to stay inside with Wing Lee all weekend. There was no way in hell he was dragging a baby doll out anywhere with him.

On Friday, I drove to school to pick Sam up. He trudged out of the school with a blanket covered lump in a car seat, a diaper bag, and grim expression. The entire trip home he fiddled with the sensor bracelet that he would have to scan over the baby’s stomach or back before dealing with it, to confirm that he was the caregiver. We got home, unloaded, and waited for the “activation”. His teacher had refused to give any inkling as to time of launch.

Wing Lee's arrival

Around 4:00pm Wing Lee began to cry. He had 4 cries: Feeding, Changing, Burping, and Rocking. The student was required to “chime” the infant with his wrist band, determine the baby’s need and meet it, and then record the time and his comments. The first few hours were basically uneventful, with feedings and changings and miscellaneous cooing sounds in between.

The feeding and changing cries became easy to identify. The burping and rocking were indistinguishable and were increasingly grating. It took between fifteen and thirty minutes to satisfy the burping or rocking cry. Apparently Wing Lee had colic... or rust on his microchip... either way he was one unhappy electronic infant.

Wing Lee being unhappy

Sam had planned to just forgo sleep for the weekend, but we convinced him that he needed to try to sleep when the baby did. He shut his door for the night, Wing Lee tucked safely in his car seat.

Saturday morning found Sam up early with Wing Lee. The night wasn’t too bad, but knowing what his friends had gone through, he knew that Saturday night was bound to be horrible. The weather was gorgeous, but taking Wing Lee outside would be risky. If anyone bumped the seat or jostled him wrong it could cost points. If Wing Lee was picked up without perfect head support, he would wail for what felt like an hour. We took him in the back yard for a short while, feeding, changing, burping and rocking and generally not enjoying the day.

By afternoon we were getting sick of Wing Nut’s whining. He had no schedule at all. The teacher told the students that he had varying schedules, but I have had three children and ten nieces and nephews and none of them had any “schedule” like Wing Nut. He would cry to be fed, take the bottle for 10 minutes, be quiet for 5 minutes and want to be fed again. Once he ate 4 times in one hour with no burping. The burping was completely random and unrelated to feeding. As a teaching tool, this thing was ridiculous. If it had a learning curve, where the student could begin to anticipate the baby’s needs, maybe it would have made sense, but the random absurd demands taught nothing.

Saturday night, Sam was up with Wong Fu 12 times. He was exhausted. We found him on the couch in the morning, baby next to him apparently sleeping. “Sure, sleep now, Stupid!” my son glared at it. Wing Nut demanded Sam’s full attention Saturday and by nightfall he was a mess. He dreaded going to bed because he was certain that the baby would cry every five minutes.

We put an air mattress next to our bed and kept Sam and Wong Fu company for the night. He wasn’t up as often, but Monday morning, we were all ready for Wing Nut to go back to school.

With relish I completed my parent portion of the baby packet. I stated that the tool was foolish and useless. I do not think it will deter teens from having sex. I do not think that in the heat of the moment, a teen will stop and say, “Oh no! Remember Wing Nut! We should stop!” The experience did not kick off any conversations about parenting because we have already had them. I ranted about the lack of schedule and the horror of keeping a fifteen year old up all night with a guessing game. C’mon, at night it couldn’t be programmed to change, eat, burp and go back to sleep? I made clear the fact that this was a parenting activity and had no place in a Child Psych class. Luckily my pages did not count as part of his grade. He managed to get a 90% all on his own. With one unsupported head pick up and one cry that went unanswered because we couldn’t figure out what the hell Wing Nut wanted, he passed with flying colors.

Wing Lee by the end of his visit (We had all aged)

What did we learn from this wonderful experience? I’m making sure my other sons sign up for Parenting Class.

Lucy