Bringing Up Bébé

 

Katherine Hepburn as Susan. [Online image] 1938.

I didn't like Bringing Up Bébé from the minute I heard about it. And I never would have started reading it if my French mother-in-law hadn't sent me a copy last year while I was on vacation. I mean, an American mom in Paris writing glowing anecdotes about "French mothering" (that has be an oxymoron, by the way)!? She can't be talking about the same French moms I see on a daily basis. Ok, I'll admit (grudgingly) that Parisian moms may have the guilt-free "work-life balance" down better than we English-speaking expats. But if embracing the mantra, "the perfect mother doesn't exist," means that you have no qualms about pushing your Maclaren down the street with one hand while dangling a lit cigarette from the other, I'd really rather continue living with my Anglo-Saxon guilt. 
As for the whole relaxed-and-seductive French mother spiel: of course they're cool and collected and sneaker-free! They're holding down a desk job all day--not chasing after a toddler! I still remember running into my husband's French colleague (and mother of two) last spring. She was out on her lunch break, and I was hurrying to the bus with my son after a Gymboree class. "You look tired!" she told me in surprise. A few months later, our two families spent a summer afternoon together because we were vacationing nearby. "I'm exhausted!" she said, admitting that being an around-the-clock mom was hard work. I managed what I hoped was a cool and collected smile of empathy, while my sandaled, vacation-happy feet took me for a triumphant victory lap--without the least bit of guilt.
 

Let 'em Cry, Let 'em Cry, Let 'em Cry!

As a new mother in Necker's maternity ward, I just assumed that my roommates (I was there long enough to have two) both happened to have severe emotional disorders--or hearing problems. What kind of person would just sit there chewing on tepid pintade while her newborn screamed? But my roommates were not the odd balls out in French motherhood. Apparently the French still believe that you can spoil a baby. Give into her caprices now (i.e.: pick her up), and you'll spend the next eighteen years with an obnoxious, whiny, manipulative monstre.
My Parisian gynecologist summed it up when she saw me flinching on the examination table as my two-month-old hollered in his stroller, just out of my reach. "Does that really bother you?" she asked as she continued the post-natal exam. I realized she was talking about my son's cries.
Yes, I'm afraid it does. Sucks to be human.  

Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable as Scarlett and Rhett Butler. [Online image] 1939.