Controversy Wednesday: BLOGGING ABOUT BABY

Just wait till he sees what I've blogged about him.

I remember the first time I heard about reality TV.  I was home from college for the summer and my parents had taken me out to their local Mexican restaurant, Paco’s (rest in peace).   Between bites of fajita, my mom and dad were gushing about some new wacky show called Survivor.

“The contestants have to complete challenges for food on a desert island,” said my mom.  “If they don’t win, they don’t get to eat.  And they have to make alliances with each other so they don’t get voted off the island at the tribal council.  All the starving and fighting and pain – it’s all captured on tape.  It’s AWESOME!”

I wanted to ask if the cameras even caught the contestants taking a dump, but I was too busy being mortified at the concept of a television show using money as bait for people to act their absolute worst on camera.  For all the world to see.  How disgusting!

And now, here I am with an online journal documenting the ups and downs of my son Seabass’ life for all the world to see.  And bowel movements definitely happen here.

It used to be bad enough that parents brought out “brag books” to show photos of their kids in various states of undress to complete strangers.  Now, we can take a photo, upload it to the internet and broadcast Jimmy’s first potty to an entire world of strangers in real time.   Better yet, we can *ahem* share our personal opinions about child-rearing with strangers and *ahem* graciously receive their thoughts in return. 

This is dangerous technology for someone like me.  You see, I have a rare disease known as BTS.  Blogging Tourette Syndrome.  I have no control over what I write; whatever’s buried in my subconscious just flies onto the page and I click “PUBLISH” before I take a moment to think.  Thankfully, Jake is sensible. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve started to blog about our post-Seabass sex life (“People need to know this!”) only to be shut down by an appropriately private husband (“No, Jaime, they definitely do not need to know this.  Use your BRAIN.  People IN MY OFFICE read your blog.”).  Thank God for him. 

You know who should be thanking Jake for putting boundaries on me?  Seabass.  That poor child has been publicized as a crying and peeing, butt-stealing, dog-eaten, easily-abandoned, frustration-causing and depression-inducing little boy.  And that’s not even mentioning the dandruff!  What happens when he’s old enough to hear about what I’ve written from his friends?  “Hey Seabass, I hear you peed the bed again.  Nice job.  Now I’m gonna have to beat you up.”  (Jake assures me this will never happen because with a name like Seabass, you tend to be the beater-upper-guy, not the beaten-up-guy.) 

Okay, so I would never really blog about my child wetting the bed.  Because Jake would stop me. 

It’s amazing to me what other bloggers write about sometimes, though.  Take Heather Armstrong, for example.  Her blog, www.dooce.com is one of the most highly-respected and widely-read blogs out there.  And why?  Because she writes (beautifully and hilariously) about things that no one in their right mind would EVER EVER EVER post on the internet.  She’s actually so open that she was fired from her job for writing about her boss in 2003 and had a verb named after her: “to be dooced” is to be fired from your job for blogging about it.  Now she blogs full-time and gets paid a bunch for it.  Talk about irony.

Or Penelope Trunk, whose blog posts include everything from her time in a mental ward to a crumbling relationship with her husband, yes, CURRENT husband.

And Jill Smokler of www.ScaryMommy.com?  Let’s just say the weather’s cloudy with a chance of F-bombs.

To join the ranks of these much-revered and oft-followed women in baring it all and watching the comments roll in is very enticing.  Some days, I’m so tempted to tell you the details of Seabass’ natural birth and the havoc it wreaked below the belt I could just scream.  Or about my cellulite.  Or about our post-Seabass sex life.  (My apologies to any and all relatives.  But while I’m at it, you may as well know that, yes, we have had sex.) 

I think for now, I’ll just play it safe. 

Ah, who am I fooling?  If you stick around long enough, you’ll probably hear it all.  Oh look, here comes Jake.