People warn you about all the ways your life will change when you bring a baby home from the hospital. They forecast sleepless nights, missing out on happy hour and having spit up on your suit jacket. They joke about toddlers coming into your room because they’re scared at 4AM and pacing the floor when your teenager is five minutes past curfew. What they don’t tell you is that all of a sudden your television habits will change as well.
“Oh, Krista,” you’re thinking. “Are you watching Mickey Mouse Club already?” Well, yes. But that’s not the point. I’m talking about the entertainment I used to watch – crime and drama during prime time, daytime soap operas, news and suspense movies. All of these former mindless escapes from reality are now a glimpse into someone else’s reality. Instead of being situations that would never happen to me, they become something else to fear.
Whether it’s a toddler being taken from her parents, a father in the middle of an international custody battle, a gunman on a yacht shooting into a crowd of elite snobs or an out of control subway car, I can’t stop thinking “what if that was happening to my child, or my husband, or me.” And then my throat gets tight, the hair on the back of my neck raises and I get up to make sure all of our doors are locked, keeping the imaginary bad guys out and my family safe and sound.
I asked Craig the other night after a particularly disturbing episode of Criminal Minds how he could watch those kinds of TV shows. He chuckled and said that he’s a grown up who is able to separate what’s real and what’s not. I guess when I gave birth I lost my ability to distinguish reality from something written by creative types with messed up imaginations and too much internet access. So while he is enjoying a suspenseful plot line I’m planning my course of action for the next time I’m at a swanky party on a yacht that gets hijacked by drug dealers with a bug up their ass. What? It could happen.
And in the meantime I’ve gained a further appreciation for sit-coms, HGTV and the Disney Channel.
{ 5 comments }
I, agree! I was at the gym on the treadmill and caught myself tearing up watching a Brink’s Security commercial. The mom and daughter are home by themselves when the thief kicks in the door. I thought to myself, “They must be so scared!” And then I snapped back into reality where I was extremely embarrassed, looking at my feet for the rest of my workout.
I know what you mean! We had to stop watching Criminal Minds while I was pregnant because all of a sudden all of their plots were about babies and pregnant ladies. It was too much for my husband to handle and he banned me from watching it. lol.
TV habits do change….and not just because the little ones are watching either! Although some of the extreme things that happen on TV many times aren’t actually bound to happen…it still makes you think about things that could happen. That’s when the worrying and the mommy instinct kicks in!
Ha! I knew I wasn’t the only one! I can’t handle alot of movies I used to be able to anymore. And I agree, even some commercials make me tear up! lol
I know what you mean. If I see any movie where something’s happening to the children or family, I’m crying like crazy. I just start thinking what if that ever happened to us.
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