For Moms. Taking pictures of your baby. How much is too much? Solutions.

 

You have the most precious thing by your side. You’ve known  one another even before you’ve met, and every second you’re spending with each other alleviates any hardships life throws at you.
Those little eyes that wonder about the world, those small hands  and feet seem unrealistically perfect, and any little noise they make seem to want to tell you something.  When we had my son Patrick, I just couldn’t stop from spending time around him, and when him and my wife left to visit the grandparents for the first time ,to our native Romania, my heart broke. If I didn’t hear from them over the day I went through all stages of exasperation and psychological stress.

I know  how fast time goes by and babies at this age, literally change from one day to another.They react and look different by the time you come back from work. And you are wondering what else you missed. You don’t want to miss anything else and start taking pictures and videos on your phone (or any other device you have around the house).
Well, up to the point when your phone is filled up and you can’t anymore. Then you probably wonder, if this is a normal thing with other parents too.I would say it is a normal feeling/need, but let’s think about the entire scene for a moment.
Let’s talk about a couple of things first.

1. A Thousand Words.Remember you and your parents?  You most likely only have a few photos of you as a baby, but they bring those childhood memories to surface so clearly and vividly.Such candor and piety, so many memories from just one photo! Like a thousand words.
Solution:  Save 3-5 best of the best photos of each event you document. Make a family archival system that is easy to understand and follow and keep them where the family has access to.This could be a personal cloud(like we have a Qnap family server) or an online cloud that you can set privacy as you wish.( you can usually do backups to these and save on a hard drive just in case the service/company goes under)
The other day, I went outside with Patrick, my 4yo, and I took about 100 photos. I only kept 3(backed up the rest)

2. Annoying.Remember when you saw your other mommy friends post on Facebook? The one that posts a million pictures of her cute baby?Eating? Not one photo, but 27 photos of one meal! Now that’s documenting!  and sharing with the world.

3. Being in the moment

4.Psychological damage down the road. Thinking about this is as far fetched as living on the moon.Nonetheless, it is a reality. In my opinion there’s 2 scenarios that inevitably  will happen.
One is that your kid will slowly grow a repulsion against you/camera if every other moment you stop them from what they’re doing and ask to look at the camera.It is not interesting , not exciting or new anymore.Just like my mother in law :)) (joking of course). If this is your case, then, when this child will grow to his independent teens, and  adulthood, unconsciously they will not take pictures just because it was “forced” upon them when they didn’t have a choice..
The Other scenario is that every time you take a photo of him/her they will take it that they are important and you encourage that behavior. This means the Kid will feel more special every time you point the camera at them, like a VIP , which it will blow their self esteem and will loose  touch with reality pretty fast. I’m sure you can relate this to some stars kids, or know a spoiled  kid. Knowing this, you must also know, that egocentric  individuals  are less liked, tend to be hired less, and in general not a good company..
This will go against them at the end of the day.

5.