We lost Miloh. I don't mean lost him like we can't find him, I mean he no longer needs us... at least when he goes to sleep. Just under a year and he's ready to be on his own.
During our trip to California we realized we had a huge miss... he didn't have a cuddly stuffed animal. He grabbed our friend's kid's stuffed animals and melted into them. He has lovies and other small things, like the Deglingos Baby Blankie Rat
that he'd sleep with but wouldn't totally cuddle.
He was missing a cuddly animal that was a good size to sleep with.
It sounds all obvious that we should have given him one... but babies can't sleep with things like that for so long and we didn't prepare... any way getting one was the first thing on out list to get him.
We were going to get something the weekend we got back but in the meantime our nanny gave him a little monkey stuffed animal that we got at Staci's baby shower to sleep with. Miloh liked it so we were cool with it, but we ordered the Jellycat Aardvark
to be his go to.
When the aardvark arrived he saw it and melted into it... but it wasn't what he wanted to cuddle up to when he slept. He wanted the monkey.
Pre monkey he was getting in to a phase where he would crawl out of his bed and cry for us at his door until he fell asleep two minutes later.
Now he could care less that we leave the room. When we put him to sleep he grabs the monkey so tight and so securely and he goes right to sleep.
The monkey has replaced us. He now looks for it when he goes to sleep and needs it... he's attached.
We were just calling it Monkey but it wasn't as inventive as our name for the Aardvark which is Ardy.
Then I thought of how he cuddles with the monkey when he sleeps and it reminded me of another monkey. The rhesus monkeys that were in the surrogate mother experiments of Harry Harlow.
I should say that Harlow's experiments were really cruel, the surrogate mother ones being less cruel than the most. But while not good times this one is interesting.
In case you're not familiar, he'd give baby monkeys the option of two mothers. One was all chicken wire but had a bottle and could therefore feed it. The other was soft and warm but didn't feed. The monkeys would spend up to 22 hours a day on the warm fuzzy monkey and would only leave to go to the other when it was hungry.
The baby monkeys were so cute and cuddly with that fake fuzzy mom. So while I'm not a fan of naming good things after kind of evil people I think Harlow is a great name for Miloh's monkey because he cuddles it so cutely.
So Harlow it is.
During our trip to California we realized we had a huge miss... he didn't have a cuddly stuffed animal. He grabbed our friend's kid's stuffed animals and melted into them. He has lovies and other small things, like the Deglingos Baby Blankie Rat
that he'd sleep with but wouldn't totally cuddle.He was missing a cuddly animal that was a good size to sleep with.
It sounds all obvious that we should have given him one... but babies can't sleep with things like that for so long and we didn't prepare... any way getting one was the first thing on out list to get him.
We were going to get something the weekend we got back but in the meantime our nanny gave him a little monkey stuffed animal that we got at Staci's baby shower to sleep with. Miloh liked it so we were cool with it, but we ordered the Jellycat Aardvark
to be his go to.When the aardvark arrived he saw it and melted into it... but it wasn't what he wanted to cuddle up to when he slept. He wanted the monkey.
Pre monkey he was getting in to a phase where he would crawl out of his bed and cry for us at his door until he fell asleep two minutes later.
Now he could care less that we leave the room. When we put him to sleep he grabs the monkey so tight and so securely and he goes right to sleep.
The monkey has replaced us. He now looks for it when he goes to sleep and needs it... he's attached.
We were just calling it Monkey but it wasn't as inventive as our name for the Aardvark which is Ardy.
Then I thought of how he cuddles with the monkey when he sleeps and it reminded me of another monkey. The rhesus monkeys that were in the surrogate mother experiments of Harry Harlow.
I should say that Harlow's experiments were really cruel, the surrogate mother ones being less cruel than the most. But while not good times this one is interesting.
In case you're not familiar, he'd give baby monkeys the option of two mothers. One was all chicken wire but had a bottle and could therefore feed it. The other was soft and warm but didn't feed. The monkeys would spend up to 22 hours a day on the warm fuzzy monkey and would only leave to go to the other when it was hungry.
The baby monkeys were so cute and cuddly with that fake fuzzy mom. So while I'm not a fan of naming good things after kind of evil people I think Harlow is a great name for Miloh's monkey because he cuddles it so cutely.
So Harlow it is.
This is a very cute story. I represent Penn State Media Sales and we sell the actual research footage of Harlow's experiment. It's heart breaking to watch. Some people think that Harlow was cruel and inhumane. He was actually worried about the old adage that if you picked your baby up when he or she was crying that you would spoil him or her. His study showed that primates need to be cuddled more not less. He actually was a very humane man. I think Harry Harlow would get a chuckle out of your stuffed chimp's name. If you want to check out a clip of the study, it's on our website
ReplyDeletehttp://mediasales.psu.edu
Hey Penn State dude or dudette. I do think the experiments are interesting. And thanks for reminding me of the spoil vs need thing.
ReplyDeleteHis experiments came up in a few of my college classes but I do remember them from classes that dealt with touch deprivation and will to live/survive.
But I'm a vegetarian and anti-testing so I don't dig what they were doing at those times... however I can't deny that they had outcomes that helped folks.
Things like this aren't black and white, just shades of grey. Thanks.
stella has a very similar attachment for a stuffed musical dinosaur-she holds her arm out every sleep time in anticipation for us to set him in the crook of her elbow. she then yanks him in for the snuggle kill and off she goes to sleep...
ReplyDeletewe realized she sleeps a lot better once he came into play as well.
This is a very cute story. I represent Penn State Media Sales and we sell the actual research footage of Harlow's experiment. It's heart breaking to watch. Some people think that Harlow was cruel and inhumane. He was actually worried about the old adage that if you picked your baby up when he or she was crying that you would spoil him or her. His study showed that primates need to be cuddled more not less. He actually was a very humane man. I think Harry Harlow would get a chuckle out of your stuffed chimp's name. If you want to check out a clip of the study, it's on our website
ReplyDeletehttp://mediasales.psu.edu