Our television has been banished. We are now, officially a television free household!
It all happened rather suddenly. My partner has always been keen to get rid of the television. She doesn't really like much on the box, and would rather read a book or the paper. It was also a bit concerning how much television our 4 year old was watching, which meant our 1 year old was watching too. We had been quite diligent with our first child. She didn't lay eyes on the television until she was 18 months old. We had been overseas for three months and on our return home she was horrendously jet lagged and out of kilter. For 90 days she did not sleep at night, and did not sleep during the day. She was so tired that all she could do was sit on the couch and cry with tiredness. We were beside ourselves too, and resorted to a DVD of 10 episodes of Hairy Maclary. She loved it and watched it on repeat. Finally the sleep thing came good (not bit by bit as everyone said it would, but just overnight..weird), but then it was too late. She was in love with Charlie and Lola, Hairy Maclary and Playschool (which I think is actually very educational and well worth children watching on occasion). When our second child arrived and we were all so very tired the TV became a kind of pseudo nanny. Miss 3 year old was happy to be parked in front of it for an hour or so while the baby was being bathed, dressed, fed, etc. She didn't need me to play with her, get toys out, help paint something, etc. At the time it was a life saver, but when the baby was 6 months and picked up the remote, turned on the telly and sat in front of it transfixed I realised it was too much.
One night, after I had cooked a delicious meal and my partner and I sat on the couch with it and started to watch an episode of 'The Voice' (a stupendously terrible show) I realised that this was not how we should be living. Meals should be eaten at the table. We should talk about our days. We should not vegetate in front of crappy TV shows until we fell asleep. I suggested it was time to go TV free. My partner was thrilled and that very night we took the TV and the cabinet to the shed. We told the four year old it broke.
I started writing this post over three months ago, and still our home remains TV free. I can't tell you how liberating it is to have missed the entire season of 'The Voice' and 'Masterchef', that latter of which I had previously been completely addicted to. No longer is ABC2 the constant background noise to my day. I love it.
If we want to watch something now we have to get out the laptop or the iPad and actually make an effort to get the iView going, or borrow a DVD. No longer are we sitting on the couch as soon as the kids are asleep watching complete trash until we fell into bed ourselves.
I freely admit that not having a television these days is not the same as not having a television 20, 10 or even 5 years ago. We have the ability to access pretty much everything on the internet, and can easily look up and watch the shows that 'everyone is talking about'. I remember as a child we had very limited television reception (we lived directly beneath the TV towers on Mount Dandenong and the signal passed right over the top of us), and anything that was on Chanel 10 was impossible to watch. At the time I was pretty bummed to be missing such gems as 'Neighbours' and the brand new hit show 'The Simpsons'. Looking back, I realise that my brother and I spent lots of time outside, building cubbies, going for bush walks, dressing up, digging holes. Things that kids don't do so much these days.
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