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How Star Trek Will Help Me Soothe My Baby
December 14th, 2011
When recently babysitting a friend’s seven-month-old, the baby had a particularly bad night. I tried almost everything I could think of to soothe her, but there was no getting past one simple fact: I was not her mother, and her mother was all she wanted.
The only moments of respite came once I had discovered a video on YouTube advertising a Soothing Sounds for Baby CD. It was just a demo, but it played about a minute of calming, steady sounds—water running, hair dryer, clothes dryer, vacuum cleaner, etc. I played that video over and over and over again, because it was the only thing that would stop the crying. That event made me a firm believer in the power of white noise. (If I had any doubts, our gear columnist Jen Wilson nipped those in the bud with this post.)
So, when my colleague Alicia sent me a clip of a 24-loop of ambient ship noise from Star Trek: The Next Generation (my favourite of the Star Treks), I realized that it is essentially white noise for (nerdy) grown-ups! (Just listen to it, and tell me it doesn’t calm you right down.) And why shouldn’t it work for baby?
So here’s what I’m hoping for: between now and the time I give birth, that someone, somewhere, will create a white noise machine that includes the ambient engine noise of the Enterprise. Because I will buy that for my baby’s nursery. I will buy it so hard. (Are you listening, Conair?)
Did you/do you use a white noise machine with your baby? If so, which brand? And (important) did it have an Ambient Starship Enterprise setting?
—Megan, pregnant lady, sci-fi fan and CF.ca’s executive editor and senior web producer
Copyright © 2012 St. Joseph Media. All Rights Reserved.
I totally agree. We didn’t use a white-noise machine per-se, but we ALWAYS had a fan, a humidifier or a space heater running in our daughter’s room. And it almost ALWAYS guaranteed a better, longer sleep. With no. 2 on the way, we’ll be investing in a white noise machine. I imagine it uses a lot less energy than our previous vices.