Supernanny
Written By Pete Nelson
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"It's not always peachy," she allows. "Raising children invites adversity and challenges. There's going to be times when it's going to be more difficult. You go through phases. I'm a realist. But at the same time, I've gotten really fed up with all the negativity surrounding people who are going to have babies. People tell them, 'You won't sleep for ages.' Or, 'Forget about sex -- that's not going to happen for ages.' Or, 'They'll be a nightmare when it comes to feeding.' I think everybody's forgotten about just what a miracle it is to have a baby."
Frost is unflappable; she meditates daily, which helps. She never seems to lose it with a child. It upsets her when the children she works with become out of control, filled with rage, destructive and angry, but only because they are unhappy and don't know what to do to fix it, and that breaks Jo Frost's heart. Most of the time, perhaps all of the time, she knows how to fix it.
"You know," she says, "I never see the child from the outside, the way people who watch the show see them. I see the beauty.
"It's about having a different mindset. Teaching parents how to listen to the voice within, so that when they make decisions, slowly but surely they become really competent when they start to see the results and they can then give themselves a pat on the back and say, 'Hey, I didn't do too badly today. I'm quite pleased with myself.' It builds your confidence."
She does not expect parents to be savants. She does expect them to talk and to work as a team, no matter how stressed they get.
"It's really about making sure that you come together, from the beginning," she says, sipping the last of her tea. She sets the empty cup and saucer down and runs her fingers through her hair to pull it back from her face. "I mean, you meet a young lady, you get to know her, you decide to spend the rest of your life together, you get married, you make a conscious decision: 'Let's have a family.' And then you stop talking? Doesn't make sense. Are we living in a world where there's no more common sense?"
No, but we are living in a world where few people seem to have as much common sense as Jo Frost. We watch her show, see how she solves problems, and think, "Duh. Why didn't I think of that?"
She does have other things on her mind besides children and babies. Just not for very long. "I've got friends who haven't got babies," she says, "so we don't necessarily talk about babies. And I have friends who do have babies; we talk about babies, and we don't talk about babies. But then, I've got friends who've had babies and I haven't seen their babies, and I want to see their babies."
