Many parents today have taken to chronicling the birth of their children on videotape. One West Windsor couple not only captured the birth of their son on video — they decided to share it with the rest of the nation.##M:[more]##
“A Baby Story,” as seen on The Learning Channel, focuses on a West Windsor family in an upcoming episode. “Baby Reytblat” features Susan Mintzer and Ben Reytblat, their 18-month-old daughter Abigail, and the birth of their son Daniel. It will be aired on Monday, October 17, at 2 p.m.; and Thursday, October 27, at 9:30 a.m.
“We became involved in ‘A Baby Story’ through our obstetrician, Dr. Antonio Sison, who had already been involved in a previous story with the producers,” says Susan. “When another couple ‘dropped out’ of the program, they asked him if he would recommend another family.”
The Learning Channel is advertising the show by promoting the fact that Susan is older than many of the other mothers featured on the show: “Susan ignored her biological clock for as long as she could. She didn’t even change a diaper until she was in her 40s! But once her daughter Abigail came into the picture, this hardworking couple discovered they loved being parents.”
The focus on her “biological clock” surprised Susan. “I had never thought of myself as an older mother until I noticed that ‘advanced maternal age’ was written on my chart in the doctor’s office,” says Susan.
Daniel Reytblat was born by Caesarean section at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital Hamilton on August 10 — 17 months to the day after his older sister Abigail.
“The camera crew was very discrete in the operating room,” she says. “The crew included nice people and made us feel very comfortable. I had a lovely room in the hospital with room service and visitors — including Abigail.” She was discharged from the hospital when Daniel was four days old.
Susan Mintzer was born in Elizabeth and raised in Westfield. Her parents, Albert, a physician, and Leatrice Mintzer, an interior designer, have lived in West Windsor for two years. She earned a degree in English and psychology from William Smith College in upstate New York. Over the years she worked in advertising, marketing, training and development, was a partner in an Internet company, and is a partner (with her husband) of Cost Effective Development, based in West Windsor (www.costeffectivedev.com).
They met while they were both working with other companies. “I was his client, then we were friends, and then partners,” she says. “Our focus is on open source software, which gives more flexibility to customers who don’t have million dollar budgets. There is no licensing fee and working with a code you can see everything going on — their only cost is for customization. We work out of our house where we are able to cut overhead and keep costs down. It also enables me to work off-hours.”
Ben Reytblat was born in Irkutsk, a large city in Siberia. Raised in Ufa, an industrial city now called Bashkatostaon, and Vidra, a small industrial city in the suburbs of Moscow, he arrived in the United States with his family in 1976. He attended Mundelein College and the University of Illinois, both in Chicago, and graduated from the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana with a degree in math. He received his master’s in computer science from Rutgers in 1986. His mother, a mathematician, and her husband live in Illinois; his father and stepmother, also mathematicians, live in Connecticut.
Last year Susan and Ben moved to West Windsor from Somerset to be near her parents. Now, thanks in part to the television production, they are exploring their new community.
One of the pre-baby expeditions filmed by the Learning Channel crew was a shopping trip to Pied Piper Kids Boutique in Cranbury. The store, owned by Patty Ryan and Teresa Cunningham, both of West Windsor, features infant and toddler clothing and accessories.
Both women, who lost their husbands on September 11, 2001, met at a support group. Ryan was a former substitute teacher at Dutch Neck School and Cunningham a clothing seamstress. With their previous experience in sales and finance, they opened the business on September 11, 2004. A percentage of the profits from Pied Piper Designs benefits Tuesday’s Children, a non-profit family service organization that has made an 18-year commitment to every child who lost a parent on 9/11, as well as life management skills for adults. The store, located at 60 North Main Street, Cranbury (www.piedpiperkids.com or 609-409-1144).
Like most new parents, Susan and Ben have had some adjustments to make. “I don’t get things done quite as quickly now with two kids as I used to,” says Susan. “I would like to be doing more work but I have accepted the fact that I won’t be able to do much for a few months.”
The adjustment period has also been covered by the television crew and also by the parents themselves. “They gave us a digital camcorder to record our thoughts for the first few weeks,” Susan says. “We recorded close to eight hours of material for them. It seems that it would make every episode a little more personal.”
Now Susan is getting braced for the limelight. “It amazes me about how many people watch the show,” she says. “We have been watching some of the reruns — they show it a lot during the daytime. When I told one of our babysitters, who is now at college in Connecticut, she told me that her roommate watches it all the time.”
While the family received a few gifts from TLC including Natural Care products and “Baby Daze,” a book to record the first few months of the baby’s life, “we did not participate for the gifts,” says Susan. “This will be our 15 minutes of fame and we will have a nice documentary out of this experience.”
A Baby Story: Baby Reytblat, The Learning Channel (TLC). Monday, October 17, 2 p.m., Thursday, October 27, at 9:30 a.m. Www.tlc.discovery.com.
