A soon to be father uttered this comment yesterday while watching an ultrasound:

“I’ve seen at a lot of things in my life, but nothing like this…”

I’m not sure why his comment caught me by surprise. Every day a patient and/or a family member or friend will say something about how “amazing” it (the ability to see inside the uterus) is…and if I ever stop long enough to think about it, I realize that she/he/they are right. Ultrasound is an amazing technology. And the images we have the privilege to witness, that of a developing life, are particularly strong. Yet it troubles me that I forget how privileged I am. Via Wikipedia:

Habituation is frequently used in testing psychological phenomenon. Both infants and adults look less and less as a result of consistent exposure to a particular stimulus. The amount of time spent looking to a presented alternate stimulus (after habituation to the initial stimulus) is indicative of the strength of the remembered percept of the previous stimulus.

Habituation, or burnout? Cross linked at RedStateMoron.