"How do you spell Zyrtec?" she asked, and my head whipped around. Abby often writes letters to her alter ego, Dr. Abigail, asking for help and detailing her animals' symptoms, which range from a stuffy nose to an "ear infeckshin." Then the doctor arrives, with a white coat and a plastic stethoscope. On this particular day, Dr. Abigail was writing a "pill list" in marker on green construction paper. I looked over her shoulder: "Tylenol, Advil, Zyrtec, Flonase, Nexium."

I am disturbed, but not surprised, that my daughter can recite names of prescription drugs almost as easily as she can name colors from the Crayola box. The commercials for these drugs are ubiquitous, infiltrating even her limited exposure to TV.

I understand that pharmaceutical companies have the right to pitch their products on TV, and I realize that, in some cases, this information benefits viewers who find out a drug is, in fact, right for them when they ask their doctors.

But I wonder how many people bypass their doctors and order these drugs over the Internet. I wonder how many people ask for cholesterol-lowering drugs rather than a referral to a nutritionist. And I wonder how many people really understand the risks of taking these drugs before popping the pills.

I also worry about the message this and other advertising is sending to our children. It seems there's a pill for everything, a quick fix for any problem. It's not just the pharmaceutical companies. The advertising for beauty products with important-sounding ingredients such as Retinol A is also getting out of hand. And it, too, is making an impression. Snuggling cheek-to-cheek recently, my daughter informed me that I should get Olay Daily Facials so I "would never get wrinkles."

Perhaps the worst offenders are shows such as ABC's "Extreme Makeover," during which "ugly" people are plucked from the masses and given plastic surgery that lasts several hours and promises to change their lives and make them happier.

I saw the first five minutes of this program recently and was disgusted. It's bad enough that celebrity diets, nose jobs and collagen injections are publicized and idolized, but to encourage the idea that even "ordinary" people will be happier if they alter their faces and bodies is ludicrous.

There are enough people in the world who have no choice but to endure mastectomies and open-heart surgeries, and I had absolutely no sympathy for the woman — who wasn't all that ugly, by the way — whimpering about how scared she was minutes before going under the knife.

I wonder how we got to this extreme. Have Americans become so lazy and self-absorbed that we are constantly seeking a quick fix, and the drug companies and media are just giving us what we want? Or have we been manipulated away from old-fashioned ideals such as working hard, being patient, accepting the things you cannot change?

Traditional wisdom tells us that widespread use of new medicines equals progress. I'm sure that was true, with penicillin and the polio vaccine. But as the backlash against antibiotics (doctors now only prescribe them when absolutely necessary because overuse and misuse has led to drug-resistant bacteria) has taught us, prescription drugs are not always the best medicine.

In diagnosing a stuffed rabbit last week, Dr. Abigail informed me that the patient needed Flonase.

"What's Flonase for?" I asked.

"Allergies," she said. "It even works for pet dander."

"What's pet dander?" I asked.

"Dander from pets."

"What's dander?"

She hesitated. "Fur, I think."

My daughter will never have a TV in her room, and her viewing time will always be limited. But short of banning TV — as well as the Internet, magazines and newspapers — from the house, there's not much I can do to shield her from the messages of our increasingly image-driven, quick-fix society.

I try to teach her that what her body can do is more important than how it looks, and I push chicken soup more than Triaminic when she has the sniffles.

Most of all, I encourage her natural instinct when she's doctoring her animals, which is to provide a hefty dose of good, old-fashioned TLC.

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Lisa Miller is a freelance writer who lives in Oneonta. She can be reached at lisamiller44@hotmail.com.