Leah Remini's kid battles to get off bottle

By CRISTINA KINON
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Thursday, April 24th 2008, 4:00 AM

Leah Remini doesn't mind if other people judge her. In fact, she invites them to do so.

Thursday, the "King of Queens" actress is the featured guest on "Rachael Ray," and cameras invade Remini's home to document her struggle to wean her 3-1/2-year-old daughter off her bottle. Day, night, in the bedroom and in the living room, the show followed Remini and her husband, actor Angelo Pagan, as they dealt with their child-rearing issues.

"I have no problem being judged," Remini told the Daily News. "What I do mind is imperfect people acting indignant about a situation in which they, too, have maybe failed.

"They might have their kid off the bottle, but that kid still may be walking around with a pacifier in their mouth, which according to pediatricians is equally as bad."

"Rachael Ray," which airs weekdays at 10 a.m. on WABC/Ch. 7, isn't Remini's first experience with "reality" television. She has appeared on two episodes of the VH1 series "Inside Out," once in 2003 to document her marriage to Pagan and a second time in 2004 to document the birth of her daughter, Sofia Bella.

In addition to sending a parenting expert to Remini's home, "Ray" sent one of its viewers, who had experienced the same problem with her own child, to give Remini advice.

"The viewer was sympathetic to the real issue, which was that I did want Sofia off the bottle, but I didn't want to hear my daughter cry," Remini said. "She had very helpful tips that worked with my philosophy of not just ripping the bottle from her hands, which as a parent I was not willing to do."

Remini says the main factor in putting her foot down was realizing that the bottle situation was actually unhealthy.

"I want to be clear that if Sofia wants to watch a scary movie before bed, I won't let her because she has nightmares, so she does cry and we get through it," Remini said. "But if she was going to hurt herself, I would stop her even if it meant tears. I didn't see her being on the bottle as a matter of life or death, but now I do see that it is actually damaging her. And for that, I was willing to let the information in."

Remini won't reveal whether she wins the battle of the baby bottle - you'll just have to tune in - but she says that regardless of the outcome, she's happy to put her story out there so that it might help other parents.

"The general public can relate to my ability to be honest about where I might not be that great [as a parent]," said Remini. "I have always loved the connection that I have with the people who get me. I also pride myself on telling the truth, and if I helped another person with this issue, then I did well."

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