Bad Parent: How To Do Everything Wrong
Step #12: Bribe son with Tic Tacs.
by Jennifer Baumgardner
December 1, 2006
School:
Take son to preschool the day after he turns two. Sneak out of school, sniffling, when he isn't looking because that's your strategy when you leave him with babysitters. Walk home talking on cell phone to sister about how son is in school and next thing you know you'll be taking him to college when other line beeps in. Learn that son is hysterically crying, "desperate," as the teacher terms it, and that you are to pick him up immediately. At the pick-up, start to cry when teacher asks if you even said goodbye to son before leaving.
Psyche:
Notice son winds his tresses in his fingers as he is falling asleep, plucking out many strands during each nap, creating small bald spot.
Food:
Son appears to consume about a gallon of milk every day, eggs, and very little else. He asks for Tic Tacs and cough drops as a treat, demanding in a loud, rude voice, "Need Tic Tac! Need Tic Tac!" Try to resist giving child Tic Tacs or cough drops, as it seems weird and he's crunching them and probably going to break one of his tiny teeth. Despite anorexic's diet, son is extremely tall. Sometimes he will emerge from his bedroom chewing on something and when you inquire what, he'll say, "hair."
Psyche, part 2:
Notice son gets up from a nap covered in strands of hair. Call pediatrician for advice. Pediatrician says to ignore that son is pulling out hair ritualistically, that son is soothing himself, like thumb-sucking. Ignore hair-pulling for one day and then take to whispering intensely to son not to pull his hair; you'll give him cough drops if he'll stop pulling hair. Please stop pulling hair.
Love:
At son's school, three weeks into the term, as you are fluffing his hair to obscure thinning areas, receive wet, mentholated kiss from balding two year old. Wince as heart nearly breaks from how lucky you are.
photo courtesy Nathan Kendall
©2006 Jennifer Baumgardner and Nerve Media
About the Author
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Jennifer Baumgardner is a Brooklyn-based magazine writer and author. She is the co-author of Manifesta and Grassroots, and the author of Look Both Ways: Bisexual Politics.
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