Parental Advisory?

When I was in my 20s and 30s I knew everything about parenting, which made it even more unfortunate that we didn't have kids at that juncture. Apparently that brand of expertise comes with an expiration date, sadly, because by the time the kids actually arrived I seemed to know a lot less about being a parent.

As it turns out, it's like everything else in the world: you can't really be taught, you have to learn it for yourself. Of course, over my 12+ years of experience, I've developed a few theories... but I'm reminded of a baseball quote. Charlie Lau, on catching the knuckleball: "There are two theories on catching a knuckleball; unfortunately, neither of them work."

Each of my children has in their own way provided a well-equipped laboratory for research and development in the field of study, but I thought it might be interesting to submit a case study for possible peer review.

Our daughter is prone to report a new ailment every day -- I'm always prepared for a litany when she gets off the bus, and she rarely disappoints. And despite her apparent athleticism, she seems to get bumped & bruised on virtually any trip across a room that's not completely empty. I've heard it before, is what I'm saying.

So this morning I was not completely astonished to find her with a long gauze bandage wrapped around her hand and halfway to the elbow. When I inquired, she told me that her arm hurt and she needed to protect it. I don't have a lot of patience with her... well, I don't want to say "hypochondria"... let's say "hypersensitivity", so I told her she would be taking it off before school. She said no, she needed it because her arm hurt, and she was to say the least not impressed by my contention that since it was neither cut nor broken, it wasn't doing her any good.

I am aware that you can't really win a war of wills with someone who's determined to be unreasonable -- I have often said that parenting is the ultimate proof that you can't ever really make another person do anything -- so I decided to retreat to the shower to consider my next move.

I knew that gym and recess are highlights in her schedule, so I decided to tell her that if she was that hurt, she would have to sit out of both gym & recess for the day. Maybe I was just waterlogged, but I really believe in natural consequences: if you mess up, the result of that should be related to the offense. So I thought it was a logical way to squeeze her... but she just shrugged and said, "okay."

I certainly didn't want this to devolve into me chasing her around the house with a pair of scissors, and I couldn't very well threaten not to take her to school, so I decided to up the stakes: I told her that since she had been argumentative and defiant in not removing the bandage, her consequence would be to lose her privileges for the day -- no evening TV, no bedtime snack, no video games or any "special" recreation after school. Surely this would tip the balance...

... except of course if it had, I wouldn't be writing this. She said, once again, "okay."

And of course she had an awesome day at school because everyone was all curious/interested in her Serious Injury, so it appears she, well, beat me at my own game.

I did tell her that if the bandage continued, she would be too injured to play in her Little League game tomorrow, so she did conclude this evening that it was feeling better after all. But I hate to lose to an 8-year-old.

I suspect that if by some miracle I get multiple readers for this entry, the snickers will be inversely proportional to the number of kids per reader -- some of you have Been There, I'll wager -- but I'm certainly curious to know whether any of you would've handled it differently (I can ask that because I'm reasonably cure my wife won't read this; I know she would, ah, have an opinion). Warning: if you get all know-it-all on me, don't be surprised if your doorbell rings and you find her standing there with me peeling rubber halfway down the block....