Each of my children has a deep and debilitating fear of fingernail clippers. I am at a loss to explain it. Just the sight of the tool elicits thrashing and whining of severe magnitude. Why should this be? They clain it's that I once cut some nail too short and the appendage bled. While certainly a concern, this reality is hardly cause for the dramatic and repeated alarm that I am forced to witness. I did it once, boys! And how many nails have I have I cut, overall? At 20 nails per child at once every two weeks for about 23 combined years....That's a really good track record. The odds of getting a bleeder are low enough that Vegas wouldn't even make that bet.
One solution, which I have frequently brought to their attention, is the possibility of them actually trimming their own. They can't. They freak out at the thought. Have I mentioned that their combined age is 23? You would think that some measure of maturity would be imparted to their personal grooming habits.
Come to think of it, that is really not the case. I do have one child who would shower twice a day if the water were free. I have another child....an older, sweatier child, who figures that more deoterant can buy him a good week without a shower. Have you smelled preteen boys? More deoterant will not, under any circumstance, replace the need for soap and water paired with vigorous scrubbing.
So, as their mother, I still have to oversee these requirements that their Health curriculum covered in the Second grade. When does it change?
2 comments:
Only when they discover girls.....
kjp
I remember the year that my cousin Paul lived with us in Guatemala. He was 13 (I was 15). I was appalled to find out that he sometimes only brushed his teeth once a week! So you are not alone. Time will change things, but I'm not sure when.
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