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Crazy or Careful?
Last week I had dinner with my parents and somehow the conversation rolled around to the topic of Things I Have to Worry About That Never Occurred to Them When I Was Small.
We talked about all the childhood issues that have cropped up in the news (apart from the heat): developmental disorders, speech therapists, reading delays, physical therapy requirements, etc. My mother began musing about the proliferation of these syndromes and why they seem so ubiquitous now. My father said they were certainly around in the dark ages of his children's childhoods and mentioned a couple of my brother's preschool acquaintances who he was sure had some kind of issue "You don't remember? That kid could climb the walls like some kind of lizard."
I volunteered that a couple of my friends' brothers had odd allergies or sensitivities. One was allergic to red food dye. My mother said she always wondered about that one.
Who knows? I certainly know plenty of adults with severe food allergies (not sensitivities), especially to peanuts, mushrooms and shellfish. (I've met no one else who can't handle food coloring.) None of them makes particular demands of hosts and friends and all of them find ways to navigate menus and foreign kitchens (while carrying epi-pens around).
So something must be in the ether because Emily Bazelon has a piece in Slate this week about children and food allergies that gets at something that percolated underneath my dinner table chatter: when is a child under the constant threat of anaphylactic shock and when are parents being crazy? When is too much caution stifling and when does dragging the lives and practices of every other parent into the mix excessive?
Of course this is the thing that would hit me. I'm socially skeptical and quite aware of how creepy parental dynamics get. (And this week's Washington Post is only feeding my paranoia. Blech.) My mother tells me that people were always awful, and that the only thing new here is that people have more avenues they can take to be self-righteous and holier-than-everyone.
I don't imagine there's a parenting utopia out there, but the hair on my neck is already bristling, readying itself for a defensive future.
posted by Elise at 11:12 AM
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Laura K. said...
You know, I was talking to a friend of mine about this not long ago. It goes along with a generalized, pervasive lack of personal responsibility in society today. If your child is allergic to peanuts, for goodness' sake, tell him NOT TO EAT OTHER KIDS' FOOD! If your child is a diabetic, do you tell every other child in his class not to bring anything sweet or starchy to class? Of course not. You teach your own child what s/he can and cannot eat. *climb off soapbox*
8/02/2006 8:03 AM
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11/24/2006 11:06 AM
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12/13/2006 2:17 PM
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12/16/2006 5:32 AM
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Laura K. said...