Kids can be crazy. We all know this. They can do things that just make you ask in total bewilderment, "what were
you thinking?" As a mother of two this has happened to me many times
over the years. But, honestly, never to the degree it happened last
month.
Here is one of these incidents where, as a parent, you would just like to curl up in a ball and hide. Or run away and let someone else parent in your place. After many conversations and lots of back and forth with parents and kids I am ready to put this one out in the world for all of you to mull over and do what you want with. Because, dudes, I am so done with thinking about it.
Picture this:
My beautiful, spirited, fun-loving 7 year-old walks into the house after school and says to me, "Mommy, this hurts." And she is pointing to an angry looking scratch on her forehead. "What IS that?" I ask, pulling her close. And upon further inspection I see there are more. Many more. She has scrapes up and down her arms, some of them quite deep, and more on her forehead and cheeks. What is going on??
And then I see that, in fact, they are not just random scratches but markings, letters and numbers and symbols. Now I'm freaking out a bit. I see that on her forehead, right in the middle, was etched a large "1-". WTF?? After inspecting further I ask, "What happened? How did you get these marks?" Her answer? "We did it to each other." Oh dear.
So, here is the scoop as I understand it:
The school had an assembly (ticket on the fast train to boredom) and the kids were getting antsy. They started to whisper and plan. They created a "club" of the four of them sitting together. As part of this club they decided they needed something to identify each of them as a member. Because, you know, they might not recognize each other otherwise! Jeesh. Then they found a small object on the floor and decided to scratch these identifiers into each other's skin. This, my friends, seemed like an AWESOME idea to a group of 7 year-olds.
Unfortunately for them, the teacher and Vice Principal were not quite as impressed. The scraping was so bad on a few of the kids that there was some blood. But my daughter was the only one lucky enough to have them on her face. After a stern talking to at school the kids were sent home to communicate what happened to their parents. The stories definitely varied depending on which child you spoke with but the theme was the same; there intention was not to hurt and they were sorry.
Finally, the scrapes have healed and the incident is in the past. But I have to wonder, what the hell could be next and how am I ever going to be ready for it?!
Here is one of these incidents where, as a parent, you would just like to curl up in a ball and hide. Or run away and let someone else parent in your place. After many conversations and lots of back and forth with parents and kids I am ready to put this one out in the world for all of you to mull over and do what you want with. Because, dudes, I am so done with thinking about it.
Picture this:
My beautiful, spirited, fun-loving 7 year-old walks into the house after school and says to me, "Mommy, this hurts." And she is pointing to an angry looking scratch on her forehead. "What IS that?" I ask, pulling her close. And upon further inspection I see there are more. Many more. She has scrapes up and down her arms, some of them quite deep, and more on her forehead and cheeks. What is going on??
My Girl Post-Scrapes.
And then I see that, in fact, they are not just random scratches but markings, letters and numbers and symbols. Now I'm freaking out a bit. I see that on her forehead, right in the middle, was etched a large "1-". WTF?? After inspecting further I ask, "What happened? How did you get these marks?" Her answer? "We did it to each other." Oh dear.
So, here is the scoop as I understand it:
The school had an assembly (ticket on the fast train to boredom) and the kids were getting antsy. They started to whisper and plan. They created a "club" of the four of them sitting together. As part of this club they decided they needed something to identify each of them as a member. Because, you know, they might not recognize each other otherwise! Jeesh. Then they found a small object on the floor and decided to scratch these identifiers into each other's skin. This, my friends, seemed like an AWESOME idea to a group of 7 year-olds.
Unfortunately for them, the teacher and Vice Principal were not quite as impressed. The scraping was so bad on a few of the kids that there was some blood. But my daughter was the only one lucky enough to have them on her face. After a stern talking to at school the kids were sent home to communicate what happened to their parents. The stories definitely varied depending on which child you spoke with but the theme was the same; there intention was not to hurt and they were sorry.
Finally, the scrapes have healed and the incident is in the past. But I have to wonder, what the hell could be next and how am I ever going to be ready for it?!
Wow Jen...wow! Maybe it was just a one-off of crazy 7 year old behaviour? When I was younger, I gave myself hickeys all over my arm one day in a fit of boredom as well I guess. It was one of the few spankings I got in my life....and I remember it well. Maybe I also freaked my mom out with that weird one and that is why I got spanked. But I never did anything like it again...
I am 100% sure it was something like that, Sara. I think they got caught up in it and just didn't think. They are good kids who did something silly. But man, this parenting thing can get bizarre!
Holy crap. I swear, I have NO IDEA what kinds of thoughts go through kids heads, but I overheard my son say, "Hey Ava Scarlett, let's play The Amazing Oliver and the jumping babies..." and all I could picture was some kind of human-cannonball business and my 2 year old being shot-put into the tv or out the window or something.
I'm so glad your girl isn't permanently scarred in a Manson-family kind of way. YIKES!! No wonder they need parents. Oy.
gawd...i'm laughing but in that "oh lord, i know something like this is going to happen to me someday and it's completely normal but completely NOT" sort of way.
people talk about events in childhood that scar them for life (in a mental way i mean!) but they fail to mention how these things scar the parents!
My 13 came home from school complaining about her arm. "it hurts" she said. I of course begin the inspection/interrogation. I found out that the kids all thought it would be fun to punch each other, (as a way of greeting) as hard as possible. Of course she had bruises. This idiotic game lasted about a week. The school told them to stop, they did. I'm sure next month they will come up with another hare-brained scheme to act like nitwits.
Now that I think about it, I'm sure the only reason they stopped was because they couldn't lift their arms to punch anymore.
Love it, emmyjr1! Relieved to know that all kids, at any age, can do crazy stuff for no apparent reason.
Wow, that's definitely worrying. It's incredible what the "group" mentality can provoke. AT that age, if your peers think something is "cool" and "everyone" is doing it, it becomes a no-brainer that everyone has to participate. My 7-yr old son and his friends "play-fight" and sometimes it leads to tears and bruises. I think it's good the VP took a stern approach. With every week comes a new challenge, and I often wonder if I'm taking the right approach...
This one definitely falls into the "if you don't laugh about it, you WILL cry category..."
I feel for you! The good thing is that a group of them got into it together and they did it to each other. But still: weird!
yikes jen!Scary for you to discover but meant in fun, squirmy bodies lead to the strangest things. When I was 10 my friends and I had a gross out club. The initiation was to pinch the tops of our hands as hard as we could. Drawing blood sometimes. If we endured we got to sit with an earthworm on our noses till we went crazy.
How fun.
Can I just say your darling looks delicious in the matching mom glasses- please have several B and W photos done asap.......
Oh my hell, kids are weirdos - pretty much ALL kids, and the brighter and more imaginative are often even weirder! I remember when we were kids we used to tuck pins through the top couple layers of skin on the ends of our fingers so we could walk around with pins sticking out of our fingers, which is ridiculous, but I think the goal was to freak out the squeamish kids. Weird.
We must have lived the same generation Alice, as soon I started reading your post, I remembered doing that too. ya, weird!