Thursday, October 22, 2009

Stupid things parents do that actually work

I realized today how many stupid things parents tell their children to do. I'm not talking like, "Hey little Jimmy, see how fast you can run at that wall" kind of stupid thing, but things to make their kids feel better, or be entertained, etc. These are a few examples from my life:

Child: "My (insert body part) hurts."
Parent: "Count to 100."
This never did anything to make me feel better, but by the time I finished, it usually didn't hurt anymore, or at least as much.

Parent: "(Name of child), go get me (insert needed object). See how fast you can go; I'll time you!"
Child goes to get object, usually rather quickly in order to "make good time."
However, this soon turns into,
Child: "Mom, I'm gonna get (object). Time me and see how fast I go!"
Downside: parents never actually time their child. But at least the kid thinks he or she is super fast.

This one's a little more situational. I remember when my brother got the Chicken Pox. He had one particularly itchy spot on the top of his head, and my mother tried many things to keep him from scratching. In the end, she gave him his teddy bear and told him to scratch the bear where he itched (on the top of his head). I don't know why this worked, but I'm assuming that it did. How do I know this? Because when I got the Chicken Pox, my mom did the same thing to me, and I remember not feeling so itchy.

These are just a few examples of experiences I'm sure we all had as children, without which, our childhoods would have been bleak and painful.

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