My Weekly Out of Character Moment

Apparently I am making a habit of this. The whole acting rashly out of character thing.

I treated the kids to some Old McDonald's today (their words not mine) and we took it to the park with us to snag our allotment of vitamin D. After we ate I of course turned them loose on the play equipment because full bellies + sunshine + fresh air + physical activity = nap. Right?

Everyone is climbing and sliding and swinging and all is well. It's the first beautiful Saturday in two weeks here so of course the park is crowded with house crazy families. Suddenly Tuck pops out of one of the tubes crying. When I asked him what was wrong he told me that "that little girl won't let me through." I was fully expecting to see a 12 year old stuck in the middle of the tube.

It was a little girl probably about four (the same age as Tuck) with her hand in Munch's face telling her "You're not gonna do it either" in the snottiest voice I've heard from a teenager much less a four year old. This is me leaving my body.

The normal me would have shot her a dirty look and moved my children to a different part of the park. Today I was not normal me. "Please move out of the way so other children can play. You are not the only one on the playground and you really need to share." In my brain I was asking myself who was talking.

Snots McFly decided that sure, she would move out of the way. She made her way through the rest of the equipment, down the slide and straight to me. "You aren't very nice to talk to me that way." And she stood there with her hands on her hips like I owed her an apology. This is me not even thinking about returning to my body.

"It's not very nice of you to be rude to smaller children and to talk so disrespectfully to an adult so save your speech for someone else."

It's that voice again! Where is it coming from? Now I am pretty sure that if her people had been around I never would have talked to her that way, so what made me do it today? Was it because her people were no where to be seen? Was it because there were a lot of smaller toddler size children on the playground and I was making a preemtive strike on their behalf? Or was it the fact that I am so tired of mannerless children running amuk on the planet that I finally took a stand?

I am not proud of my behavior at all and maybe I crossed a line. I probably did. Who lets a four year old rile them like that? Just the same, what would you have done? Would you have moved on like Normal Me? Would you have sought out the parents and had a conversation? Or would you have drop kicked her like a penalty shot on an open goal like Out of Body Me?

This parenting thing just keeps getting more complicated.

Am I the Only Person Bothered by This?

I am a person of average height (5'7") and my husband is tall (6'3"). My children have always been in the 95% in height. Height has never been a problem for our family but I still have a problem with this.

Aren't we trying to eliminate growth hormones from our food? Hasn't it been shown that these can have effects beyond building them taller? I'm confused.

But my big problem with this is the motivation behind it. Your perfectly healthy child is being picked on for being short so you boost them with growth hormones. Why not just teach them how to cope with bullies? What ever happened to "Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me?"

Better yet. Why aren't the bullies' parents taking active steps to stop the action? Is it ok for people to be bullying about height? Or color? Or weight? Are we going to start allowing children to get gastric bypass? And what are we going to do for the children who are teased about being too tall?

I am a little concerned about the things we are doing with science and medicine. Instead of focusing on cures for disease we are researching how to eliminate teasing? Where is the line? Is there a line? Will we eventually get to the point of Stepford medicine? Will we eventually be able to fix every little imperfection or facet that we don't like about ourselves?

What happens to the personalities? What makes one person different from another? Where is the emotional strength? I know I am firing off questions like a machine gun but I can't make sense of it. Why would you spend 10's of thousands of dollars to "fix" a perfectly healthy child? What message are you sending? If someone bullies you, retreat into your shell and go buy a cure for yourself. Or is it, the bully was right. You ARE short and that is wrong.

I understand in the piece they noted that this child was not able to reach the water fountain and that is an issue. But isn't it the law that provisions are made? Like maybe a step stool? My husband gained inches late in high school. What is going to happen to the 8 year old who goes through this therapy who has a growth spurt in high school?

I am concerned about the implications this bears. But I'm not the only person with an opinion. What's yours?