| Kids are gross (2) | Monday, Nov 28, 2011 9:43 am |
Let's all be honest for a moment and admit a simple fact: Human children are disgusting. It seems that everything that typically remains inside a normal human being has the tendency to leak out of a baby, whether it's snot, partially chewed food, partially digested food (i.e. puke), or fully digested food (i.e. poop). Here are some rebuttals I can imagine hearing from parents:
- You did the same thing when you were a baby. Irrelevant.
- It's different when it's your own kid. Even if I had a kid, 99.9% of kids would still be gross.
- Everything a baby does is beautiful and innocent. Wrong.
As a non-parent, I legitimately have a difficult time controlling my gag reflex in the presence of a child who's eating. Quite possibly the most disgusting thing I've ever seen in my entire life was when my nephew scooped the half-chewed and mushy food bits out of his around-the-neck Baby Bjorn thing and put a big ol' handful in his mouth. That was years ago, and it still gives me chills. A more recent episode involved a new father lovingly spooning the excess mashed potatoes off his baby's face and putting the contents into his own mouth. Granted, some of the blame in this case lies on the disgusting parent.
I have a 15 month old boy and would have to agree that much of what he does is gross. I do find myself doing things I never thought I would do before he was around, especially when it comes to partially chewed food. (I used to have a hard time washing dishes with untouched adult food on them). However, I can say with certainty that I am not eating anything he has touched, let alone wiped across his face.
I can sort of identify because I'm not as grossed out by pet things as non-pet people probably would be. But there are still times when I'm cleaning up cat puke, and I can feel through the paper towel that it's still warm, and it feels like I'm gonna lose my stomach contents.