Sacrifice Play

When my fifteen month old child picks up a purple marker with a gleam in his eye and begins playing a manic game of cap-on, cap-off? And I let him do it, knowing that the pen’s going to end up in his mouth? The very same mouth I went to great lengths to feed pureed-spinach-tinted frosting a few weeks ago rather than allow him to nibble synthetic green (food-safe) coloring? That mouth? Yes, that is a classic example of one of my parenting Sacrifice Plays. I know that I am conceding a small defeat (in this case, Crayola marker ingestion) for a larger goal (toddler empowerment, tantrum avoidance). So it makes me a hypocrite? Small price to pay.

We all play the parenting hands we’ve got. We maximize our kids’ well-being while sacrificing what we have to in order to meet life’s challenges. In our house, we like to say that everyone’s got to take one for the team. Our dog has been getting an extra breakfast or two lately, since the aforementioned toddler is fairly focused on plinking kibble into his bowl and it keeps him entertained while mom gets to, I don't know, blog (wink). The dog’s girth may suffer. But we all have to pull our weight in the family, as it were, to ensure that the whole is healthy.

I thought about weight recently in the grocery store. I’m one of those annoying virtuous people who usually shops at health food stores, co-ops, Whole Paycheck, Trader Joe’s, farmer’s markets, places I know won’t sneak cr*p worse than a "Conforms to ASTM D-4236" marker into my kid’s food. I make a lot of my own food (pancake mix, for starters, although I have to get the sugar out of that recipe). But sometimes, it is convenient (and cheaper?!) to go to a regular grocery store. What snuck into my cart the other day just made me groan.

Let me just say up front that (hypocrisy alert again) our house sees its fair share of candy. It’s not like processed sugar products don’t make their way into our lives. It’s just that when I am trying to grab whole wheat mini bagels for my teething toddler, it irks me that there would be high fructose corn syrup in the top five ingredients. Thank you very little, Thomas' Company. "The perfect wholesome snack for kids and people on the go"? Mmmm, that HFCS wholesome goodness.

When I am going for a whole wheat product, I really don’t expect to be making a Sacrifice Play. If I’m giving my kid a Ring Pop? I probably expect to have some artificial color tradeoffs. Giving my kid a (perfectly frozen) Ding Dong? I think I can sense there might be some troubling preservatives there. But whole wheat bagels? Come on, folks, that’s no place to sneak in a Sacrifice Play.

What are the Sacrifice Plays you face as a parent? Do any of the choices you’re forced to make seem unfair?

*Original DC Metro Moms post. Photo courtesy of SXC. Read more!