Almost Cool Dad: Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Can See

Babies touch themselves. I had no idea that was even a thing until my son started and when it first happened, I brushed it off as something to easily un-see–a whatever moment.

It continued for days after that, then weeks. As most parents do, I immediately went into self-blame mode. Was it a weird cartoon he’d watched? Was the influence of Jay-Z and Beyonce in cahoots with the Illuminati? I wanted to know what I inadvertently exposed my child to that had him Pee-Wee Herman-ing it whenever he wanted to relax.

Perhaps there wasn’t a reason to trip over his crotch-a-mania since it only took place at home but little did I know, my son has inherited my gene of creating indescribably awkward moments. One of those moments came shortly after the mini-me had a meltdown over having to leave a convenience store without a couple of potatoes he adopted as pets. As we got off the elevator in our building, we encountered two young women  walking out of an apartment.

My son was self-soothing the Al Bundy way, with his hand down his pants. Since the potato incident was so traumatic, he was about elbow-deep down his jeans this time. When the women got close, one of them smiled and said  “Hello cutie,” and behold, Junior is peeping out from behind my legs, smiling from ear to ear, wrangling around in his jeans like he was searching for his keys.

“Is his hand down his pants, is he..?” The women gasped. I explained that it wasn’t what it looked like and it was just how he takes the edge off of stressful situations. So much for just keeping it in the house.

I didn’t want to start doing web searches for stuff like “child holding penis” or “kid grabbing his thingy”. Who knows what would pop up on the screen? I decided to call my mom and ask her if she knew anything about this hands down the pants stuff. Since my mom grew up in a family of 12 kids and raised two boys, I figured she had seen everything.

Just like any experienced parent of a new parent would do, she answered while holding back her laughter, “Yeah, babies do that.”

I was speechless and felt betrayed by our inadequate system of information sharing. I wanted to fire off an angry tweet to whoever was in charge of important life stuff like that. With all the public service billboards and posters we see everyday, there should at least be one that says, “Stop Trippin’, Your Kid Isn’t A Perv.”

A recent visit to the pediatrician backed up what mom told me. Young children do explore themselves prior to adolescence. There’s nothing sexual or wrong about it. The body parts behind the diaper are new and interesting for babies. Usually, kids stop when they get to kindergarten and first grade when they realize their peers aren’t doing it.

Right now, my son just has no concept of what’s appropriate at what times and in what places. Instead of shaming him or telling him to stop completely, we have ongoing conversations about when and where it’s OK to inspect himself. Well, about as much of a conversation you can have with a one-year-old.

Fortunately, there hasn’t been any exploring outside our apartment since.  In fact, now he catches himself when we’re out and stops. It also helps that I give him something random to occupy his little hands like a toy, party flier or piece of junk mail. Though one evening after a long day of playing outside and naming all the things we saw, my little explorer kicked back and shoved both hands down his diaper.

Work hard, play hard, can’t be mad at that.

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