Summary

The article discusses the challenges of parenting in the age of information, where parents are bombarded with fears of both immediate dangers and long-term health risks, leading to a state of constant anxiety.

Abstract

The author of the article, presumably a parent, describes the overwhelming nature of modern parenting, where the fear of harm to one's children is exacerbated by the internet's endless stream of cautionary tales. From the potential dangers of sun exposure and the toxicity of sunscreen ingredients to the risks of vitamin D deficiency and overdose, parents are caught in a cycle of anxiety, trying to navigate the "right" choices to protect their children. The article highlights the irony of being warned against helicopter parenting amidst stories of fatal accidents and diseases, suggesting that the internet's advice can be both a source of fear and a critique of the parental response to that fear. The author reflects on the futility of trying to safeguard children from every possible harm, acknowledging that life's randomness makes it impossible to predict or control all outcomes, despite the desire to do so.

Opinions

The author satirically suggests that the internet's constant stream of disaster stories fuels parental anxiety, making even simple decisions feel fraught with danger.
There is a critique of the culture of fear perpetuated by the media, which can lead to overprotective parenting styles.
The article implies that the pressure to make the "right" choices for children's health and safety can be paralyzing, with potential risks associated with almost every option.
The author expresses a sense of helplessness and absurdity in trying to protect children from both immediate threats, like drowning or brain-eating amoebas, and long-term health issues, such as cancer from sun exposure or vitamin D deficiency.
There is a recognition that the stress of constant vigilance and worry, termed "the forethought of grief," is detrimental to both parents and children.
The author seems to reject the additional burden of guilt imposed by internet advice that criticizes helicopter parenting, asserting that the randomness of life and the lack of control make such criticism unfounded.

Helicopter Parenting Vs. Brain-Eating Amoebas

If you’re like me, you celebrate summer by feeding your anxiety a hardy, seasonal diet of horrors. That means clicking on every story featuring a tragedy befalling another woman’s child and obsessively combing through it for details to protect mine. Also, as an Appalachian, I am required to bear witness to suffering.

Sadly, the web is full of these tales. One after another. Then, suddenly, between stories of violent pedophiles and brain-eating amoebas, up pops an article warning against the greatest danger of all: helicopter parenting.

It’s the internet’s way of saying, “Stop hitting yourself!” I’d love to stop worrying so much, but thanks to this endless flow of disaster, the simplest, most carefree parenting moments feel like Frogger — forever jumping away from and towards death.

Just stepping out the front door feels dangerous. Every day, when I walk outside with my kids, I’m fretting over skin cancer. So I put sunscreen on them. Easy enough, right?

Wrong!

What kind of sunscreen? Did you know some brands have toxic chemicals? Some of those chemicals have even been linked to cancer. You can research the different types of sunscreen on the Environmental Working Group website. Bonus, it will also tell you which pesticide-laden foods will give your children cancer.

In the 1% of your brain that’s not entirely devoted to keeping your kids alive, you might have questions. Does the company that makes this sunscreen test on animals? How does it treat its employees? That 1% of your brain that used to be a whole person might want to stop and consider those things.

But you can’t because while you had your head up your ass, your children’s vitamin D levels plummeted. Vitamin D is the sunshine vitamin, and everyone has a deficiency nowadays.

Care to guess what low vitamin D has been linked to?

Yup, cancer. You need to get that Vitamin D level up, stat! You could get a bottle of liquid supplement at the drugstore, but you shouldn’t. It’s fat-soluble. Too much could/can/will kill a child. It’s basically like keeping a loaded gun in your cupboard.

You can try the Vitamin D gummies with the childproof cap. The only problem is that they are full of sugar, stick to teeth, and cause cavities. Children die under anesthesia while getting dental work. It happens all the time. Or it happened once. Does it matter?

Let’s skip forward and say you finally slog through this sunscreen and supplement quagmire. You get your kids out the door and packed into the car. You look back at their tiny mime faces caked with pasty, mineral sunscreen, their bodies safely encased in SPF 50 surfer suits. Now what?

Where to?

The pool full of cancer-causing chlorine or the lake with brain-eating amoebas? Long game or short game? At some point, you’re not so much trying to keep your kids alive as choosing the means of their deaths.

If you go to the lake, you’ll need to decide how much to disclose to your children about the invisible things trying to swim up their noses and eat their brains. You don’t want to give them an anxiety disorder, for God’s sake.

I like to stand there with a pained expression, yelling out, “Keep your head above the water. Are you having fun? Mommy is too. No, Sweetie, I’m not crying. Try not to disturb the sediment.”

You could go to the beach.

No chlorine or dangerous amoebas in the ocean. But how good are you at scanning the horizon for fins? Knee-deep is safe, right? But is it knee-deep with the tide in or out?

Did you check your children for scrapes? Sharks can smell one drop of blood from a mile away. Plus, there’s this new flesh-eating bacteria in warmer Atlantic oceans we should discuss.

By the way, while you were fixating on sharks and vitamin overdoses, you overlooked the most obvious danger: drowning. Try drawing in a deep, calming breath in a world where your child might not. You can’t.

Living with the “forethought of grief,” as Wendell Berry calls it, is bad. Nobody wants to walk around with these pinballs of crazy bouncing around their head. It’s bad for me, and I’m sure it’s bad for my kids.

The problem is that parenthood is a constant, oscillating state of terror. Life is random. There’s no wizard behind the curtain; there isn’t even a phony huckster pulling levers.

It’s a coin toss back there. No amount of therapy, meditation, or sertraline makes that untrue. And thanks to the internet and 24-hour news, we hear about it every time somebody’s child lands on tails.

Now parents are supposed to carry more worry and guilt about the mountains of worry and guilt already crushing us. I think, just this once, I’m going to take a pass on feeling worse about my parenting.

Thanks anyway, internet. Jerk.