Playing Doctor

The other night at bedtime, Z and I were snuggling in her chair before I tucked her in. There must have been some lead in, but in retrospect it seems like this statement came out of nowhere. "Mama, my teacher says we can't play doctor because of privacy."

Oh, hell no.

Trying not to wig prematurely, I asked her if some of her classmates had been playing doctor. She said, "Yep. One girl got in trouble because she kept playing and my teacher said we couldn't play doctor because of privacy." Uh huh.

So the next day I asked her teacher about it. I tried to couch it in as non-judgement terms as possible. I told her what Z had told me and asked what was up. She said that she had caught some of the kids looking under each other's shirts. She nipped that in the bud and told them they could look in ears and eyes but not under clothes.

I told her that I had noticed one of the other girls seemed a bit too worldly for a three-year-old and that I assumed she had older siblings. She kind of cringed and mumbled something about a 'family situation.' That she had caught two girls lying on top of the other and one was saying, "I'll be the boy and you be the girl." Holy crap.

Here in the county where I live the rates of child molestation are astronomical. My husband is a cop and my next door neighbor is a victim advocate. I know just exactly how awful people can be. I hate that any part of that world is brushing up against my sweet baby.

No wonder so many of my friends home school.