Don’t make the baby drink

Sippy Cups are not for ChardonnayI don’t have much time to write because I am watching Spain toy with Honduras, and hoping that unlike in 1969, a Honduran loss won’t lead to military conflict this time.

But I did want to, in a flush of post-Father’s Day dadpride, point out this story from the Carroll County Times-Georgian about what happened when one couple left their kids with a babysitter for the evening:

When the children’s grandmother arrived at the house five hours later to pick up the three boys and one girl, she found the baby lying in what appeared to be a lifeless state, not responding, according to police. None of the other children showed signs of alcohol consumption, and Truitt was not the family’s regular babysitter. It was through interviews that police were able to determine it was wine that the child had consumed.

Perry said Truitt eventually confessed to giving the baby wine in a sippy cup to make the infant go to sleep.

The infant was then taken to the emergency room at Tanner Medical Center/Carrollton where tests revealed the baby had a blood-alcohol level of .33.

The baby survived, and the babysitter was sentenced to 8 years in prison. I’m not bringing this article up because I condone drunking up your infants, or because I think it’s a particularly just sentence. Depending on your view, eight years is either too long (if it was just wino caretaking gone awry) or too short (if it was attempted baby murder). Rather, I point this out because it was NOT A DAD who did this stupidness.

Hooray for fathers everywhere who have resisted the urge to use alcohol on their babies the way they use it on themselves. You really did deserve that Father’s Day handjob you got yesterday.

Published by Nathan

Nathan Thornburgh is a contributing writer and former senior editor at TIME Magazine who has also written for the New York Times, newyorker.com and, of course, the Phnom Penh Post. He suspects that he is messing up his kids, but just isn’t sure exactly how.

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