Why Have We Made Candy the Scariest Part of Halloween?
A few days ago, I saw a letter to a Slate advice column entitled, “My Wife Just Threatened to Divorce Me Over My Position on Halloween Candy.” Basically, these parents had a major disagreement over their kids’ consumption of Halloween sweets; the mom wanted to limit them to a few pieces and then give the rest away, while the dad had a much more lax “eat as much as you want” policy. “[N]ow that they’re older and see their friends getting to enjoy their Halloween candy post-holiday, it upsets them to the point of tears,” he wrote. So this year, he told them they could keep it all — which was met by a threat of divorce from his wife. Yes, divorce. She has since throttled it back to simply threatening to withhold sex for three months (!!), but all this has me thinking: Is some temporary extra sugar in your kids’ diet really that big a deal?
It should go without saying that if your kid has some sort of medical problem or allergy, and eating too much Halloween candy would be extremely detrimental or even life-threatening for some reason, then yes, by all means, restrict the candy. But for parents whose concern is just sugar overload, can’t you hang up your nutrition police badge for one special occasion and share in the joy of (mostly) uninhibited candy consumption?
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After all, this is a holiday that’s predominantly about candy. It’s the whole reason kids get dressed up and go door to door. Sure, costumes are fun, but face it — they’re secondary to the thrill of the Halloween sugar rush. I have fond and vivid memories of my own childhood Halloweens: the older I got, the more ground I could cover in one night, which meant a bringing in a triumphant haul that I ceremoniously dumped onto the floor as soon as I got home, sorting, organizing, and negotiating trades with friends and siblings. And even since becoming a mom, I’ve always been thrilled at the parental privilege of the “candy tax,” wherein I cherry-pick a few of my own favorites from each of my kids’ buckets “because I’m the mom, that’s why.” Plus, no one can deny the sweetness — no pun intended — of your kids knowing your favorite candies and deliberately saving them for you; they’re always so proud that they can give you this gift.
My kids are older now, a tween and three teens, and if they trick-or-treat I don’t restrict their candy intake (partially because I gave up on providing them with optional nutrition once ramen noodles became a food group; I just toss a multivitamin at them each day and hope for the best). But even when they were much younger, I had very few rules around Halloween candy. Really, the only one I stuck to was my no-candy-before-school policy … just so I wasn’t the a-hole who sent her kids to school all hopped up on sugar (you’re welcome, teachers). Otherwise, if they wanted to have some as an after school snack? Fine. An after-dinner treat? Sure. A few pieces just because? Go for it. I found that without restrictions, they tended to be pretty responsible with it on their own. I never once found any of them sitting beside an empty Halloween bucket and a heaping pile of wrappers, looking bloated and nauseous. In fact, more often than not, we’d go into Thanksgiving — and then into December — with a sizable stash of candy still left … leaving me to wonder if they’d notice if Santa slipped some into their stockings.
According to an ongoing survey by Today Parents, my relaxed candy policy is in a small minority; only about 16% of respondents said they let their kids have free rein when it comes to their candy. The largest share — 45% — say their kids get all of it, but in rationed amounts, while 36% say their kids are allowed to eat only “some of it.” (One piece of candy and zero pieces of candy came in at 1% and 2%, respectively.)
Strict monitoring of my kids’ food intake of any sort has never been the hill I wanted to die on, but maybe I was onto something when it comes to giving them unfettered access to their Halloween treats. “The bottom line: Restrictive control tactics around candy, along with polarizing language about candy, can not only cause children to feel more preoccupied with candy, but it can create fear, guilt and shame for wanting and eating these foods,” writes nutritionist Crystal Karges for Motherly. “The goal is not to avoid giving them candy. Rather, we want to help them have a healthy, non-obsessive relationship with candy. We want them to be able to eat and enjoy candy when the opportunity arises in an amount that feels best for them … and then move on with their lives!”
Parenting is a whole bunch of saying no. Sometimes I feel like a professional wet blanket, denying my kids this and that for their own good — which is largely my job as a parent, I know, but that doesn’t make it any easier. Halloween, though, is the one night of the year where my kids can build those sweet and sticky memories of being wealthy with the currency of childhood: candy. And when I can finally say yes, because it’s a special occasion … and be the fun mom for once.
These celebrity parents wore coordinating Halloween costumes with their families.
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