Although I didn’t know it when my children were toddlers -- and probably would not have believed it -- those little powerhouses of curiosity and adventure are more resilient than those of us who have grown up to become mere mortals. I recall being very meticulous about every aspect of cleanliness when my eldest was born. Everything that touched her had to be boiled, bleached and scoured. After all, it was my sworn duty as a mother to keep her absolutely safe from creepy, crawly germs.

Imagine my horror when discovering a dead bug in her poop one day as I changed her diaper! There was also the day when I found green construction paper in the midst of that mustard pool that is normally void of anything. At least I had somewhat expected that one. Being the perfect mom, I had created a huge mural with construction paper covering the wall above her crib. There was grass, a tree that reached up to the ceiling, flowers, birds, clouds and a sun up in the corner. One afternoon I put my precious princess down for a nap and after a couple of hours I continued to do whatever it was I was doing while being grateful that she was taking an unusually long nap that day. Finally, I decided to go take a peek. I was met by a vision of my child sitting in her crib stuffing her mouth with the blades of grass as quickly as she was ripping them from the wall. I wondered what her digestive system would do with all that green paper, and the next day I found out. It did absolutely nothing with it, other than send it on a journey through her intestines.

But when I found that dead bug in her poop, there had been no warning at all. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. To this day I can’t imagine how a baby could catch a bug. One day when I opened her diaper to change it, there was a little "love bug" in the poop. We lived in Florida at the time, and love bugs are these very slow-flying bugs who come around seasonally. I have no idea what they do other than mate and disappear again. You know they’re mating because they usually fly around together, hence the name, love bug.

It was after discovering that bug in my daughter’s diaper that I began to suspect that perhaps I’d gone too far in attempting to keep her life so germ free. Maybe she wasn’t as fragile as I’d thought. So I vowed that when my next child was born, I wouldn’t be so picky. But what did that mean, really? I didn’t run to save him when my little boy picked up a toy from the floor and put it in his mouth, but other than that, I think I was still pretty convinced that my children needed my constant protection from the vast majority of germs out there.

I will never forget the day when I was cleaning the cat’s litter box. It had a lid on it, and it sat in the corner of the kitchen. The opening to the litter box was toward the wall, so my son left it alone because he had no idea what treasures were inside. Then when he was about 18 months old, I pulled the litter box away from the wall and removed the lid to clean it. Just then, the doorbell rang and I went to answer it, leaving the litter box completely exposed. When I returned, I saw my sweet, precious son sitting in the middle of the floor shoveling cat poop and litter into his mouth. I gasped and a string of expletives flew from my mouth as I ran towards him. His big smile turned into a look of shock, and his giggling turned into crying as I began trying to scoop the poop out of his mouth. The smell that emanated from his mouth is one I will never forget, no matter how much I’d like to forget it.

What happened after that is somewhat of a blur. I remember him clawing at my breast and trying to lift my shirt to nurse, and I remember thinking that I’d rather be on a sleazy television talk show than have his mouth touch me at that moment. He had never enjoyed having his teeth brushed, and even getting him to rinse his mouth that day was a challenge, but somehow I survived, and more importantly, so did he.

I’m certainly not advocating that parents let their children eat whatever bizarre substance they can shovel into their mouths, but I don’t think it’s something we should be losing sleep over either. My youngest once nursed for half an hour with a mouth full of pea gravel. My husband brought her in from the backyard, where she had obviously been filling her mouth without anyone noticing. When she was done nursing, she sat up, burped, opened her mouth and the little rocks began to fall out of her mouth. It seemed a miracle at the time that she hadn’t choked, but now I realize that just about every toddler lives through such miraculous events, which makes them pretty routine.

My friend Kim said her son ate an anthill when he was a toddler. He scooped up ants and dirt and happily put them in his mouth. And I know several moms whose toddlers loved dog food. I’m not entirely sure why we get so upset when these things happen. Yes, my son could have contracted toxoplasmosis from the cat poop, and kids can get worms from eating dirt, but those are usually not life-threatening conditions. Perhaps parents get so upset because toddlers usually seem so happy when they’re in the midst of eating some newfound treat. We’re horrified at the thought of eating such disgusting items, which are not even a part of the food chain, while our dear child is as happy as if he’d just discovered Crepes Suzette. We worry that we may be rearing someone who will never get a date to the prom if they continue to have such socially unacceptable tastes, much less get married and leave home someday.

I am happy to report that my children are now 7, 10 and 13, and their tastes have changed considerably. In fact, the two younger ones are downright picky eaters, and it’s hard to fix a meal that all three enjoy or even accept. They are thoroughly "grossed out" by the thought that they ever put any non-food item into their mouth. I feel relatively sure that their odds of getting a date to the prom are as good as the next kid’s, and I do think that they will get married and leave the house someday. But if I had another toddler tomorrow who started scooping something gross into his mouth, would I respond calmly and rationally? Of course not.