It was an ordinary Wednesday and I was doing regular, totally normal human things—like feeding my pet lizard. I was on the phone with a friend when I dropped the last superworm into the tank and noticed the mulch moving.
“Hm,” I said, my attention instantly stolen.
“What?” my friend responded absentmindedly.
“The mulch in Snappy’s tank is… moving.”
“What does that mean?” she asked.
“I guess… something is moving under the mulch?” I offered.
Initially, I assumed a worm had evaded Snappy and was trying to bury itself. I wasn’t entirely wrong, but what I saw next shocked me. As I pushed the coconut fibers aside, I uncovered a long, dark exoskeleton. I dropped my spoon straight into the tank, leapt back three feet, and covered my face.
“Oh my God, it’s not a worm!” was all I could manage.
“What’s not a worm? What are you doing?!”
“I was feeding Snappy—”
“Wait, Snappy? Oh, the lizard?”
“Yes, the lizard! I was feeding him, noticed something moving, and when I went to inspect it… it’s not a worm!”
“Ew, gross. I don’t want to know about this,” my friend replied, clear disgust in her voice. “What is it?”
“I don’t know! It’s under the mulch and—” I paused, trying to lure Snappy onto his hammock so I could get a better view of the black invader.
“Gross. Send me a picture,” she laughed, horrified.
For a split second, the shape resurfaced. I made out what looked like wings and antennae. But with every attempt to scrape aside the mulch, Snappy leapt at my hand, tongue out.
“It looks like some sort of bug, but I can’t tell what—Ah!” I screamed. “He’s hungry! He keeps trying to eat my hand!”
“The bug?!”
“No, the lizard!” I screamed, now genuinely afraid of becoming reptile food.
I’d only been accidentally bitten by Snappy once before. To be honest, I didn't remember it hurting so much as simply terrifying me because I knew lizards carry salmonella. In any event, I wanted neither the bite nor the bacteria.
Then, the mulch moved in a completely different spot.
“Oh my God. I think there’s more than one.”
“That’s gross. Gross, Hailey, ew!”
“I’m FaceTimeing you so you can see. Maybe you know what it is.”
“No! Do not FaceTime me, I don’t want to see this!” she yelled.
I hit FaceTime anyway. Steph’s face reluctantly filled the screen. “Hello.”
I flipped the camera toward the tank. “Do you see it?!”
My prospective career as a videographer died right then and there as I frantically swung the phone back and forth over the enclosure—a chaotic blur of brown coconut fibers and Snappy’s snapping tongue going in and out of focus.
“No! Put the lid back on!” Steph shouted. “Let the kids deal with it! Isn’t it their pet?!”
She had a point. We had made it crystal clear—or so I thought—that it was Cole’s responsibility to feed the lizard he’d begged for for six months. Yet here I was, elbow-deep in a reptile tank, risking life and limb to sort worms from mystery bugs.
Besides, what was I going to do with the thing if I actually scooped it up? I wasn’t even sure what it was—or worse, if it could fly.
That horrifying thought made me freeze. I secured the mesh top, backed away, and turned to Google from a safe distance.
“Alright, this isn’t getting us anywhere. Talk to you later,” I said, hanging up.
I typed “big black bug in lizard tank” into the search bar and watched the results populate.
Evidently, the mysterious black invaders were darkling beetles—the adult stage of superworms, and the exact same insects I’d been feeding Snappy all along. While I was surprised to find these newest terrarium squatters, it actually made sense. Other worms we’d fed Snappy, like waxworms, had also turned into moths. It had taken me days to figure out where that sudden moth infestation was coming from—until I caught one fluttering inside the tank and spotted a few tiny holes in the mesh screen where they’d apparently been staging a prison break.
Knowing what they were made me feel better, but it didn’t make me any more excited to execute their exit.
Aha, I thought. I know just the man for the job: Ethan, my middle child.
Ethan loves bugs. He isn’t afraid of a single creepy-crawly we’ve ever encountered. Even things that fly or jump are considered exciting challenges rather than nightmare fuel.
Case in point: during a previous feeding, an open bag of crickets tipped over, spilling at least twenty onto the floor of Cole’s bedroom. I’m not afraid of crickets, per se, but when a bug is large enough that I can make out its individual eyelashes, I’m tapping out. These were jumbo crickets—hopping everywhere and batting their eyelashes at me as if daring me to catch them.
Ethan to the rescue! He wasn’t just unafraid; he was downright joyful, darting around trying to cup the things while Cole and I scrambled onto the bed like terrified Victorian maidens.
I looked at Cole, surprised by his sudden reluctance to touch the critters. He remained fixated, grimly counting each bug as Ethan caught it. Then, one hopped under the radiator. We watched Ethan scramble on his hands and knees, but the cricket escaped down the hole surrounding the pipe.
Cole’s face instantly crumbled.
“No!” he wailed, hysterical, big rolling tears spilling down his cheeks.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, trying to console my then-seven-year-old. “It just went into that hole, it’s no big deal. Snappy has plenty of food,” I offered, desperately trying to figure out why he was so distraught.
“No big deal?!” he shouted. “Would it be no big deal to you if a giant cricket escaped near your bed?! I’m not sleeping in here.”
My heart stopped. Cole had slept in our bed for over a year, and while I loved the cuddles, there simply wasn’t enough real estate for me, my husband, our 60-pound dog, and our 70-pound son. We had finally gotten him into his own room, sleeping through the night barely a month prior.
Panic set in. My life flashed before my eyes: me, clinging desperately to a sliver of mattress while my son slept soundly, plank-style, horizontally across the bed. I started biting my nails, recalling the dull, throbbing headache I used to wake up with every morning after fighting for a square inch of blanket, and the nervous eye twitch I’d developed from chronic sleep deprivation.
We cannot go back.
I searched my brain for anything to save us from regression. I tried to pacify him with the serene sounds of nature.
“I actually love the sound of crickets!” I encouraged. “I only play rain sounds at night because Google doesn’t offer continuous cricket noises!”
He glared at me.
“It won’t hurt you, bud—they’re totally harmless!” I tried again, but he seemed personally offended by the suggestion.
“Oh yeah?! It might not bite me, but I don’t think it’ll feel very good to have a cricket crawling into my earhole at night!”
“Earhole?!” was the only response I could muster.
Time to switch tactics.
I pretended to spot something moving, jumped off the bed, slammed my sandal onto the floor at the imaginary cricket, and sprinted to the bathroom around the corner—flushing the empty toilet behind me for dramatic effect.
“Did you get it?!” he asked, visceral relief washing over his entire being.
“Yes. Yes, I did,” I lied, deciding his sleep—and my sanity—was far more important than the cold, hard truth.
As a parent, I’m consistently preaching honesty, insisting that truth builds trust, and trust fosters independence. Or rather, the kid-speak equivalent:
“If I can trust you, you can take the mailbox key outside and get the mail all by yourself. But if you sneak candy before breakfast, I can’t trust you, and you don't get the key.”
This was, of course, an actual exchange with my youngest, Theo—for whom both candy and brass keys are high-stakes luxury items—but you get the point.
As I said, I emphasize the importance of honesty and try to lead with it, drawing on personal experience whenever applicable. However, when it comes to my children, even when firsthand experience backs up my advice, it usually goes something like this:
Me: “Please don’t touch the stove; I just used it to cook rice.”
Kids: “Why?”
Me: “Because it’s hot and will burn you. Trust me, I’ve been there.”
Kids: “It’s hot?”
Me: “Yes, it’s hot.”
Kids: “It can burn me?”
Me: “Yup, it can burn you.”
Kids: “Oh, okay.”
Legitimately thirty seconds later:
Kids: “Ow!”
Me: (Sighs in defeat)
There are countless examples just like that: Don’t climb on that, it’s not safe. Don’t put your fingers in the door jamb. Don’t hop down the stairs with your eyes closed.
I try to shoot straight, but either it doesn't translate or my kids are just gluttons for punishment. At this point, maybe I should try reverse psychology: Go ahead, spin really fast and sprint headfirst into that wall. If I have a 50/50 shot of them heeding my warnings anyway, why not gamble on the approach?
Or maybe it’s in my delivery. People tell me I talk to my children like they’re adults—that I’m "up here" and need to come "down here." They say I use words that are "too big" and explain myself too much. To some extent, I get it. When Cole was four, he spoke like a middle manager, dropping phrases like "for example" and "let’s negotiate." Just two weeks ago, six-year-old Ethan looked at me and deadpanned, "I’m disgusted." But the thing is, they actually comprehend the words I’m using. They even use sarcasm and air quotes correctly!
So where does that leave us?
Looking back at the cricket phantom-slaughter and the darkling beetle invasion, I am slowly coming to realize a few fundamental truths about parenting:
First, no matter how clearly or logically you explain the world, kids are going to want to fuck around and find out, test the boundaries themselves. Pushing limits is practically written into their job description.
Second, while leading by example and being honest is always the goal, executing it in real-time isn't always easy. I really wanted to pretend I never saw those big black bugs in Snappy’s tank. I wanted to leave the lid closed and live in bliss, ignoring the beetle civilization thriving under my roof. But ignoring a problem only makes it fester—or in this case, populate.
So later that night, armed with my six-year-old insect enthusiast by my side, I reached a gloved hand into the terrarium, dug through the mulch, and dropped the beetles into the cup Ethan was proudly holding. I went to bed knowing I had faced the mystery head-on… and that the only things left in my house with more than two legs were the dog, the lizard, and that stray cricket from months ago. (He’s definitely dead by now, right? Right.)
Which brings me to my final revelation: as much as I value the truth, reading the room is an equally essential parenting skill. Absolute honesty at the expense of someone’s security—or sleep—isn't always the best policy. I don’t lie to manipulate or make promises I can't keep, but I will willingly deploy a strategic white lie for the greater good. And in this house, protecting my own sanity and getting a full eight hours of sleep is definitely for the greater good.
