My Wife Can’t Wrap Her Head Around the Fact That She Gave Birth to a Ginger. Our Daughter Is Starting to Notice.

Care and Feeding Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Klavdiia Arziukova/Getty Images Plus. Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here. Dear Care and Feeding, My wife, “Mariah,” and I have two girls, “Maddie,” 5, and “Maya,” 7. Maddie is a redhead, which is something that Mariah has never been crazy about. She regularly makes jokes about Maddie that she’s the “redheaded stepchild” or that someone must have switched babies on us at the hospital because no one else in the family has red hair. Maddie is now old enough to understand what is going on, and it’s causing her genuine anxiety. The other day she tearfully asked me if we were really her parents. I assured her we were, that sometimes people can have a kid with red hair even if they aren’t red-haired themselves. When I spoke to Mariah about curtailing the jokes, she blew it off by saying Maddie knows she doesn’t mean it. What can I do to make my wife understand a child Maddie’s age isn’t worldly enough to grasp that sort of humor? —Fretful Dear Fretful, Sometimes, I read a letter and realize that we are being asked how to stop someone’s spouse from behaving like a horrible person, and it frustrates me, because there’s nothing I or any of the columnists can say to guarantee such an outcome. This is one of those occasions. I don’t know Mariah or how she shows up in other parts of her life, but in this regard, she is being a mean-ass, goofy bully to a 5-year-old, and that is not OK. Teasing a child that young about anything, much less something so potentially devastating as not being your parents’ child, and waving off pushback? Yikes on bikes. With all due disrespect, your wife is either kinda stupid, very nasty, or a combination of the two. Please sit Mariah down and tell her unequivocally that she must not joke that way about your daughter again, and that she has caused her real pain and anxiety. Be firm and explain that this is a non-negotiable, and that if she ever says such a thing again, you are going to check her in front of the kids. Do not bow down—you must stand up for your child! Are there other ways in which your wife is unkind to Maddie? Is it just Maddie, or does she show up this way with Maya too? If she is literally treating Maddie like “a redhead stepchild” or being unpleasant to both girls, you need to get that under control or make adjustments to your life to protect them from their mother. I can’t speak for you, but a MF in my house would not get away with talking to my child like that, and I don’t care if she’s her child, too! —Jamilah More Parenting Advice From Slate Each of my in-laws passed away after a period filled with many illnesses, hospitalizations, and needing continuous daily care. My spouse and I felt proud of having served them at home in their last years of need. It was a loud home with many trying days toward the end—needing to force my in-laws to exercise, take medicine, clean them, etc. as they were going through both physical and mental decline. We had home nurse aides help us in the last few months, it had become so physically exhausting. One of my kids, who is 7 years old, seems to have witnessed some episode of this (something physical) when she must have been 5 or 6 and has on multiple occasions said that she knows what I did to grandma and that I sent her to God. Never miss new Slate Advice columns Get the latest from Prudie and our columnists in your inbox each weekday, plus special bonus letters on Saturdays. Advice Family Kids