Before Parker was born, all my parenting friends told me that clipping baby fingernails is THE WORST. They described how the fingernails are very soft and hard to clip, and they even recommended that I bite the fingernails off with my teeth! I wasn’t hearing none of that “bite the fingernails off” noise, nor was I heeding any of the advice regarding the difficulty of using nail clippers. So I jumped in head first, fingernail clippers blazing!

At first, I was doing really well. I didn’t find it difficult at all to clip Parker’s fingernails. He would sleep the entire time I clipped them, and I found it pretty easy to do if I just took my time and paced myself. That all changed on one fateful day...

I’m not sure what happened. My confidence was high and I certainly wasn’t rushing. I was getting ready to clip the ring fingernail on his right hand with only the right pinky finger left to be clipped. I must’ve made an inaccurate assessment determining the edge of Parker’s fingernail, because instead of clipping his fingernail I nipped the tip of his finger!

Parker yelped, then whimpered, and then went back to sleep. His little finger had two small, red marks where the clippers had bitten his skin. I held my sleeping son limply in my arms like Mary holding Jesus in the Pietà as the crushing weight of guilt seized my chest.

I’m embarassed to admit that I’ve clipped my son’s fingernails exactly ZERO times since that incident. My wife has taken on the mantle of Parker’s Fingernail Clipper, and she’s done an amazing job. However, she thinks it’s absolutely ridiculous that I’ve shied away from the responsibility, and perhaps she’s right; it is pretty ridiculous. But until I’m no longer haunted by the events of that day, I’m afraid I’ll never be able to confidently hold a pair of infant nail clippers again.