I got pulled aside in the school parking lot the other day to hear something from my child’s teacher I totally dread.

 
Sure it’s sugar coated with a couple of kind anecdotes disguised as questions, “Is Chloe going through a growth spurt or something because she ate everything in her lunch?”

 
Pause.

 
“She ate so much in fact, she needed more so we gave her an apple from the office.”
Those office apples have come back to haunt me.

 
The whole bowl just screams, “Bad Moms stop here.” Or something more clever like “Moms who don’t pack enough in your kid’s lunch–you are the pits.”

 
I think I’ve just made a big deal out of the office apples over the years and the kids see them as some sort of grand prize if they can convince a teacher to give them one.

 
I have explained that the office apples are for students who have forgotten their lunches or are in fact starving because their parents didn’t pack them enough to eat.

Neither of those applied to Chloe that day and yet, there she was, guilty to the core.

 
I should mention I have no idea who or what the apples are for. They might be decorative, they might be plastic. I just know they don’t belong to us.

 
When I checked her lunch bag it was empty and bone dry. Huh. She actually did eat her entire lunch.

 
Yes it was a full moon, no she didn’t eat more than her usual two-bites of bread for breakfast, no she has never in the history of school lunches ever finished everything I pack, yes I look like a boob.

 
The next day, I packed Chloe a piece of cheese, a full sandwich someone who had been fasting for three weeks couldn’t have put a dent in, a yogurt, some carrots, hummus for dipping, a container of grapes, a few crackers and two—read-em-and-weep office apples, sweet, Macintosh apples along with a note of encouragement, “Dear Chloe, I am so onto you. Love Mommy.”

 
Will my child develop an eating disorder if I continue to play mind tricks with her meals? Maybe but guess what she came home with at the end of the day; two, sweet, Macintosh apples.