My Mother-in-Law Has a Bizarre Belief About Underwear. It’s Really Starting to Affect Our Lives.

Care and Feeding Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Ljupco /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 mother-in-law “Fran” lives several states away and recently came to stay with us for a week. As the days wore on, I noticed my 3-year-old son “Sam’s” underwear disappearing until we were down to one pair. I asked my husband what was going on, and he sighed and said he thought he knew the answer: that his mother had thrown away our son’s underwear. When I asked him why the hell she would do that, he said that he wasn’t allowed to wear underwear growing up because Fran believed it would make him impotent. When I confronted my mother-in-law, it turned out that she had indeed tossed Sam’s underwear. I ended up having to buy new ones. Is this unhinged behavior on her part a fireable offense? —Underwear Outrage Dear Underwear Outrage, Yeah. My first instinct: definitely fireable. Ship her off to an island, if you have to. But before we take such extreme measures, let’s try a more reasonable approach. First, she shouldn’t be throwing away any articles of clothing without asking your permission. And second, he’s 3-years-old, and she should not be thinking about sperm count. I checked this Reddit thread, which didn’t lead me to any conclusive evidence unless “Lostinthesaucy” and “SkidNutz” are full-time urologists moonlighting as message board trolls spreading the news that it’s crucial for all men to “let ’em dangle.” But again—they’re talking about the sperm count for men, not 3-year-old boys. I would say be kind to your mother-in-law, but ask her to please not throw away Sam’s underwear anymore. If she’s still unconvinced and believes she’ll be deprived of future great-grandchildren, send her this McGill University paper on some of the myths tied to male fertility. But, for now, a short-term fix: Hide all your son’s underwear when she comes to town. Or maybe, to prove a point, start throwing hers away. —A.J. More Parenting Advice From Slate My husband and I have two boys, “Aaron,” 8, and “Archer,” 12. Just under two weeks ago, I began to notice that Aaron’s underwear wasn’t showing up in the dirty clothes to be washed. 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