Why You Should Banish The Five-Second Rule..Doctor’s orders!

So, the other day I found my preschooler eating a furry piece of muffin that had a slight tinge of green from sitting just underneath the couch (within small finger-grasping reach of course) for an undetermined amount of time.

For a second, I thought it was a Cruskit with avocado I had prepared for afternoon tea, but the crumb output at her feet told a very different story.

No matter how much I should be used to her eating food off the floor, it’s still one of the few triggers for my ninja-like reflexes, which when they kick in, allow me to swipe said offensive object from the unsuspecting hands of my little one usually prompting a vocal protest.

Once the disgust subsides, I then wash hands (both of ours) and explain that you shouldn’t eat food off the floor because it’s gross and will make you sick.

But American geneticist Chris Mason, who had the awesome job of studying all of the types of bacteria found on the New York subway, says that literally every surface in the world is covered in bacteria and the idea that things can be “perfectly clean” is a myth.

“I would advise any new parent to roll their child on the floor of the New York subway,” he said.

“We tend to think of our homes and personal environments as these pristine places, and public ones as dirty and infested with bacteria, but you should really think of yourself as a rabbit who gets to hop between two forests.”

There is a lot to be said about the hygiene hypothesis, or the old saying that dirt and germs strengthen the immune system, because science has proven time and again that it’s true.

So it’s actually okay to let your child bite their fingernails and sneak a booger or two.

As for the five-second rule? Pfft! Maybe we need more of a colour-based system (perhaps when things get more green than their original colour, it becomes a no-no? Just a suggestion).

All of this talk on five-second rules made me reflect on my relationship with this unspoken rule and I have noticed that for fresh food dropped on the floor, my acceptable period of time allowable before it is picked up and eaten has relaxed somewhat since I had kids.

In fact, it seems to follow a bell curve through life.

When I was a kid, I would pick that dropped lollipop up off the grass, scrape off the dirt and stones and carry on eating that sucker because I just spent the 50 cents I’d also found on the ground to buy it.

In my teens, it was always the two-second or five-second rule depending on which company you were keeping. There was also a desire system in place. The lettuce from a burger? That can so stay down there. The tomato? Maybe, if it doesn’t have sauce on it. The last piece of chicken fillet? Quick! Quick! Get that bad boy back in my mouth!

As a pre-child adult, you play the I-didn’t-even-see-that-fall-so-I-don’t-have-to-have-that-internal-battle-as-to-whether-I’m-going-to-pick-it-up game.

Once kids arrive, you start to revert.

The rusk is dropped on the floor, so you quickly snatch it up (within two to five seconds) and give it a good once-over to check for hairs, stones or other offensive items, and give it back.

By the time you have a toddler or preschooler, you are pretty much wondering if they need to have afternoon tea since they just ate that furry piece of muffin that has a slight tinge of green. That will be my thought process from here on out – thanks Doc Mason!