Student Question
What is the favorite weapon of Dave's mother against him in "A Child Called 'It'"?
Quick answer:
Dave's mother's favorite weapon against him in A Child Called It is food. She frequently refuses to allow Dave to eat, which forces him to steal food from other sources in order to survive. His mother also uses food as a reward on the rare occasion when she needs to manipulate Dave into doing something that will benefit her.
David's mother uses food as a weapon against him. In the first chapter, he is given a bit of his brothers' leftover cereal as a reward for completing his morning chores:
Today it’s Lucky Charms. There are only a few bits of cereal left in a half of a bowl of milk, but as quickly as I can, I swallow it before Mother changes her mind. She has done that before. Mother enjoys using food as her weapon. She knows better than to throw leftovers in the garbage can. She knows I’ll dig it out later. Mother knows most of my tricks.
Throughout the book, David's mother punishes him by removing his access to food. David is forced to steal other kids' lunches in order to survive. He begins stealing food from a local store until he is caught by the manager, who reports David's crimes to his mother. He...
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steals the family's leftovers out of their garbage until his mother purposefully leaves contaminated meat in the garbage, knowing that David will steal some and get sick.
David also begins stealing frozen food from the school cafeteria, and his mother becomes suspicious of his actions. When he gets home from school on this day, she forces him to vomit the contents of his stomach into the toilet. He then is forced to scoop the hot dog pieces out of the toilet, and she serves him the bowl of partially digested hot dogs for his dinner.
David is determined to survive, which requires him to continually circumvent his mother's power of food control. The ability to remove all hope of nourishment from her son is her favorite "weapon" to use as punishment, and she also uses it as a rare reward in order to manipulate David's emotions, such as in the chapter when the social worker visits. On this occasion, David is allowed to eat all he wants for dinner so that he will provide a glowing report of his mother's treatment of him.