Lana Clay-Monaghan, a 35-year-old other of infant twins, was doing what a lot of moms do earlier this spring when the unthinkable occurred: she was innocently looking at baby wipes at Target. And although that is the most relatable thing ever for most moms, what happened next is not: when Lana was leaning over to get a closer look at the baby wipes, someone placed a bucket over her head! In an instant, her world went black. The bucket prank, a stunt that is going viral on TikTok, took Lana by surprise, and the shock had devastating consequences.
“All of a sudden my vision, my hearing was obstructed,” she told the Los Angeles Times. She screamed and struggled to get the bucket off of her while the perpetrators just watched and laughed. When she could see again, she says, “I turned to my left and when I turned around it was a group of males filming me.”
Four teen boys were filming the terrified mom and laughing. But the pranksters surely were not prepared for what happened next: Lana blacked out and fell to the floor.
“I started to say, ‘Help me,’ when I fell to the ground,” she said. “My last memory is people laughing at me.”
The teens took off, and Lana was taken to the hospital, where she was told an “acute heart issue” had caused her to pass out. Clay-Monaghan also has epilepsy, and her health is nothing to mess around with. If only those teenage boys had known that, or cared.
She says that although she was upset that she was attacked with the prank, she’s even more upset that the teens took off when she was clearly in medical distress.
“What a failure to our children to not teach them that the moment you do something wrong, you have integrity and you go get help,” she said.
The bucket challenge is just another stupid social media stunt in the eyes of those who participate in it, but according to police looking into Lana’s case, it is assault. And, teens—come on—have you forgotten the “keep your hands to yourself” rule?
As parents, it’s our unfortunate job to talk to our kids about not taking part in these dangerous social media pranks. But long before that, for their own safety and for the safety of others, we need to teach our kids that they shouldn’t be putting their hands on anyone else’s body and no one should be putting his or her hands on theirs, either. A foundation of boundaries, consent, and the golden rule will go a long way to keeping our kids from taking dumb into the range of dangerous or illegal.
If your kids are on TikTok or any social media for that matter, please have a talk with them about challenges like this. They may seem harmless, but there’s always an exception, and I sure don’t want my kid (or myself!) to be it.
