This week in Yes, I'm Still Pregnant:

Yes. I’m still pregnant.

He is officially one day over-due.

Have I ever mentioned how much I like things well-done?

Or how patient I am?

Or how much I wanted to stab a small, rectangular piece of paper?

And before I am asked, these are the things we’ve tried (So Much TMI Alert):

Membranes stripped? HA.

Spicy food? Double HA.

Raspberry leaf tea? RIGHT.

Castor oil? DO NOT RECOMMEND.

Sex with accompanied attention paid to nippular area? That was… magical…

Rocking in rocking chair and bouncing on yoga ball? I’m seriously sea-sick.

Calming meditation: FUCK YOU, CALMING MEDITATION.

Long walks? I’ve probably logged over 20 miles in over the last two weeks and I’m not even exaggerating. For once.

At least by the time he comes we’ll probably have skipped that pesky newborn period and moved right on to learning his ABC’s or possibly Calculus at the rate I seem to be progressing.

Now if you’ll excuse me, instead of quietly accepting the things I cannot change I’m going to go ahead and practice my hip-rolls with Keaton to Psy’s Gangnam Style.

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I'm not feeling very clever today…

I’m fighting off a scratchy throated sickness that has sapped all my energy and that I am NOT allowed to be fully hit with until after Keaton’s birthday on Sunday {DO YOU HEAR ME, UNIVERSE?}, so in the interest of taking a nap instead of boring/irritating the Internet with my stance on sensitive political/social topics, I will just be posting this video, which says it better {and without the use of my extensive swearword vocabulary!} than I ever could.

Come on, World. Quit being a giant asshat. It’s time. {Had to get one in.}

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Mother. Fucker.

I tried breaking up with competition dance last week. It didn’t go as smoothly as I had hoped. Instead of going back to recreational, one of her teachers suggested she could go ahead and repeat the first year line. Because she was young for her current age group, she still fits the 4-6 age grouping of that line. To be honest, I’m {and don’t forget Bill!} not super excited about the prospect of another year filled with The Sequins and The Crazy from March through May. Of course Rowan really wants to do it even though she’ll probably be the only first grader in the class.

Or will she.

About 10 minutes ago I got a call from the charter school we fell in love with two years ago. Despite being told we had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting in {at number 55 on the waiting list} we were just offered a spot. Only way back last fall when we registered Rowan we were seriously considering pulling her from Kindergarten and holding her back a year so after going back and forth on it, I filled the application out for Kindergarten again. The offered spot for my very proud first grader is for K only.

So to sum up, The Ultimate Powers of the Universe seem to be offering us some sort of cosmic do-over of the shitstorm that was last year.

Only I don’t know that I want ANY of us to repeat last year. It was one of the hardest, most emotional, and inexplicably challenging years as a parent I’ve ever had to get through- its only competition being Keaton’s First Year of Screaming Screaminess. I don’t want to go in reverse. We came out bruised and battered from it but we made it to the other side with a lot of growth. I am so proud of Rowan’s accomplishments that she fought for last year and to send her back to Kindergarten, even if it is a different school, kind of seems like I’m invalidating all of that hard work. I know that the charter school has a reputation for academic rigorousness but still, the kid can already read, add, subtract and do story problems. The last thing I need is for her to get bored and then start assembling small explosives or figuring out how to rob a secure vault in her spare time. By all accounts she could end up in jail by third grade! SHUT UP, IT’S TOTALLY POSSIBLE.

I really just don’t think that we can do it.

But.

If I turn down this opportunity I feel like I’m screwing not only Rowan but Keaton who would automatically be accepted into Kindergarten there when the time comes. This is huge since I don’t want him in our assigned district school which is open-format, and I would never put another kid in with the Kindergarten teacher at the school we currently open-enroll to. I could roll the dice and see if he magically gets in when the time comes, or try our luck at open-enrolling into yet another school within the district but past experience tells me it’s a long shot not worth gambling on.

I used to think this charter school was The Perfect School. An Educational Utopia. After a year of hearing stories of some questionable admissions tactics on their part, I no longer think that. But I still think that it is superior, at least academically speaking, to our public school system. Plus she could get busing, which we can’t get now. And wow, I really just don’t know what the fuck to do. I would ask Rowan’s pediatrician, who has known her since birth, but she up and moved to a far-away state last month, leaving me without a professional opinion on any of this.

As of right now the school is holding her spot, but as school starts two weeks from today, time’s not really on our side. And…just…FUCK.

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So…guess who flunked her eye exam?

Fuck. (I’m sorry for saying fuck , but FUCK.)

Every single person in my family has glasses. Every single person in Bill’s family has glasses (or has had Lasik). The ONLY person related to Rowan that doesn’t need corrective lenses is HER FATHER. Upon our nuptials I told Bill it was his absolute duty as a father to pass his superior eyeball genes on to our fetuses. I don’t care if he had to bribe certain sperm, wine and dine them, sing them 80’s ballads every night or even play Kenny G if necessary. WE NEED THEM. THEY ARE IMPERATIVE TO OUR SPAWN’S FUTURE ROLE AS DOMINATORS OF PLANET EARTH.

I watched Rowan take the eye test and noticed she missed a few or said she couldn’t make out the shapes on the lower lines, but they seemed pretty small to me so I figured it wasn’t a big deal. Then her pediatrician came in and said she may need glasses. I politely told her she must be mistaken or maybe just crazy? She didn’t understand. I had a deal with my husband and his sperm. She said she wanted Rowan to go to an optometrist to get re-tested. I assured her there was a mistake, Rowan wasn’t used to the doctor’s office and was probably distracted by having to hold a hand over one eye. After all, her preschool had vision and hearing testers come in last spring and she passed just fine.

She offered to retest her with both eyes. Good! Idea!, I encouraged. She tested her using shapes: FAIL. Then letters: FAIL. Maybe she was having an off day? NO, dramatic denial-ridden parent, make the appointment.

My last hope that Bill’s superior eyeball genes are just being lazy mothereffers is that about half the kids that originally flunk the pediatrician office test go on to pass the optometrist test just fine. I’m hoping that this is the case but after watching her squint and struggle to guess at the lines on the wall I’m not so sure.

And on a completely different topic, I would like to do a little PSA for parents of future 5 year olds: Vaccinating a 5 year old is the worst thing you will ever have to witness and participate in, in the entirety of your whole live. Fight or Flight will kick in. They will fight. Blood will be shed. Some of it will be yours. They will hold you personally responsible.

No big deal, just FYI.

PS. I’m fully aware that getting glasses isn’t the worst thing in the world (Pay attention! Vaccinating a 5 year old is!) but I did NOT enjoy them past the 3rd grade, when I intentionally flunked the sight test. And also? KERCHING KERCHING.

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So yesterday. That was fun.

To premise this story I would like to point out that in my four and a half years as a parent I have learned this:

1. A child who goes red-faced for a minute and then smiles at you has just shit in your bath-tub and

2.  It’s a big fat waste of time to take your kids into the clinic when they have cold/flu symptoms. Every single time they give you the same catch-all word, say it with me now…VIRUS! Then they either tell you to push fluids and give fever reducing medicine as necessary (which you are obviously already doing, dumbass) or they give you a prescription for antibiotics, which most of the time do nothing because the doc only really prescribed them because they feel bad that you’re leaving empty-handed and plus (!) while on this lovely little visit to the disease infested clinic your kid has probably picked up some other illness that the antibiotics will maybe come in handy for. (ps~ that was a 80+ word sentence. New personal best!)

Anyway. Yesterday.

I don’t have time to get into the particulars because I just looked down and realized I am still wearing yesterday’s sweatpants that Keaton puked all over when we were trying to get him to sit through a nebulizer treatment, but I can safely assure you that spending a day in the hospital with your very ill two-year old is not so very much a fun time.

After an hour and a half of pokes, prods and chest x-rays at our clinic the docs took Keaton’s pulse-ox after his x-ray revealed terrible pneumonia in his right lung, to find that he should be blue and near death with a reading in the low 80’s (lowest-end normal is 97-99). A second reading from his toe revealed a slightly higher, but still dangerously low number. Without much explanation the doctor gave me two choices: Would I like to have Keaton transported to Children’s by ambulance or would I like to drive him myself?

I waited to freak out until I was in the car driving a good 25 miles over the speed limit, picking up Bill and Rowan from her dance class on the way because I was too scared to drive into St.Paul alone, sure I would get lost and Keaton would die in the car because I had to circle Kellogg and West 7th too many times. A little dramatic? Maybe, but Keaton’s head was bobbing up and down with what I am sure was exhaustion but when a doctor tells you to rush your kid to the hospital because his oxygen levels are dangerously low you tend to think in WORST CASE SCENARIO mode.

Once there we got him admitted and then we waited. And waited some more. And then there was more waiting. Finally the doctor came in and said this was clearly RSV which is a what? That’s right, folks. A VIRUS. “What about the pneumonia?” I asked. “What pneumonia?” he said, clearly annoyed. “The pneumonia they found in the chest x-ray.” “Well, where is the x-ray? Didn’t they give it to you to bring?” My dazed but very pissed off look assured him that no, no they did not give me a copy to bring, so he ordered a new x-ray (and three hours and a double dose of radiation later guess what it showed, guys? TERRIBLE PNEUMONIA! I was SO SURPRISED!).

They kept a pulse-ox monitor on Keaton and immediately it read higher than the clinics WARNING! DEATH! reading, but it was still much lower than it should be. The problem there being that all the pediatricians were completely booked solid at our clinic so we had to see a family practice doctor and do you think this doctor found a monitor that fit a 2-year-old? Why would he do that when this much too big one that is conveniently sitting right here will be so much easier?! Inaccuracy? Details, details. Beep, Beep! Hmm… Your son should be in a coma at this reading but instead of troubling myself with finding the correct monitor I will instead send you 15 miles away to a different hospital and you can be their problem.

In the end Keaton would have needed to be admitted for fluids and monitoring anyway but that could have taken place at the hospital down the street, with familiar doctors, a familiar environment and done in a lot less panicked and scary fashion.

The important thing is that Keaton is OK and did so great throughout the whole thing. Preferring to cuddle in my lap rather than lay in the hospital bed which was just fine with me. He did NOT appreciate the neb treatment (crap. I still need to change! and quite possibly shower!) but did so great when they were trying to get his line in- after three blown veins he told the nurse with a weak smile, “I OK! I feel better now!” in an attempt to get her to stop freaking poking him with needles, giving us a much needed tension releasing laugh.

He’s so exhausted and still pretty sick but the antibiotics they gave him should help the pneumonia and the doc explained that RSV is at its worst at the one week mark so hopefully he’ll start to improve in the next day or so. Thanks to everybody who sent well wishes to the little guy! Now pray for Bill who is beyond delirious due to lack of sleep, dealing with a crazed wife and juggling work and a four-year-old who refuses to accept that the center of the universe does not lie snugly within her being.

PS: We came home to the news that not only did Rowan not get into the Kindergarten we loved and had pinned all our hopes on for her future as Queen Of Earth, but that she is ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY on the wait list. Guess how many people are on the wait list? No, seriously, guess! …Somewhere around one hundred and twenty. I mean, if you’re not going to get in you might as well REALLY not get in, vanquishing all hope of a call for an opening. The way I see it, we are PRESIDENT of Not Getting In. THAT is how awesome we are.

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Well Hey There, 2010

Our holiday break is coming to a close. Tomorrow Bill goes back to work and the kids and I are back to the grind of lessons, classes and preschool. Even though the middle of our break kind of sucked… well, I guess “blew” (or is it “Blowed”?) would be a more accurate term, as in chunks, due to the stomach flu or food poisoning or whatever it was, we rounded out our holiday break on a really good note.

We spent New Year’s Eve over at Jen and the Deps’ place and BOY HOWDY did we have a fun time. The Mallinger’s added DJ Hero and Mario Kart to their Wii library so we spent the night spinning records (or, you know, pushing a couple buttons and waving our hands in the air like idiots, but let’s not split hairs…), racing each other while failing miserably at trying to curb our cuss words in front of the kids and belting out Beatles and Rockband hits. There also may have been some alcohol involved. And home-made fireworks.

We stayed the night, and after 4 hours or so of sleep we had breakfast and discussed plans and dates for Cabin Vacation 2010. YAY! After going home and cuddling on the couch and in bed, we picked Keaton up and went to my moms for a nice meal (and leftover Christmas cookies!).

On Saturday morning we decided to take our tree and the decorations down. This is always a hard one for me. After all is said and done it is nice to get your house back but everything looks so empty and stark. When the decorations come down the reality of securing that bookend hits me and I know it’s time to move onward and into the frigidly cold, extremely long, winter that is Minnesota. I normally do this chore after Bill has gone back to work but since the weekend fell after the holiday he helped me take everything down which made it less daunting and I was surprised that even though I was sad to see the holidays end…it was OK. I was happy to sit on the couch that night and play trucks with Keaton and read stories to Rowan. It felt like a good ending.

Today we decided to brave the below zero temps and take the kids to the Mall of America to make a few returns. We also stopped into the Disney store, Barbie store and American Girl store. Rowan just walked the perimeter of the shops, pointing to it all, expressing her desire for one of each, maybe two, of every item in each store. We’re jerks so we didn’t buy her anything but she didn’t seem to mind. She was just in awe of the whole place from the elevator rides to the “people in giant stuffed animal suits”.

Then, compliments of free unlimited wristbands from my mom, (THANKS MOM!) we took them to Nickelodeon World, except when I was a kid it was called Camp Snoopy which resulted in me calling it “Camp Snickelodeon World Or Whatever” seven or eight times before I finally just gave up and called in “The Fair Inside the Mall”.

The kids LOVED The Fair Inside the Mall. Like, they would have TOTALLY married it if we would have let them. Rowan went down the big log chute ride with Bill and “even though it was sort of a little scary it was my bestest ride ever because I am brave, you know”. Nap time was pushed a little bit too far for Keaton’s liking but the lines were non-existent or really short and once we got him on a ride he was as happy as a clam. I so wish I would have remembered my camera, but alas, I did not.

You know when I did remember to bring my camera, though? That’s right. New Year’s Eve, my friends. I would NEVER forget it when I am guaranteed shots of the DCFI dressed like an idiot. So here are a few shots of how us drunk idiots rung in the new year…

Rowan and Ellie were troopers and stayed up for the New Year.

It was the Rum and Cokes that got them through. Oh, I'm kidding. They don't put coke in their rum.

Here are the glam girls, Jorie and Maddy who is wearing a bow Snoreface and I wore when we were little.

Not to be outdone, Rowan found a bigger, more obnoxious bow to secure to her head.

Let the DJ Hero-ing begin! Giacomo definitely was the night's best performer. Guy knows how to get the party started.

IT's the D-D-D-DCFIIIIIIIIIIIII... watch out!

Shield your eyes! The DCFI's bling is BLINDING!!!!!!!

Here we are doing a bitchin version of Oh Darling.

Happy New Year! From the DiGiacomo's...

The Mallinger's...

The Snoreface and the Vince's...

and me, Rowan and Gonzo.

BOOM BOOM. Keaton was thankful to be far FAR away at Bill's parents for the night.

I hope everyone has had a respectable start to the new year and let’s hope 2010 brings good things to us all!

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Christmas Weiners… I MEAN WISHES! Wait. No. Weiners.

This weekend Christmas up and threw up on us.

Event the First: On Friday we had Bill’s holiday party which was filled with his fabulous co-workers, a !free! dinner (we Gunters get really excited about free things) and 3 dirty martinis, 3 glasses of wine and a beer. I think Bill had a drink or two as well. I wasn’t really keeping track of him so much.

Event the Second: Miss Ellie Belle had her holiday gymnastics meet. Even though I read the e-mail several times, I somehow glossed over the part that said it was nearly two hours long and foolishly brought both of my children. Let me say that again: Two hours long, with two small children. Keaton actually did pretty well, and as there was a lot going on, Rowan’s impatience with the whole thing was only mildly embarrassing. Afterward we went out to eat with everyone and this is where Keaton decided he was done being polite and was ready to act like a normal two-year old who was “ALL DONE!” “GO HOME” “I THROW THINGS!”.

Event the Third: Rowan’s Sunday school Christmas celebration which consisted of the kids singing three Christmas Carols and ingesting entirely too many cookies. I’d tell you how well she did but I couldn’t really see her because even though she was in the first row, a monster of a girl who was supposed to be standing next to Rowan took it upon herself to stand directly in front of her so I couldn’t see her at all from where we were sitting. I sneaked in between the aisles to shoot one measly picture but another mom who had been there snapping non-stop pictures for the whole 5 minute performance was taking up the whole aisle and wouldn’t budge to let anyone else in. I’m going to go ahead and let you guess whose mother she was.

After they were done I got to go up and get a few pictures of Rowan, all of which contained other little faces and since I’m not sure if people would appreciate me putting their kids on my irreverent mommy blog, don’t be scared, that is not the ghost of baby Jesus, I just blurred that kids face off. For legal reasons.

Nice pose, huh? It was a very vogue Catholic Christmas show.

Event the Fourth: Santa Clause. Here is where Christy thinks she is being bright and says to Bill, “I know we weren’t planning on doing it til next weekend but the kids are already in their Christmas clothes so we should just head to the mall and see Santa.” Good idea, right? WRONG. The line was atrocious but we sort of expected that. Rowan made friends with the two little girls behind us and she was having fun so I told Bill to just go ahead and walk Keaton around the mall for a while and check back to see our progress.

He took off and here is where I tell you that before we got into this really long line we asked Rowan if she needed to go potty and she vehemently denied the need to go anytime in the near future. This is also where I tell you they positioned Santa Clause’s magical little kingdom at the furthest point from any bathroom the mall had to offer. You see where I am going here? Five minutes after Bill left, Rowan said “Well, maybe I DO need to go potty, after all. Like NOW.”

I’m sure I could have asked the people behind us to hold our spots but all of a sudden the line started moving much faster and I was sure Bill would be back at any moment. Then Rowan said “I don’t need to go any more mom!” and I  panicked and tried to check if she’d peed herself but no, she hadn’t and “HOW DARE YOU. I AM FOUR, NOT A LITTLE GIRL.” Then her eyes started watering and she announced that wait, maybe she still needed to go. This happened three or four times. AHHH! I tried sending telepathic messages to Bill to GET THE FUCK BACK HERE NOW PLEASE, but he must have had his Christy tuner turned to mute which I suspect happens more than he admits to.

A half an hour later, with only three people in front of us he made his return where I greeted him with a whispered “you suck get her to the potty now before she explodes!”, and he whispered back “how the hell was I supposed to know you crazy woman, I turned my tuner to mute!”

Anyway they sat on Santa’s lap for a picture which was not really Keaton’s idea of a good time after waiting around for an hour. He cried for a few seconds but saw how elated Rowan was so he calmed down enough to only look Moderately Terrified in the picture instead of Scared Shitless.

Event the Fifth: Gingerbread house. OK, I’m not really sure why I thought this was a good idea after all the crap we’d already done yesterday but we did it and I’m so glad we did because I have never been so amused by something my son has created. Originally we were going to do the house during Keaton’s nap because I knew he would just throw fistfull after fistfull of candy into his mouth which is exactly what he did but first he decorated a gingerbread snowman and I will let you draw your own conclusions about it:

Do you see that? What?! COME ON. The snowman has a boner. Well, it was funny to me and all the other 12-year-old boys reading this blog. So yeah. OK then. Just me.

Whatever, it made all the other Christmasy debacles of the weekend TOTALLY WORTH IT.

Snowman weiners will do that to even the most dignified revelers.

The finished product. Let's just add Gingerbread house decorating to my list of Things I Shouldn't Be Allowed To Do, along with sewing and cooking and math.

Event the Sixth involved trying to make a Christmas tree on my old Lite Bright. Let’s just say it ended with me not letting the kids ruin my (*BIG AIR QUOTES*) Mastahpiece, which looks sort of like something a color blind 3-year-old put together.

Then I addressed 75 Christmas cards.
Merry Freakin Christmas.

The End.

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In case you are wondering…

I did not say THE HELL WITH THIS LIFE  and up and join an Amish community on our sojourn to Middle-of-Nowhere-North-Central-Minnesota (although it would be fun to drive around one of those little carriages). Close! But, no. No. That would have been much more pleasant than coming home to a craptastic townhome operating on 25% power. (25%= The 5 most useless, inconveniently located outlets work and that’s about it.) In other statistical news, there has been an 87.9% increase of the usage of the Eff word, due mostly to the fact that it just flies out of our mouths when we try to flip a light switch which we can’t seem to stop doing even though we know there is NO HOPE OF ELECTRICITY BEING PRODUCED BY THIS FUTILE ACT. There is also a 150 % increase in potentially life threatening baby-proofing dangers since we have to run all our lights off extension cords. There has been a 78% increase of Time-outs due to said lamps that little chubby fingers just can’t seem to leave alone because, Look! A lamp on the floor! I must dump water from the sink on top of it so I can enjoy the sizzle and POP it makes or at the very least lick my fingers and play with the extension cords! I am a toddler! Try to stop me! Aw, crap. Back in the naughty spot.

Last night we received word that the break in our line lies firmly planted below our driveway or garage apron so it will be fixed approximately WE DON’T KNOW WHEN BECAUSE WE DON’T COMMIT TO TIME FRAMES THAT WE MAY BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR SO GO AHEAD AND EFF YOURSELF, SUCKERS, (and also, Maybe Friday but you didn’t hear that from me, you may leave the agreed upon bribe money at the corner of 3rd and Main.). So we woke up this morning to downpouring rain and an indoor temperature that was most definitely in the high eighties but probably closer to the low 90’s. Oh the beauty of no freakin’ cross-breeze. So I’ve packed up the kids and headed to the salvation of Grammy’s house where they can eat Cheetos and watch every Disney movie that was released on VHS during the 1990’s.

Our AWESOME association could have had this on the road to FIXED TOWN but they wouldn’t pay the weekend charges which they are obliged to do if it is an inhabited residence so they got yelled at a lot, by Bill of course because I have a little problem controlling the FUCKENHEIMERS and the THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT WAHHHHHHH’s in these sorts of situations. They did agree to give us a $300 allowance for a hotel stay while the work is being completed which I may take them up on just because I want them to pay out.

In the mean time I have limited access to the Interwebs so I will update as often as I can but probably won’t be able to share the awesome shenanigans of Cabin Vacation Oh Niner until I have my sweet sweet wireless back. I will have my pictures imported to my moms iphoto but I don’t know how to shrink them without photoshop (which she doesn’t have) because I am a little bit technologically-delayed in that department. But! I promise not to disappoint! I have peanuts-on-spoon races, bear vs.wolf t-shirts, mini-tractor shots, three year olds attacked by chiggers, punching Twister!, and our favorite and best Deputy Chief Fire Idiot winning the midnight kayak/obstacle course and also making a lot of strange faces. In the mean time think electricitous thoughts for us!

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Earmuffs

When I think of the moments I’m not particularly proud of in my parenting history, more than a few instances come to mind. The Yelling has got to be on the top of my list. Wishing I would get a terminal disease when Keaton’s crying was at its worst. Popping a dirty nuk in my kid’s mouth for no other reason than the sink is just SO FAR AWAY. Any parent’s list could get frighteningly long; from the mundane passive mistakes to the oops-I’m-gonna-be getting-the-therapy-bill ones if they thought about it hard enough, which, {shudder} I don’t really feel like doing right now. However, I don’t have to think too hard or long to know that swearing is a BIG problem for Bill and I.

After Rowan was born we both acknowledged we had a problem but figured we had time. As long as we swore in a sweet, high-pitched voice around her we were OK. Fast forward to 2 year old Rowan and a very bad moment in my parenting history. I was driving my sister, Rowan and my very pregnant self when a car cut me off. I held my tongue. Rowan had entered the age of Extreme Sponginess so I had been making an effort to curb my explicatives. Then the car proceeded to go 15 miles under the speed limit. Again, no swearing- I didn’t even ride their ass. Perhaps they are lost or have a medical condition that doesn’t allow them to push down on the gas pedal correctly. Then they slammed on their brakes in the middle of a 50 mile per hour road, nearly causing an accident.

“YOU FUCKING SHITHEAD FUCKER” flew out of my mouth almost as fast as my middle finger flew up and bashed against the car window. Then to my absolute horror, a high pitched fairy voice squealed out from the backseat, “Fucking Fucker!” Nooooo, I thought, Fuck! Ahhh! I mean CRAP.

“Rowan! Mommy’s upset, Don’t say or repeat that word!”

“OK, mama.” A pause, and then, “Shithead! Shithead!” Oh my god WHAT HAVE I DONE. My sister (who, incidentally, is the most foul mouthed human being on planet earth) was absolutely no help to me at this point because she had gone from politely trying to hide her giggling by clasping her hands over her mouth to full out belly laughs. Real helpful, ya jerk. After we got home I tried to explain to Rowan why adults sometimes say bad things and that mama needs to try harder to watch her language and that Rowan needs to help mom and dad by letting us know when we say a bad word. And we are SO paying for those instructions. She never fails to let us know when we slip up which you’d think would help us stop but, no. You’d be wrong.

We are parents who swear. I know, I know. This is wrong. It is stupid. But LORD WE TRIED TO STOP! We were unsuccessful! When we made an effort to stop swearing when we got upset in front of the kids, swear words just started popping up in our casual conversation because they NEEDED A WAY OUT. Let me demonstrate: Instead of saying  “SHIT” when I dropped the pepper shaker, I would bite my tongue and say nothing or “darn” or “dang” or some other useless word, but then later at dinner I would totally by accident say “Can you pass me the fucking pepper?” You see? I was mad at the pepper and by not allowing the innocent swear when the pepper pissed me off, a much worse and uncalled for swear took it’s place.

Swearing makes me feel better. It is my tension releaser. I can be a very physical person when I’m angry and if I wasn’t allowed a good shit or fuck or some combination of the two I would be libel to throw a chair out the window or worse, at you. This is genetic; my mother was a thrower too. Her weapons of choice were pots and partially frozen poultry or other meats. (I should clarify she only ever aimed at my unsuspecting and mostly deserving father, never us kids.) You see? I need the swears, lest I throw bone-in chicken breast at Bill’s pretty face.

When Rowan started preschool, Bill and I were very afraid. Would she tell her teachers to “pick that shit up” or tell them the “fucking book page tore”? Seven months in and we’ve had no such reports but we really do live in constant fear of this. I don’t want her to be punished or ostracized because we can’t seem to get a handle on what comes out of our mouths. And now the fear has gotten worse since we’ve caught Rowan inadvertently swearing to herself or her toys. GREAT. My kid just told her stuffed animals “To quit with all the damn noise!” or “Get into line, you dumb-ass”. It’s sad but 80% of me laughs when she curses. Rowan has a helium powered voice, strong and high-pitched. I’m sorry but pair that with swear words and it’s nothing short of precious.

Part of me is at peace with how we’ve chosen to handle swearing and the other part of me knows it can’t go on like this. We know it’s going to come to a point when it will no longer be cute, but flat out obnoxious. Like when we get a phone call from another parent asking us what the hell we are teaching our kid. We’ve already decided that crap will not be deemed a bad word in our house and that has bought us some leeway. We haven’t figured out much more, other than to only swear when absolutely necessary, and from there, admit our mistake and apologize. Beyond that Bill’s face would greatly appreciate any suggestions…

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