I was just innocently driving home from soccer practice.
“Mommy, how does the baby get into the mommy’s tummy?”
Thoughtful pause… “The Daddy puts it there.” (Why didn’t I say something about a stork, or God, or – look, there’s a motorcycle! Anything to delay this conversation???)
“No Mommy. I want to know HOW the Daddy makes the baby in the Mommy.”
Careful… keep eyes on road… Maybe I can get her distracted on a different – but factual — aspect of reproduction. “Daddy’s have this kind of a seed that when it meets with the egg in the Mommy, it makes a baby.” Wow, I was uncomfortable. Shouldn’t she be older to start this conversation?
“Mommies have eggs?”
Whew, it might be working. Get her on another topic. “Yes, all mommies have eggs. You will too one day.” It’s really hot in here. Why isn’t the air working?!
“So how does the seed get to the egg?”
Aaaannnndddd she’s back. I was twisting in my seat now. “Well, it’s more like a little sperm thingie that swims to the egg.” Thingie?! HELP.ME.PLEASE. Someone fender-bender me NOW.
“How does the sperm get to the egg?”
If I keep repeating, maybe she’ll get bored and move on. “The Daddy puts it there.” How soon can this be over and she’ll stop asking questions?
“HOW. HOW does he put it there???” She can be very persistent and firm, this one. She was not letting this go.
“Um…” uncomfortable silence… and then I went for it. “The Daddy puts his Daddy parts to the Mommy parts.” But that was as graphic as I was willing to go.
“EWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!”
Relief — I think that did it! “Well, you asked! Wait, why are you asking? Were your friends talking about this at school?!”
“No. Shrek did.”
“Shrek?”
“Yes, Shrek said he didn’t know how Fiona got pregnant. And Donkey said, ‘You don’t know where babies come from?’ And Shrek said, ‘I know HOW it happened, I just don’t know how it happened.’ (Note: The rest of the movie dialog that she repeated verbatim gets fuzzy at this point as I was distracted trying to stabilize my heart rate.) So I wanted to know how it happened.”
“No more Shrek for you.” Dang. Shrek. I told the hubs she was too young for those movies! Another delightful outcome of Shrek, she toots all the time and says, “Better out than in, I always say!”
Endearing, yes. And yet, he’s horrified that I told her the truth.
“You’ll lie to her about Santa Claus, but you can’t lie about this?!”
“I haven’t lied to her about Santa Claus in a whole year. She asked if Santa was real last Christmas and I asked her what she thought, and she said, ‘yes.’ Although she’s onto all the mall imposters. She’s not buying that. I’ll tell her the truth if she really wants to know.”
Sigh. Growing up is hard for mom’s to do.
PS – Laugh now, this post will self-destruct before Big Daddy finds it or the Cupcake really learns to read complex sentences!
okay, so, just okay. This wasn’t as bad as I imagined. This is exactly why I always bite my tongue and ask “why do you ask?” first! When A told me he did not want to go to 1st grade last May I asked why even though I had my “1st grade is wonderful” speech ready. The answer – “I want to go to 3rd grade momma”. Whew! Figured out it was because of a girl he liked in the after school program.
So always ask why. The answer might just surprise you! And I’m glad that question did not make you run off the road! It was certainly the big one!