I live in a type of fantasy land where my parents believe that I don’t swear. Deep down, I know that they know better. I’m fairly certain that I’ve never sworn in front of them, but I did say “shi-stuff” once. If you need that in context, it sounded something like, “When I looked in, I saw all sorts of shi-stuff.”
At home (and anywhere else, for that matter), it’s a different story. I don’t “cuss like a sailor”, but I can hold my own with the potty-mouth militia. I made admirable attempts towards eliminating bad-words from my vocabulary when Tyler was born. When I did feel the urge to swear, I reverted to caveman language, and would grunt and growl my frustrations. That lasted for about a week, and then I was back to using **** and **** and ****. My inner voice (so very persuasive) argued that Tyler was too young to learn or understand the words, thus making it okay to cuss freely and as often as necessary. Well, inner voice has been rather quiet on the subject now that Tyler is trying to mimic sounds.
As a result, the campaign for a cleaner mouth has been restarted. A big motivator for me is that I never want to hear the following phrase from Sarah if Tyler utters one of the baddies.
“He learned that word from you.”
I still slip once in a while. But when I do, I tend to operate on the assumption that the words aren’t as severe if I whisper them. Telling Sarah about my day, I may say something like, “some dumb ((((****)))) in a Honda cut me off today.” The parentheses would be me whispering the mother of all curses.
Sarah would inevitably reply with, “This is an ’81 Honda! HOW DARE YOU?”[1]
I don’t have Tourette’s Syndrome, but I have been shocked into episodes of it before. For example, I may be inclined to say a specific word or two after stubbing my toe on the entertainment center. A four-lettered utterance may find its sound waves vibrating around my general location on the too frequent occasions that my difficult-to-light gas grill will suddenly catch, and shoot a fireball into the air, typically resulting in a few singed hairs.
The point is, I’m really trying to stop swearing (in front of Tyler), whereas Sarah is trying a different approach. After spending an hour or so in the garden, she came in the house for some water.
“Man, I’m a dirty biznatch.”
“Hon… Disguising a swear word by adding a couple extra letters doesn’t discount the fact that it’s a swear word.”
[1] For the uninitiated, we’re somewhat nerdy, and reply with movie quotes whenever the opportunity arises. We pale in comparison to a couple friends who shall remain unnamed *cough*melandadam*cough*. The quote in this post is from “Employee of the Month.”
2010-05-15 - The Army Crawl, and Rock on.mpg
2010-05-09 - Happy Father's Day, Grandpa
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2010-05-07 - A Mile in Daddy's Shoes
2010-05-04 - Swinging and Getting Attacked by Delilah
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2010-05-09 - Happy Mother's Day, Grandma
Just this weekend, I forgot to cook something for a party we were going to in 15 minutes. “SH@*” I yelled and jumped out of my seat into the kitchen. My 5 y/o responded with “oh, sh@* sh@* sh@*” ”
whoopsie.
Yes, I do remember an occasional slip up … just don’t try to teach him how to say Fuddruckers any time soon.
My sister saw a bumper sticker for Fudpuckers … she couldn’t say it right and had her grandson cracking up!!!
Ahhh … the power of words.
I never really had a potty mouth but occasionally i do slip up. mainly when i hurt myself. My son thinks its hysterical when anyone swears, it like those are funny words!
jackie´s last blog ..Daycare!
We’re working hard on that front as well. And I agree, just adding or changing a couple of letters doesn’t make a difference. Frack? Same thing as the other. The good news is that it forces me to think before speaking!
A Free Man´s last blog ..Wide eyed and new money with faded beauty queens
I’m with you on this one, but I’d like to say I’m better at it than you guys. Then again, I’ve had more time, so I’d guess you’re probably about where I was back then. Not ever swearing in front of my parents always kept my skills at a pretty high level.
I 100% agree about the swear substitutions– stay strong in that argument. If you don’t want the kid saying it, don’t say it. Then just pop the lid when you’re alone in the car or something and let it all out before you get home.
LiteralDan´s last blog ..Amusing searches, Vol. 1
You could always say what SpongeBob Square Pants says, “Tartar Sauce.” Is that still cussing? But you know what? They definitely do repeat your words.
Sunshine Mama´s last blog ..This and That
I have the potty mouth at our house and, like you, I started by toning it down. Once my son repeated “bulls***”, which he picked up from Grandpa and DAYCARE, I figured what the hell… let her rip, tater chip!
JAR´s last blog ..My First, My Last, My Everything
My 1.5 year old nephew dropped his sippy cup on the floor the other day and said “f**k!” It was only me, my wife, my brother-in-law, and my sister-in-law in the room at the time. We were shocked and amused but did our best to NOT LAUGH (did not want to positively reinforce the new vocab word).
Both me and my brother-in-law drop the f-bomb quite a bit in casual conversation, but hearing it from a toddler’s lips is a touch disturbing.
My sister-in-law’s comment was the best part, “We’re so proud of him.”
Brenton´s last blog ..Out of Sight, Out of Sleep!
20-months-old = Repeating every single word I say. And in the same intonation.
Which means I should have been more careful earlier today when I said the S-Word (hey, it’s not my blog. I’m being polite here) in the style of an old black man (imagine the word being much longer, and the middle part being two syllables long), because he repeated it in exactly the same way.
Failing that, maybe I shouldn’t have clapped and said, “Good job!”
Well, live and learn.
People in the Sun´s last blog ..Thought of the Week
That’s why I love Battlestar Gallactica. Frak, frak, frakking frak stick.
Coal Miner’s Granddaughter´s last blog ..Different
[...] has been, as of late, trying to copy the words we say. Luckily, Sarah and I have our swearing under control now. If that weren’t the case, I’ve no doubt that Tyler would already have [...]