We added a boy to our family and that has been, shall I say, interesting. Partially on account of how having a boy has been an entirely new experience for us when it comes to diaper changes. I keep forgetting to keep that little water pistol covered. Plus, I kept getting tinkled on whenever I would baby-wear until a sweet friend informed me that apparently when you have a boy, you have to point it down. HASHTAG THE MORE YOU KNOW.
But mostly, it’s because of my preschooler’s newfound obsession with the fact that boys have different body parts than girls. While she does have an anatomically correct boy baby doll that was passed down from my childhood, she never seemed to give his anatomy a second thought during pretend diaper changes beyond our initial conversation about the proper names for everything.
That changed once her baby brother arrived.
The very first time she helped me change a diaper in the hospital happened to be immediately following the baby’s circumcision. It did not occur to me to tell her that the contents of said diaper would not normally look so, um, battered, and so what happened was that she stood on a chair peeking over the side of the baby bed as the doctor was talking with us.
And when I undid the baby’s diaper she looked down and then her eyes went wide as she yelled out in horror “OH NO MOMMY! WHAT HAPPENED TO OUR BABY’S BOY BAGINA? I SHINK IT EXPLODED!”
Yep.
Then we talked again about the actual names of boy parts and I answered lots of questions about why they are different from girls. I don’t know if I answered them well but I answered them.
Later that next week, due to Scarlette’s propensity for striking up embarrassing conversations with strangers, she proceeded to re-enact the scene from Kindergarten Cop while chatting with everyone in line at the grocery store.
Yep.
Eventually the interest seemed to wane and I thought all of the excitement surrounding that particular aspect of having a little brother had finally died down now that we’re several weeks into this gig.
Until Mother’s Day.
(Or, okay, the belated Mother’s Day brunch we had with our family last weekend because on actual Mother’s Day I was all “I can not even leave this house with two children on three hours of sleep, y’all.”)
So we’re out to brunch and I was feeling very impressed with myself because my oldest child was being quite well mannered and my littlest child was sleeping soundly and also I had gotten both of them to the restaurant in one piece to begin with. I mean, I was wearing two different earrings and only had mascara on one eye but whatever.
Our family was enjoying some lively conversation as my daughter nibbled away at her meal when suddenly she jumped up on her seat and brandished her corn dog high in the air, proudly displaying how she had eaten away just the crust on the top so that the tip of the hot dog poked through, and exclaimed loudly “LOOK EBERBODY! THIS CORN DOG LOOKS JUST LIKE RIDLEY’S P…”
Yep.
A little while later, when I reminded her about how there are some things we only talk about with our family, she looked at me all bewildered and said “Well yeah, I know that. I only DID tell just our family about his p….. AT THE RESTAURANT!”
Touche, kiddo. Touche.
