First Published April 12, 2006 ~~~current mood: shocked~~
This one stars my oldest son, Nicholas, who is now ten.
With the birth of our third child, Jessyca (6), came a whole slew of questions about where babies came from and why? Nicholas has always been and always will be a very inquisitive child. He loves to take things apart and try to put them together and asks endless questions. When Jessyca was born, Nicholas was going on four years old. One night, he tried to crawl into my lap and I told him not to because Mommy’s stomach was still sore. I had to have a C-Section with Jessyca because she was a breach baby. He asked me why my stomach was sore and I tried to explain to him that they had to cut Mommy’s stomach so Jessyca could come out, to which my oldest Natalee responded that she was NEVER having babies because she didn’t want to be cut open. I told her it doesn’t always happen that way. Nick asked, “Well how else do they come out????” At that moment our little Jessyca let out a scream to tell me she was hungry, so I looked at Sgt. Snickerdoodle and asked him to please talk to the boy. (Yes I should have known better.)
I was not privy to the explanation that ensued but the next afternoon, my son would explain it to whoever happened to be in earshot.
We lived on Camp Pendleton at this time and the elementary school that Natalee started Kindergarten at was only a couple of blocks away. I would take Nick and Jessyca on an afternoon walk to pick her up in the afternoon. As we were walking up the trail to the school, we ran into an officer’s wife that lived in our area. I knew her from passing at the commissary, she would always comment on how big I was getting while I was pregnant.
She stopped and said,”Ohhhhh you finally had your baby!!” She looked into the stroller and cooed at Jessyca and told me how beautiful she was.
Nick couldn’t hold it in any longer. He was bursting to tell someone what he thought was so awesome.
“Jessyca got cut out of Mommy’s tummy, but Natalee and me came out Mommy’s pee-pee!!!” He looked so proud of himself for his knowledge.
*cue crickets and shocked silence*
As I am trying to melt into my shoes and think of something to say, the officer’s wife looks at my son with this strained smile on her face and says, “Well, aren’t you clever.” (If you have been in the military or have been married to someone in the military, you know that it was officer wife code for “Your child belongs in a cage and should not be brought out into society.”)
Nick took this as a sign that he needed to tell her ALL the stuff that Daddy had told him the night before. He is babbling to her about how Mommies and Daddies love each other and then Daddy puts a baby in Mommy’s tummy, but he’s still not sure how, and that when the baby is done cooking it comes out. As my son is babbling, I am entertaining thoughts of how I will kill my husband. (We are divorced now but I digress.)
I tried to gracefully excuse us from the lady’s presence, saying I was going to be late picking up my daughter from school, but Nick loved his audience. He was still explaining to her that sometimes a baby tries to come out upside down and they have to cut Mommy’s tummy open so the baby can come out.
The end of the conversation is:
Me: Come on Nicky, we need to go get Natalee.
Nick: But Mommy, I want to tell the old lady what else happens.
When Nick says “old lady” I see the woman’s spine visibly snap into indignant mode and she just pats Nick on the head and tells him to listen to Mommy. She glares one more time at me and is gone.
Me: Nick sometimes it’s nice to keep all the stuff Daddy tells you a secret. (Oh THAT man is in sooooo much trouble when he gets home!)
Nick: Why Mommy?
Me: Just because.
Once again, it is never good enough for my children to slightly mortify me. Once we got to the school, he would explain “how babies came out” to Natalee’s teacher, as I was trying to figure out a way to climb into Jessyca’s stroller and hide under her blanket.