It’s amazing how a casual conversation at lunch can quickly turn into one of the most panicked situations of parenting. Ok, so maybe I’m being a little overdramatic, the time Honeybun hit her head and had a seizure Easter morning was way worse than what happened yesterday, but I still almost peed my pants!
Somehow during lunch with my parents we got on the topic of Oklahoma (I think Honeybun asked if she used to live there). We discussed how mommy and daddy lived there before she was born but that she had been there before. My dad refuted this fact and I reminded him we went when she was just one to see an Oklahoma State football game.
The conversation then turned to a friend who had had a miscarriage which, of course, made Honeybun ask “what’s a miscarriage?” No big deal, I’m cool with answering that question, chances are someone close to us will have a miscarriage sometime in the future and she should know what it means.
“A miscarriage is when a baby in it’s mommy’s belly dies.” She looked stunned. “Babies can die in their mommy’s bellies?!”
“Yes, not all babies live until they are born. A miscarriage is when a tiny little baby that is just starting to grow in a mommy’s tummy doesn’t grow right or isn’t strong enough and it dies. It’s very sad.”
And then it happened: “How do babies get in the mommy’s tummy?”
Holy camoly…ummmm….my parents and I all burst out in laughter and my face turned hot and I thought about running away. This, just hours after the “sexy” talk, why me?!?! But you can’t run away from your problems so I charged at it head on. “Well, babies start from eggs.”
“Like chickens?”
“Kind of. Mommies, well all women including you and Sugarplum, are born with lots and lots of eggs in their bodies.”
“Oh.” I paused and waited. That was it, for now. In all honesty, I’m surprised we made it this long without the question coming up. She saw her baby sister and brother growing in my belly and she saw her brother come OUT of my belly so the asking how babies get in is a logical question.
I know it will come back up and there will be more follow up questions and I’ll take those as they come but I guess I need to do more thinking on what I’ll say about the WHOLE thing should I need to in the future. I’m not one to lie to my kids about anything, but I also don’t want to give them more information than they ask for nor do I want them to know more than they need to. I also don’t want to be that mommy who tells her kids everything (like Santa isn’t real) and then has my kid tell the other kids and ruin their lives.
I strongly believe in children being children and not growing too fast, I don’t know that the concept of sex should be a taboo thing that children shouldn’t know about (though I obviously think it’s something that should only be enjoyed by adults as I told Honeybun once before when sex came up) but society says sex should be secret and so it makes me uneasy discussing it with my very young girls.
When do you plan to have “the talk?” with your kids? Will you do with your partner or will daddy talk to the boys and mommy talk to the boys? For now I think I’ll go with the “take it as it comes” approach and hopefully will have backup when the the time comes for the big talk!
 Talk about Sex){kind=link}