Children can be curious little buggers. Perhaps you were when you were small. Perhaps you too have had to field intimite questions from children about tampons, where they go and how EXACTLY they work. Or is it just me?
Apparently not. Writer and blogger Kirsty Rice has this to share…..
By Kristy Rice
We were standing in line at the 10 items or less counter when little traveler number 3 turned to me and asked in a nice big loud voice “Why is the front of your bottom hairy?” I prayed that the people around me were non English speakers but when the girl behind the counter smiled and the man in front of me snorted I gathered this was a conversation we were sharing with everyone.
I tried a distraction “do you think we have 10 items? Shall we count them again?” It didn’t work, he continued on…and it got worse “I mean, I know why you have hair on your eyelashes, to keep out the dust…but why do you have hair on the front of your bottom? What are you keeping out?”
I think all parents have had these conversations and it seems to be universal that they occur in public situations.
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I found myself in a line of (I’m not exaggerating) about 50 women waiting to go to the toilet at the Australia Zoo last summer. As we all stood gazing forward waiting for a door to open it occurred to me that I had certain secret women’s business to attend to and 3 little travelers at my feet. I am a believer of open and honest communication with my children but a toilet cubicle at the Australia Zoo wasn’t quite how I planned to have the conversation. I was going to have to create a diversion.
As we all piled in to the cubicle I lined them up in order of urgency eg. seriously busting to just busting and managed to inconspicuously gather the necessary equipment out of my handbag. When it was time to do what I had to do I said in my best Sesame Street excited tone “what’s that up there? Is that a crocodile in the ceiling? All three travelers fell for it and I smiled to myself at my brilliance and speed. Done. Crisis averted.
As I stood up the voice of little traveler number 3 screamed with a tinge of both curiosity and amazement “what’s that string?!” The room fell silent. Someone giggled. I had an audience. Before he could ask me again in a louder and clearer tone I whispered desperately (and making no sense at all) “my knickers are falling apart but please don’t tell anyone, I’ll be really embarrassed”. He was happy with the answer, he had a secret.
As I walked out of the cubicle I faced the crowd and knew that I had probably shared more information than any of them had hoped for. A sympathetic mother gave me one of those looks and said with a grin ”no secrets here hey”. I laughed and agreed “I know, I’m dying of embarrassment”. Little traveler number 3 knew he was in on the joke and said “yes, her knickers are falling apart, but don’t tell anyone…she’ll be really embarrassed.”
Just asking: how much do you tell your kids about periods, tampons etc? As most mothers know, keeping your kids out of the bathroom is virtually impossible when they’re small and they do tend to ask a lot of questions. How do you explain it and is there an age that’s too young?
Is it better to be open and honest, even if that can sometimes make you squirm?
If you don’t have kids, what are your memories of what you saw and asked about growing up?
Comments
307 Comments so far
re Daisysal, on whether the word ‘vagina’ is in the year 5 dictionary
“Depends
a) how well he can spell and
b) how well he can use a dictionary”
(yeah, I know I keep way too much stuff!)
But checked my Year 8 dictionary from 1968, and no vagina in there….Mine must be a male dictionary, because it has ‘penis’.
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Hilarious!
This has reminded me of a day I was in the toilets at a shopping centre & I heard this lil boy yell out; “Mum! What is THAT?! Where did your willy go?!”.
Gold. Pure freaking gold!
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Have a similar story when my partner and i were at Healsville sanctuary a few years back and the keeper was giving about 20 visitors a talk about a wombat its digging habits and its pouch etc when this little voice pipes up with” my mummys got a pouch” well you could have heard a pin drop for about five seconds then the immature people amongst us self included started giggling.Poor mum , now i have a five year old i will be steering clear of any group situations at the zoo.
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When my sisters and I were kids, all our personal development conversations seemed to take place at the dinner table, to the horror of my parents. I’ll never forget the time my youngest sister (then aged 6) asked what a tampon was and my second eldest sister screaming out “you shove it up your vagina!”. We were encouraged not to speak at the table after that…
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No child is ever harmed by knowing the truth, provided it is explained in age appropriate terms. Why are so many parents STILL embarrassed by the universal facts of biology? Grow up and get over it.
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One of my friends was babysitting her five year old niece as well as looking after her son who was about a year younger than his cousin, my friend popped both kids in the bath then nicked out to get a towel. The following conversation ensued: “Guess what? I’ve got a vagina!” Son: “That’s not a vagina, that’s a private!” the arguing about what was what continued until my friend was asked if it was a private or a vagina. She diplomatically told them it was the same thing just a different name. Her son sneered at his cousin and told her: “Anyway that’s not a real vagina, real ones have got fur on them so yours is a fake!”
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My 11-year-old son being random in the queue at the supermarket (where else): ‘Mum, I looked it up and vagina isn’t in my school dictionary!’ Me (making trying to make the best of an awkward situation by just going with it because the damage was done): ‘No, you’re in Grade 5, darling’. Lots of sniggers. Thought it was okay until the packet of tampons came up for scanning. Son: ‘And I know what THEY’RE for!’
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I think the real question to ask is why wasn’t the word vagina in his school dictionary?
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Depends
a) how well he can spell and
b) how well he can use a dictionary.
It was probably there.
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Just the other week we had the “but how did the baby get in there?” question while having dinner! My daughter’s 5 y/o friend is expecting a sibling in the next month, and apparently it is the talk of the daycare yard! After declaring that her friend’s mummy had a baby in her tummy, my 7 y/o son responded by asking the dreaded question of how babies get there in the first place! After a few chokes and glances between us, my husband and I attempted to avoid the nuts and bolts and basically said when a mummy and daddy love each other, they make a baby together which grows in the mummy’s tummy until it’s born-details omitted-and held our breath waiting for the next question….thankfully it was just “yeah, you’re not born with it in there” and left it at that! So my question….when do you HAVE THE TALK, and how?!!!!
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When I was 4 my dad had to have surgery. I loved my dad and was very concerned as to why he was having an operation. Without getting to graphic my mum very delicately and politely tried to explain that her and dad didn’t want anymore kids and that was why he went to hospital. Somewhere during the conversation she made ill-fated decision to mention the cat who had been neutered. So far the next week I wondered around telling everyone, and when I say everyone I mean EVERYONE, passersby, the checkout girl, my kinder teacher, friends, neighbours etc. etc. That: “My daddy got fixed like the cat.” I cringe now when I think about it, thank god my dad was to drugged up on painkillers to care
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that’s making me laugh out loud…now how to explain why I’m laughing to my 8 year old son?!
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Haha these are so funny! I remember when I was younger finding my mother, who is a physio’s, medical textbooks flipping through them and stopping on the vagina page. Absolutely stunned. I rang through the house with the textbook yelling “look!” “look!” it’s vaginnaaaaaaa!!! I think I may have even showed the neighbour. I will never live it down.
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Hmm I know this was ages ago too but it has made me laugh so much and remember my younger brother used to take my tampons, remove the strings then fluff them out and turn them into trees for his army fields by sicking twigs into one end.They actually looked very good ( once you forgot where they came from) They were in the right size proportion to his toy soldiers and he added a touch of authenticity by painting them green. I love reminding him now that he is 48!!!
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I know this post is kinda old but reading all the comments is HILARIOUS!!
I don’t have kids but two stories my Dad still re-tells to this day even though I’m 27 now :
- when I was about 5 or 6 Dad was taking me on a special outing on the train. In a very loud voice I asked him, “I found this white thing furry thing with a green string in Mummy’s bathroom, what is it?” He soon figured out I was talking about a tampon and he started laughing. Apparently others listening also made the connection and started laughing too!
- when I was only about 3 my Dad took me to the botanical gardens and I was complaining that my feet were sore cause I’d been walking for a long time. A few minutes later a large woman with cerebral palsy walked by and I said in a very loud voice, “that woman is tired of walking too, she’s walking so funny…wibble wobble wibble wobble!” As with the train story, many people heard and couldn’t contain their laughter!! *cringe*
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Not quite in the same vein but miss 4 almost dies of excitement yesterday when she misheard Derby Day as Barbie Day!
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I remember when i was a lot younger say 6 or 7 going into my mums handbag with my twin sister and we would unwrap and pull the strings on all her tampons (not knowing what they were obviously). Now i laugh but feel terrible for my mum just thinking about when she would have needed to get one out and only finding open ones..
Also had a bit of a giggle to myself today when using the public bathrooms at the shopping centre where i work and hearing this conversation.
Little Girl: MUMMMM HOW DO I GET THE PAPER TOWEL OUT
Mum: Thats not paper towels thats a condom and tampon dispenser.
Litte Girl:WHATS A CONDOM
Mum: Thats what people use when they dont want to have a baby.
Little Girl: WHATS A TAMPON
Mum: Thats what ladies use when they have their period.
Little Girl: WHATS A PERIOD
Mum: I think we need to have this conversation at home darling.
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I had a chat with Miss 9 after she found a packet of tampons in the car. After carefully explaining she was silent then said “that is the most disgusting thing I’ve ever heard of, can we never speak of it again”. I told her that we didn’t have to speak about it for a while but one day we would have to again. She was silent for a while then said “so, does Dad know about this?”
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that’s hysterical! I had to tell my little girl the whole story at 9 as her friend was an “early starter”. I loved “so, does Dad know about this?” I could just imagine my girls saying the same thing.
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My 3 year old son walked in on me the other day putting a tampon in – his response –
“mum, what did your bottom just eat?”!!
priceless
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You guys seriously need to stop this – I am going to go into early labour I am laughing so much!! God kids are beautiful…
I hope you keep that one locked away to remind him of when he’s older Lovedmum.
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Hahaha! Thanks for the giggles ladies – some of these stories are sensational!
My two year old hasn’t really started asking any questions yet – but I just know it’s coming. Hopefully not while standing in line at the supermarket! But I recall when I was younger (14) – it was my parents who embarrassed ME…
My mother was away for a work conference when I got my period for the first time, and over the phone (through my tears and sobs) she walked me through where to find the pads and how to use them. At the end of the conversation I pleaded with her NOT to tell my dad but of course she did…
At the DINNER TABLE later that night, in front of both of my brothers, my dad (who was visibly very nervous and embarrassed) awkwardly blurted out: “so do you know how to clean yourself?”
I almost died. My brothers sent food flying across the room as they burst out into laughter, I started to bawl and ran off to my room – and my poor dad, realising what he had said, was wishing the ground would swallow him whole!
We have a laugh about it now…
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Oh that is awful! Poor you and Poor Dad!
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Dads say the darndest things!
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I think my dad said something similar when we went to get my pads – so you know how to use them and everything? Er, yeah.
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The only recollection of embarrassing questions from the kids had nothing to do with bodily functions at all.
We were in the shopping centre and #1 who was about 4 at the time had just caught sight of a completely bald man for the first time. Look mummy, isn’t he silly, he has no hair! He heard and turned to look. One very embarrassed and flustered mum shepherded her away, mumbling Well, how do you know he doesn’t think you’re silly because you have hair?
Even though we’ve always had open discussion. Nothing was taboo, and it still isn’t.
Both kids are girls. #1 never seemed able to cope with her period when she first got them. I even had to ‘rescue’ her at Sea World one day – rush her off to the ladies, buy pads and scrub off her bikini bottoms.
#2 never told me when she got hers. Well, not for a few days anyway. She never had any problems working hers out at all.
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My little girl asked all kinds of questions I wasn’t prepared to answer when I had to take her to my last pap smear. The GP was happy to answer them, but then I spent the next week discussing the finer points of breasts, nipples, breastfeeding, and so on.
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When my eldest son was about 3 we had to have our gas heater fixed. It was just after he became very curious about who had a penis and who didn’t. We were behind the repair man as he worked and my son goes ‘does he have a big penis?’ I answered yes as quietly as I could but he said it again ‘I know he has a penis but is it a BIG one?. OMG I nearly died and hoped the guy didn’t hear – he didn’t react so I assumed not.
He came back a few days later as the heater still didn’t work and after saying nothing about penises for days as soon as my son saw him he asked again ‘oes that man have a BIG penis or not Mum?’. This time the guy cracked up and said he’d heard him the last time too and thought it was very funny. I didn’t!!!
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well did he or didn’t he?!?!
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I remember a friend’s son, who would have been around 6 years old at the time, asking my friend where he came from.
My friend, being the well-prepared mum she is, had been anticipating this question and launched into her researched explanation, ensuring she used the correct anatomical terms etc… When finished, she paused in case he had any further questions.
His response: “Um…well my friend Marcus comes from Queensland and I was wondering where I came from”.
I wish I’d had a camera to record the look on her face…
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Hilarious!
Thanks for sharing
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I have loved reading all the funny stories, I’ve got a sore jaw from laughing so hard!!
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(A story told to me by my mum) My mum and brother (who was 3 at the time) were at the shopping centre. Mum could see a lady with quite dark hair on her top lip coming towards them. Mum tried to distract my brother, as she knew what he was like, by asking him if he wanted to have a turn on one of those little rides. Too late, he spotted the lady walking by and asked mum at the top of his voice (as only little kids can), ‘Mummy, why does that lady have a beard?’ She said she wanted the ground to open up and take her.
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I haven’t got kids but when I was 16 my cousin, who was about 8 at the time asked me loudly in the kitchen, “Do you have pubic hair?” I went very red and eventually said yes before her mother realised and told her you don’t ask people those questions! I don’t remember being curious about periods, I knew about sex since about 6 (the joys of TV!) and my friends and I called it “You-know-what” at school. I only found out a few years ago that one of the girls didn’t know what!
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Hahahaha this is sooo hilarious!
I remember seeing a tampon string on my mum when I was little and she was in the shower….I did ask what it was but I can’t remember her response?
I learnt about periods when I was about 6 or 7 and my friend had a 13 year old sister…..my friend said “my sister is very grumpy because she’s started periods which is where blood comes out in your pants”! Haha.
I also remember being in the bath around 3 or 4 and saying, “Dad, I AM going to grow a penis! It’s just hiding in here!” whilst trying to pull out my inner labia…Haha sorry if TMI! Made me think twice when I learnt about Freud’s penis envy at uni
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my 3 yr old son is adamant that his baby sister will grow a penis just like his when she gets bigger
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Back in the day when I would babysit for pocket money a friend of a friend asked me to watch her daughter who was 5 at the time.
I gave her a bath one night and she grabbed her hoo-haa and said “What are these stretchy things?”
I nearly died.
I told her to “ask her Mum”.
Bahahahahaha!
The girl is now 15 years old, everytime I see her I have a laugh at how innocent kids are when they’re little.
They have no idea.
So no clairebear, thats definitely not TMI
Its very funny.
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My now 13 yo, then 4 yo boy was sitting in the car one day pointing at every passer by saying “he’s got a bottom and “she’s got a bottom and he’s got a bottom” etc etc. We got home just as our next door neighbour was putting his rubbish out. Boy bounded out of the car, shouted “hello Mr Bottom-man” at our neighbour and disappeared though our front gate.
Our very lovely, and very gay, neighbour turned hurt and horrified eyes at me, I tried, I really did, I tried to explain that it wasn’t at all what he thought it was, but because of the turning purple and unable to speak words thing that happened to me, he, quite reasonably, didn’t believe a word I said.
He and his boyfriend never talked to us again.
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Bit of a shame they couldn’t see the irony / humour in that…..
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Oh, thats excrutiating. I feel your embarrassment…
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Mum told us kids her tampons were for sore bottoms after she found us with them shoved up our noses. When we went to the super market my little sister decided to be helpful, recognised the highly obvious packet of tampons, grabbed them in her sticky little fingers and ran up the isle to mum yelling “Sore bottom mummy?!!!!!”
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Hahahaha. I can’t stop laughing at these!
I don’t have children yet, but I do remember vaguley as a child walking in on mum coming out of the shower. She had a tampon in, and I spotted the string. I then proceeded to run out of the bathroom screaming, to get my little brother. We both ran around yelling at dad, that a mouse had crawled up mum’s bottom.
This continued to be hilarious every month until we got a fair bit older. Poor mum!
At least we laugh about it now.
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My 3yo daughter went to the dentist recently and had some fissure sealants put in her teeth to prevent any future cavaties. Anyway, they use guaze when doing it to keep the cheek away from the tooth.. roll onto the next day she comes out of the bathroom with four of my tampons shoved in the sides of her mouth top and bottom saying she is playing dentists. Strings hanging out and all.. so funny
Hubby had a vasectomy a few weeks ago and she walked in on him changing in the bathroom taking his gauze pad off his ‘boys’, she said ‘why do you have honey all over your penis daddy’.. (it was betadine)… She called it his ‘boteration’..
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My brother had a vasectomy a week or something before one of the kid’s birthdays, and my niece was telling us how Daddy had a sore wee-wee. She also had some kind of infection once and would show any of us she could her sore wee-wee.
We were brought up seeing Mum and Dad naked, so its not a big deal for us, but he was a big embarrassed to have the news of his vasectomy broadcast!
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My dad had a vasectomy when I was about 7 and I informed my teacher at school that he had been ‘desexed’. I just wish I could remember how my teacher responded!
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My 3 year old boy regularly asks me to “show me that you don’t have a doodle mum”. I oblige when I can – just a superficial look. We’ve had the talk about how boys and girls have different body parts. After the first one he went to child care and told his teacher she had boobs and that he had a doodle. Yesterday he asked me what the pimples on his chest were. I told him they were called nipples. His response? “they’re nipple boobs and they’re very small so I can only feed very small babies”.
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Once when my little boy was about 3 he was talking to me as I was on the toilet (as they do, constantly), when he suddenly burst out: “Mummy! Why have you got a beard on your bottom?” Luckily we were at home.
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Hilarious!
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My three year old daughter has issues with being discreet when asking can I take her to the toilet…
“Muuum I needa do a poo!”
Always in public.
Miss Three is constantly giving us lessons in anatomy, however her father slipped up one day with the use of the word “ballsack” being the extremely cluey child she is, Miss Three, despite our constant efforts to correct her thinks girls have “fosses” & boys have “ballsacks”
I remember when my brother was three he put my Mum & a disabled man in a rather awkward situation yelling out shocked as we walked past “Mum that man has no legs!”
Luckily the man in the wheelchair saw the funny side of this and made up a rather amusing story to explain to my brother where his legs went.
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Oh my little sister did something similar once – we were waiting at the lights to cross the road and she pointed at the legs of the woman next to us, who clearly had a bad case of eczema or something similar, and said ‘Ewwww, her legs are yucky Mum!’. The poor woman just looked at my sister and nodded and said ‘Yes, they’re not very nice are they?’. Cue my Mum wishing the ground would swallow her up!
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We haven’t got to the period questions stage yet – between pregnancy, breastfeeding and the pill I have only had about 6 periods in the last 4 years! However, LittleDude did ask me the other day “Mama, where your penis?” I quickly answered “Only boys and men have penises” and he was happy with that. Luckily, we were at home in our own bathroom when it occurred to him…
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I don’t have kids yet but I work in retail and I’ll never forget what a little boy said to me as I was helpinghis mum try on some jewellery. He was lovely and well mannered, ‘pleases’ and ‘thank yous’ He would have been about 3-4 I reckon, and he said to me
him- “I have a doodle, you don’t have one of those do you.”
me- “no, no I don’t.”
him- “yeah, it’s cos your a girl you know”
I died, it was so funny and his mum was just very red and saying oh god sorry. I didn’t care, kids are kids and they’ll say whatever they are thinking. so cute.
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Apparently when quite young, I would walk around the supermarket pointing at every man and shouting triumphantly ‘and HE has a penis!’
.
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Apparently as a toddler I was terrible like this;
To elderly woman – “Why is your face rotten?”
+
To acne suffering teenager – “What happened to your face?”
Kids have no filter I know but I do feel a little bad whenever someone in my family tells those stories. Especially for the adolescent, how awful!
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Mrs T, thank you for the laugh.
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We’ve been known to sit at the dinner table, with the kids going through EVERYone they know “they have a penis”, and “they have a vagina”. I imagine my mother-in-law would die of embarrassment if she knew our dinner time conversation. She’s the same woman who told my son to stop playing with his penis (he was all of 18mths) because the “ducks would get it”…
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I was told the same thing! It didn’t stop me playing with it, it just made me terrified of ducks.
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i tell them everything. i don’t want them to be squeamish about bodies.
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same. I was always embarresed as a child to talk about anything body wise so my kids and i are very open and honest about everything. sooooo much easier!
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Don’t remember asking about any of that stuff, never got “the talk” from mum or anyone. Got my period at 15 so by then I knew what pads and tampons were and I just had to wing it. (no pun although I could never understand why people bought pads without wings and was always so pissed off when I accidentally bought the ones without or the store didn’t have any with wings)
I’ll always remember those tampon “instructions” in TV Hits magazine or one of those. It showed how absorbent they were by telling you to place them in a cup of water and see them expand. There were these little diagrams that I didn’t really understand having never seen a tampon, but my friend at the time was wise enough and kind enough to demonstrate the cup in water trick. She was one of those girls who knew everything like that way before me(everyone knows the type).
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Sadly, pads have not always come with wings. They are one of the greatest inventions of recent times. As is the plastic lining bit to stop leaks, they did not always come with that, either. As are how thin they are now. I seem to remember that Stayfree used to be around 2cm thick. They were like a brick. As is them now coming in extra long. Thankfully, I missed out on the whole sanitary belt thing. *shudders*
And I accidentally washed a tin of Moxie the other day, and unintentionally recreated those ads!
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Yeah I think wings were just coming in back then, or pretty recently before. Yes, best invention! I used to steal my mum’s pads to start off with and they were the 2cm thick bricks you mention, I had forgotten about that, haha.
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I’m not a fan of wings – they always seem to stick somewhere they shouldn’t.
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One of the books we had (think it was an old one of my besty’s mum?) was all about those Modess belt things. We were bloody mystified! I was onto tampons straight away!
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Me too. The belt with the weird little hookies. Yikes. Tampons were my friend too. Straight away. The loaf of bread that they called a pad was not for me, I moved to south florida the day I turned 15, pads were so not in the lifestyle.
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Isn’t it amazing that so many women never had to use pads without adhesivee or massive whacking mattresses and surfboards, instead of thin things? There was no wearing tight jeans during your period back when mine first started – telltale bulges everywhere. And I agree, wings are a wonderful invention – though the aeronautical engineering degree sometimes required to unwrap them and get them on your undies straight can be a bit of a challenge.
My favourite laugh, though, is when advertising types laugh about how women are so dumb they bought panty liners which men just invented to make women think they needed something they didn’t need. The laugh’s on them – how useful are panty-liners for all of us who spot, can’t tell when we’re due, or just want to safeguard against a leaking tampon! Smug smucks for thinking women would go on buying these things in their millions and whacking them in their knickers for absolutely no reason.
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I LOVE panty liners! I don’t know what women like me did before they were invented. And by women like me I mean women who have a lot of vaginal discharge (regular, not thrush, and not uncommon)…. and for me it’s been that way since I was 12 (over 30 years ago). I think there are only a few days a month where I wouldn’t really need the liners, but hell, I wear them everyday anyway.
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i was in a lift in a shopping center the other week and a mum was explaining to her two young daughters about cross dressers. “but mum he was a man and he was wearing a skirt and he had hairy legs!!”
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When my little sister was 3 she asked my mother when she was going to grow a penis. she was soon told she was a girl and girls don’t get penis’s. she was sincerely disappointed for days after.
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I was disappointed too when during my little brother’s toilet training, (which was different to mine- why?!?) I discovered the hard way that girls can’t wee very well standing up. Experiment: fail. Mum had a little cleaning to do after that.
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When I was four I wanted nothing else but a penis like my Dad and younger brother, despite my mother very clearly explaining why I couldn’t have one. But my wish was so great to the point that I remember having a dream that I grew a penis and was incredibly disappointed to wake up and find that no penis had grown!
I so wanted to stand up to wee….
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Oh I wanted to stand up to wee too! One time I tried using a toilet roll to pee through, without first considering that it was cardboard and not waterproof!!
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HAHA! That is so funny!
How inventive!
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Just a quick, somewhat related question: How will I explain to my daughter what pubic hair is when I’ve had full laser in that area (meaning that I don’t have a single hair down there). How do I explain to her when she reaches puberty that it’s normal to have pubic hair but I don’t have any. And then, on top of all that, how do I explain that it’s not acceptable for her to remove it until she becomes an adult, and she doesn’t have to if she doesn’t want to. Oh God, I’ve gotten myself into a big hypocritical mess!
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Yes! I have had similar thoughts, though waxed not lasered. When my 3 year old daughter commented on why it looked different from before I muttered something about having an itch and needing to take the hair off so I could but cream on it! Might fly as a one off explaination but perhaps not a long term answer!
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No advice sorry wish I had something.
I stopped getting Brazillians when a close girlfriend revealed her reasons for retaining her pubic hair…. the very real likelihood of having *that* conversation. Her daughter is about 8 years older than mine.
So yes I’ve “gone native”! Can’t say I miss the pain….
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I’m in the same boat. I can’t stand hair down there on myself. To my future daughter I guess I’ll just say we grow hair in that area with puberty, but getting rid of it again is only for adults and even then, only if we choose to.
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no kids yet but what a glimpse into the future! i’m going bare, lasering it off, got so sick of waxing… lol at least i have some time to think of a really good come back for my future kids
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I am all natural & love my soft curly bush. But my girlfriends are horrified at my feralness and i’m the butt of jokes (only between us mind you!). But c’mon is this so rare??
Why the f*** would I let some stranger wax my arse-crack??????
That is much much stranger than a lovely soft curly front bum.
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Well I am all natural too and that’s how it’s going to stay….so I guess that makes at least 2 of us!
If I was getting teased about it I think I would be teasing them back.
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I can tell you from being the child in that example a long time ago! I was completely convinced by walking in on my mum in the shower that you werent supposed to have hair there. I just assumed that like girls shaved their legs, you were supposed to shave there too! My mum was terribly embarassed when she caught me some time later and I explained what I was doing!
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I completely agree! It’s bad enough letting doctors poke about down there during a pap smear let alone let someone else!
Go the bush!
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P.S. I think if I had a daughter, I’d allow her to shave or wax it off at whatever age she requested – in fact I don’t think that you can stop her shaving if that’s what she’s determined to do.
The only thing I’d think twice about is lasering – I think there has to be a minimum age because it’s more or less permanent. For me I don’t like the idea of lasering because fashion’s come and go – and maybe it doesn’t look so nice as you age – not really sure.
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Nah, I don’t reckon you can stop them. I shaved down there probably at about 13 – way before I knew that was a normal thing to do. I just really didnt like pubes!!
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me too!!
I just thought they were so ugly, all black and curly.
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I have a similar situation. How does one justify a brazilian to Miss12 who is desperate to shave her legs (all her friends are doing it) but is not allowed?
On an amusing note, when MrAlmost15 was about 5, he noted in the shower one day that he thought I needed to have a bikini wax (this was pre-brazilian). It was then that I decided that perhaps he didn’t need to shower with me anymore!
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I’m not having a go, but just curious why you won’t let her at 12. My mum didn’t tell me about shaving, and then only begrudgingly let me at about 14 – after I’d endured 2 years of snide teasing and boys rubbing their hands up my legs going mmmmm, nice and furry. I imagine I’ll be saying no to make-up at 12, but if my daughter asks to shave, I’m letting her.
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My mum wouldn’t let me shave my armpits when I was 11 (early bloomer), because she thought I was too young.
I was horribly teased for it during primary school, and then through year 7 until I decided to steal a razor from her cupboard and do it myself.
Then again, same thing with my legs – wasn’t allowed to shave until 14ish, when they were really hairy and I was told they were furry and gross by some of the girls at my school.
If I have a daughter, I’ll let her shave armpits/legs when she feels ready to – regardless of whether thats 11 or 15.
But like OnceWasNicky, I probably would say no to makeup until at least 15.
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I don’t have kids but for some reason this question randomly popped into my head yesterday – ah the dramas we women get ourselves into!
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My mum never showed me her pubic hair, or any other part of her body that wasn’t on display to the public. She gave me a book that explained pubic hair and periods and boobs and stuff. It even had Disney characters in it. I still find it weird how parents show their naked bodies to their kids, and then feel upset because of the consequences. You have a choice in the matter, and if you’ve altered your body to an unnatural state then your kids are probably better off not seeing that. So yeah… just don’t show your daughter your pubic area and you’ll be fine. Just make sure she’s aware of how her body will change.
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I remember having “where do I come from” type book in primary school, that had an illustration of a couple having a “special cuddle”. My mum was doing her duty and politely explaining the whys and wherefores, when I asked – “But how do they know when to stop?” Not sure what she said, but “when they get tired” probably wouldn’t have been too far from the truth!
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i remember our kindergarten class being taught (perhaps informally) by my teacher about our “private parts”, which were to be referred to as your “willy” or your “penny”. i never heard anyone else call it a penny though; it literally only just occurred to me that my teacher was a kiwi and she was obviously saying “fanny”.
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That’s actually quite funny!
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How hilarious is it hearing Yanks call bum bags “fanny packs” or they “fell right on their fanny”??
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Remember “the Nanny” (Fran Drescher) fell straight on her fanny in the opening theme song. I agree. We lived in North America for 4 years, I never got used to it.
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Bahahahaa… Just repeated that in my head in a kiwi accent, how funny!!!
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I used to be utterly convinced that my kindergarten teachers sometimes wore nappies, because I could hear them rustling when they walked past, and their undergarment area looked bulky in that way.
I have no idea why I remember this.
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That’s hilarious!
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my kids call them mummy nappies
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We spent a good six months trying to convince our daughter that she didn’t have to wait to grow a penis like her 3 year old brother before she could go to the toilet like a big girl. She watched me go to the toilet at home more times than I could count and new quite clearly that I didn’t have one. The penny decided to drop one day jammed in the public toilet at a shopping centre, when she announce to everyone at the top of her voice, Mum you don’t have a doodle! The knowing smiles at the sink were priceless.
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My daughter aged about 4 and I were standing in a busy checkout queue in a crowded supermarket when she announced at the top of her voice “Mum I know how babies get out but how do they get in your tummy?” everyone turned and waited for my reply. I quickly distracted her and hurried out the store to have the talk quietly.
Another time she raced up the supermarket aisle, grabbed the biggest pack of tampons she could find and yelled out “Mum do you want some of these?” I pretended to look at something else as everyone looked for the parent she was talking to.
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I’ll add, that my red rocket can’t possibly understand why you would use a pad when you could use a band aid.
The rule to control band aid usage in our house is ‘no blood, no bandaid’.
So when you have so much blood her view is “Why on earth don’t you use a wiggles bandaid!”
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A few of my favourite was my five year old asking me “So mum I know that you have a baby boy in your tummy and Callum wished for him but how did he get in there?” Sadly i said ‘god put it there honey becuase mummy and daddy loved eat other alot’… the real answer was way too much.
Or the other one with my son who was 6 at the time and Dad was away ‘Mum why does my penis get hard’. This got the practical answer of ‘well honey when you touch it your body sends more blood to it and that makes it hard’.
No more questions on that one.
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my favourite of all time is one from a close girlfriend.
A few months after having her third child she was still sporting a few horrifying haemorrhoids. While trying to get ready in the bathroom her at the time three year old screamed out…”mummy, mummy you have prawn stuck in your bottom”
I think she found a lock for the door after that!
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Oh god I’m so sorry to laugh at your friends expense…. But man, that is priceless!!!
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Not really related sorry, but funny none the less. My husband and 1 year old were both in the shower, when suddenly he called out for me to come quickly and help him. I ran to the bathroom & opened the shower screen to see him with his eyes closed and head covered in shampoo suds & he wanted me to get her out – now!! Missy was holding daddy, waving him back & forth & singing “ding dong, ding dong”.
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oh lordy.
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oop I just choaked on my tea
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I had to re-read that just to make sure I did actually read what I thought I did…oops!
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Thats the best laugh I’ve had in days!
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Thats priceless!!
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3 kids – 3 stories
1 – they say to involve your child when you have a new baby, so my two year old became my little helper when I returned from hospital, helping me with nappies, wipes etc, including getting a pad for mummy when I went to the loo. So we were about to go to the shops & Miss Two walks out in her track suit with the crutch bulging, down to her knees. “what have you got in your pants?” I asked. “Nothing” she says. So I pulled the elastic forward and there was an entire roll of toilet paper unrolled & stuffed in there. She looked sweetly at me & says “Just a little pad”
2. In a busy ladies toilet at a major dept store with a 4 year old son. I had my period & had to take him with me to the toilet while I changed the pad as discreetly as possible. Apparently not discreet enough, because at the top of his voice he yells “Look at all that blood, is that where they cut your penis off?”
3. With another son in a supermarket & he had recently started kindy. As we walked past the pads etc, he grabbed a packet of pads & put them in the trolley. I told him to put them back. He then clasped the pads tightly to his chest and pitched himself down the aisle, so that he was in full view of the entire checkout area, and proceeded to chuck his one and only mega-tantrum – clutching the pads and screaming “I want it, I want it” over & over. Most embarrassing. When he had asked me in the past what the packets of pads were, I had said cotton wool – he wanted some to do craft like they did at kindy.
Moral – don’t lie and tell them that mums sometimes bleed- then only answer the questions they ask. They don’t need to know anything they’re not ready for, but they will keep asking until they know the truth. Tipi
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Hahahaha your stories are amazing!
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I laughed out loud, so loudly I woke the dog up!
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I laugh now too, but at the times it was really embarrassing lol
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“is that where they cut your penis off” hahahaha that’s classic.
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