Wednesday 6 February 2008

Practice Your Answers Now

We have an open door home.

That means that if there are no guests in the house, the doors don't get closed. Even the doors to the toilets.

it took my husband some time to get used to it but I grew up in an open door home so it never really occurred to me that this wasn't the way everyone did it.

It has led to some interesting discussion and this morning wins the grand prize.

Sebastian is aware that his mummy bleeds once every month. He knows that this is somehow related to a woman's ability to have babies but to say he has all the information to put the entire puzzle together would be wholly misleading. I give him just enough information to satisfy his curiosity.

This morning I am in the shower. Sebastian is peeing in the toilet next to my shower showing off his newly developed skill of standing up to pee. I turn the water off and am stepping out with my towel to dry myself off as my son turns to me with a tampon held up and asks me "What is this for?"

I freeze. I am not prepared for the question. Marc is on the other side of the door and he cracks a silent giggle. I look like a deer caught in headlights.

I try to recover before Sebastian senses my panic. Never ever let your children see you sweat.

I explain that it works a bit like a band-aid (plaster in UK) to help Mummy when she bleeds once a month.

"Oh!" is all he says and flushes the toilets, pulls up his pajama bottoms and goes downstairs.

My heart is pounding and I have to sit down to recover. I am now going to write a script for all those questions that I know are coming and I don't yet have an answer for.

2 comments:

Janell said...

Your answer sounded perfect to me. I was instructed to never give them more information than they are asking for and you did that perfectly. Next time, maybe you can do it without the heart pounding!

Shirley said...

Isn't it funny -- he didn't want anymore information.

One time when we had the whole family in the car, and I needed to make a drug store stop before heading home. Kids and husband waited in the car, and when I got back, my oldest son had to know what I needed to stop for. He wouldn't take any vague answer. Finally I said "I needed some tampons, Jonathan."

His reply, "Oh Geez. too much information, Mom."