We Revisit The ‘Where Do Babies Come From?’ Talk

funny-stork-delivering-baby-birth

Our dog is having her ‘monthlies’ at the moment which Miss10 noticed, and it started a conversation this morning which, if I’d known was coming, I probably would have stayed in bed and pretended to be asleep.

Naturally, Miss10’s first concern was that Jazz was injured.

“No, no,” Tracey assured her. “It’s just her period. She’s a girl dog so it’s all very normal.”

“What’s a period?” asked Miss10.

“I’m needed in the kitchen,” I told Tracey. I don’t have any issues chatting about this stuff with my kids, it’s just that I think it would be less embarrassing for my girls to talk to their mother about it. I mean, apart from buying pads and remembering to not hitting my wife up, I don’t have a lot to do with that time of the month.

“Get back here!” my wife called after me.

“Just joking,” I mumbled.

It turns out we’d already had this talk with Miss10, but our daughter had just misunderstood the terminology. She then laughed and reminded us of why this topic originally came up. She’d been talking with her cousins a few years ago and the topic of where babies come from had come up.

“They come out the middle hole,” Miss10 had told them. “It’s between the wee wee and the bottom.”

“No it doesn’t,” the older of the two cousins assured her.

“Yeah. It’s called a number three,” she said, presumably because a wee is a number one and a poo is a number two.

“There’s no such thing,” this cousin continued.

“Oh, yeah?” said Miss10. “Then where do you think babies come from?”

He rolled his eyes in an ‘isn’t it obvious’ sort of a way. “They come out the lady’s bum, of course.”

So anyway, this morning I was pleased to know we’d already gone down this road. For a minute I thought we’d failed our duty as parents – I can imagine how scary it would be for a young girl to have her first period and not know what was going on.

But just when I thought the conversation was done and dusted, my daughter continued…

“I know how they come out,” she said. Of course she does. She’s the third of seven kids, so the topic has been coming fairly regularly all her life (like every two years). But then she grinned and added ominously, “I know how they go in too.”

“You do?” I spluttered. I think it was her grinning about it which made me nervous. I mean, I know if we’d covered one part of sex education we’d covered the lot.

“Yep,” she said. “Sex. There’s an egg and it grows and then it comes out months later as a baby.”

“Almost right,” Tracey told her. “Remember, to make a baby I provide the egg and your dad provides the sperm.”

“It’s amazing stuff,” I said.

“Usually,” added Tracey.

“Ouch,” I mumbled.

“And they come together,” said Tracey, stepping over my bruised ego and continuing the lesson, “and nine months later a baby is born. But you can’t make a baby without both the sperm and the egg, male and female, boy and girl.”

“And a marriage certificate,” I added.

“Bruce!”

“Joking.”

“So Jazz can’t get pregnant?” asked Grace.

“No,” said Tracey.

But just in case I’m locking her on the balcony for the next fortnight. Shame I won’t be able to do that with my five daughters.

Joking. Sort of.

When not over here, Bruce Devereaux hangs out at his Big Family Little Income Facebook Page. Come join us 🙂

 ”Raising a family on little more than laughs.”

5 Comments

  • Lol. But you are right the marriage certificate comes first. My 5 yr old asked me yesterday where humans come from. Thank god she was happy with “from a mummys belly” I am so not ready for this talk

  • My mother gave me a very detailed and awkward sex talk when I was very little. The only part I remember is “and if you do it outside marriage you will go to hell”.
    It didn’t screw with my head at all…

    • Yes, I don’t think we’ll be using that argument. I prefer to tell them to take it slow, one base at a time, because once you’ve slid into second it’s almost impossible to go back to hanging out on first.

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