My Kid Asked, “Do You Know What Sex Means?”

Some mothers have eyes in the back of their heads, I have ears everywhere. By that I mean that I have this incredible ability to overhear conversations in my home that aren’t meant for my ears. Like the other day I was sitting on the toilet when I overhear in another part of the house my almost 7 year old say to my 4 year old, “Do you know what sex means?”

WHAT?!

There I am sitting on the toilet trying to take care of my business and trying to mind my own business when I overhear something as MONUMENTAL as my eldest child talking about sex. It’s a good thing I was on the toilet porque me cagué.

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It’s OK, it’s OK, I told myself. It’s not a big deal she probably doesn’t know what sex means either. She probably just heard the word and is asking her younger sister about it out of curiosity. Oh, GOD please don’t let her know what that word means she’s only 7! But even if she does know what it means, it’s OK, you just need to talk to her about what it is she thinks she knows and clear everything up in an age appropriate way. You can do this. You can handle this.

All these thoughts are going through my head as I continue to sit on the toilet (because I wasn’t done yet people, I couldn’t just rush out of there mid-wipe to deal with the situation).

Meanwhile, I can hear my eldest asking the youngest over and over in an increasingly exasperated voice, “Do you know what sex means?” The youngest one isn’t responding and I can tell it’s making the eldest one really upset. Finally, the youngest one screams, “No, I don’t know what that means!” And I’m relieved that she doesn’t know, but terrified that my eldest is about to tell her about it.

The thing is that my eldest is now so mad at her sister that she is almost in tears because gosh darn it why can’t her sister pay attention to her and respond in a reasonable amount of time? (Because karma honey! Now, you know how I feel when I’m asking you a question and it takes a bazillion repetitions before you even notice that I’m even speaking to  you.)

When I get to them. I try to remain calm and collected and I say to the eldest, “What did you ask your sister?” She shrieks at me, “I don’t want to tell you.”

Both she and her sister have worked themselves into a state and need to be separated and calmed down, but I NEED for my eldest to tell me what she said because this is surely something we have to talk about so I say to her, “I know you are upset, but I need you to tell me what you asked your sister because it sounded like you asked her if she knows what a grown up word that starts with the letter ‘s’ means.” She is scrying (combination of screeching and crying) and I know I won’t get anywhere with her so I say, “We don’t have to talk about it now, but we will when you calm down.”

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By now, their father has come onto the scene and I try to code talk to him by saying, “I think someone asked someone else if they know what a three letter word that starts with ‘s’ means.” He looks utterly confused so I say, “You know, ‘s,’ ‘e,’…” He still can’t figure out that I’m trying to spell out sex, poor thing that’s how little of it he has in his life, I really should do something about that.

I stare at him with knowing eyes, trying to communicate as much as I can by bulging my eyeballs as far out of my sockets as possible. Time slows to a crawl, while he goes through the alphabet in his head to try and figure out what the missing letter of this mystery three letter word is and then I see his eyes register understanding and he gasps, “No!”

I leave the room with the youngest and tell my husband on the way out, “You better ask her what she said.”

Eventually, eldest calms down. I’m in another room when I hear her father ask her, “What word did you ask your sister if she knew?” and my eldest answers, “Sense, I asked her if she knows what sense means.” Well, both her father and I start cracking up even though we are rooms apart because of course “sense” makes more sense that “sex.”

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Phew…good to know it’s just my sense of hearing that is off and that I still have some time to practice the whole “sex talk” thing. I guess I better figure out my “sense talk” too because clearly my youngest doesn’t know what sense means. That can’t be good, can it? Or did my eldest say “cents”? Oh, who cares I’m just glad she didn’t say “sex” and we really need to work on her enunciation skills.

Do you know what “sense” means?

Image via thomashawk/Flickr