Last week, we were playing a board game together as a family when my husband blocked our six year old son’s next move. Our boy saw his dad’s defensive strategy and proclaimed, “Damn it, Daddy!”

He didn’t realize he had said anything wrong, so we explained that it was bad, and he need not ever say it again. We didn’t need to ask him where he learned it. We knew he had picked it up while playing games with his dad. My husband’s competitive nature has also been responsible for teaching our son the words, “sucker” and “crap”.

My husband, the sailor, also taught our daughter her first curse word. When she was about two years old we were driving in the car when, out-of-the-blue, we heard the “F” word come from the back seat. Before we had a chance to stop her, she had said it about ten times in a row. At least she used it in the proper venue. Clearly, she had heard that while driving in the car with her dad.

But, I can not blame my husband for the time my daughter did not fling curse words, but instead assaulted us with attitude.

I was extremely hormonal tired, and had been working all day while my husband played with our daughter, who was just a toddler at the time. They sat down to have a snack together as I flopped my exhausted body onto the couch. No sooner had I sat down, than my daughter asked, “Mom, can you get us some napkins?”

Irritated that she asked me, instead of her father, I angrily said, “Oh, sure! Dad’s been playing all day while I’ve been working, but I’ll get up to get the FREAKING napkins!”

I returned to the room and tossed them a couple of paper towels before falling back into my seat.

Then I watched as my daughter climbed onto her dad’s lap and put her face a mere inch from his. She held that position as she stuck her hand into their snack bag, then glared at him and yelled, “Dad! These are FREAKING cheese puffs!”

But all things considered, I don’t think my “F” word is nearly as bad as his.

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Look at what my husband found, in the far reaches of a cabinet while searching to see if we had any more cans of coffee. The cabinet goes so far back that it ends up behind our dishwasher. That’s my excuse anyway.

He didn’t find any coffee. Not that either one of us could think about drinking, or eating, anything after seeing this.

I found it particularly interesting that the forgotten potatoes look healthier than my spider plant.

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Yesterday afternoon, I took my sick son to an urgent care where he was seen by a kind and capable nurse practitioner. She quickly assessed him and wrote a prescription before sending us on our way. I kind of wanted to tell her this story. Kind of…

When our daughter was born ten weeks early via emergency c-section, my husband and I got a crash course in medical terminology. We learned all about NG-tubes, picc lines, desats, brady’s and many more words I hope you boys and girls never need to know.

We spent hours in the intensive care unit each day and picked up invaluable information from the neonatologists and our child’s primary care nurse. For 35 days straight, we sat at our daughter’s isolette reading her chart, working the monitors, and reapplying electrodes. By the end of that journey we felt like medical professionals ourselves.

Our son was born premature a few years later, but because of his heart condition he was immediately transferred to a children’s hospital where they had equipment to better care for him.

It was déjà vu with a twist. We were thrown into a familiar situation, in unfamiliar surroundings. Yet, we figured we were ahead of the game. At the very least, we knew the lingo and could communicate with the staff.

Or, so I thought.

Because I’m sure the nurse practitioner who met my husband upon our son’s admission was quite surprised when she introduced herself, only to have him say, “We’d like a real nurse, not one who’s just practicing.”

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The other day, I was snuggling with my little boy when I asked, “Who’s your favorite person?”

He hugged me and said, “You and Daddy both.”

I tickled him a little and teased, “Both? But I’m the one who feeds you, cleans up after you, does your laundry, drives you to therapy and school, reads with you, helps you with homework, and tucks you in bed.”

He replied, “Yeah, but Daddy throws me in the air.”

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