I swear

The Butterfly — my four-year-old daughter — has something of a potty mouth. We knew it was going to be a problem when, on the morning of her third birthday, she woke up in her crib, sat up, blearily surveyed the blankets and binkies littered about her, and wondered aloud “Where’s my damn Taggie?”

Since then she has occasionally dropped the D-bomb (such as this time) or the H-bomb (such as the time she expressed her perplexity at finding my bed stripped of its bedsheets  with “What.. the… hell?”).  Here are a few more stories in which the Butterfly would make a sailor blush.


The Butterfly and I are reading a poster, or more accurately, are reciting the letters on the poster to practice the alphabet.

The Butterfly: … N… E… W… Y… E… A… R… Upside-down I…

Me: That’s called an “exclamation point.”

BF: What?

Me: An exclamation point.

BF: Why?

Me: [ Pointing to a different letter. ] No, that’s a Y.  This one was the exclamation point.

BF: Oh.

Me: [ Pointing to a different letter again. ] No, that‘s an O.  This one was Y.

BF: I see.

Me: [ Pointing to yet more letters. ] No, that one is an I, and that other one is a C.

BF: [ Sighs ] I hope you’re joking me, ’cause otherwise kindergarten is going to suck.


I come home to find the Queen B shaking her head and the Butterfly in her time-out chair downstairs.

“What happened?” I ask.

“She said the F word,” was the terse reply. “Go talk to your daughter.”

So I go downstairs and talk to the Butterfly.

“Why are you in time-out?” I ask.

“I said a bad word,” she grumbles.

“What did you say?”

“I said… fff…k…n,” she mumbles quietly.

What did you say?”

She sighs. “I said frickin‘.”


Scene: It’s early morning and the Komplexify family is getting ready to head out to school.

The Ladybug: Daaaaaad? The Butterfly is saying “sex.”

Me: I’m sure she’s saying “six.”

The Butterfly: No, sex, dad. Sex sex sex sex! Sexy sexy sex!

Me: Where did hear that from?

BF: The girl on the Weather Channel said it.

Me: What?

BF: The girl who did the experiment with the hot water?

Me: What?

BF: When she threw the hot water? And it turned to ice? She said sex-sex.

Me: ….

BF: Sex-sex! Sex-sex!

Me: Ah… no. She said the experiment was a success.


I’m out eating Mexican food with the Butterfly. I go to get drinks and utensils when the little girl stands up and — much to the horror of myself and the other patrons — shouts across the restaurant:

I WANT MY FUCKING SODA!

I run over to her, apoplectic with embarrassment and anger, and demand “What?”

The little girl chews and swallows her food and repeats.

“I want my fork and soda.”

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1 Response to I swear

  1. Tr*st*n says:

    This made my morning! Absolutely hilarious (and slightly mortifying)… she is way to cute for her own good!

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