The happy moment my seven-year-old dropped the F-bomb

I have an exceedingly colourful turn of phrase.

And by ‘exceedingly colourful’, I mean I can swear with the best of them.

Unfortunately, that’s when I’m actually in a good mood. I can positively turn the air blue when I’m even remotely inconvenienced.

Don’t get me wrong, this is definitely not something I’m proud of. In fact, it’s something I constantly try to rein in when I’m in my daughter Ella’s company.

I don’t expect applause for this. It’s only right and I would expect any adult to do the same.

As far as I’m concerned, my daughter has never heard me swear, but I’ve tied myself in knots as to whether an expletive accidentally slipped into my daily discourse with my daughter and I failed to notice.

My ‘colourful turn of phrase’ is certainly not something my parents approved of when I was growing up, but it’s a habit I got into in secondary school and one I found extremely difficult to break.

It caused me sleepless nights when I became pregnant.

What if my swearing was so unavoidable I ended up raising a foul-mouthed toddler?  The type of child other parents shield their own little ones from?

I imagined Ella swaggering around the playground, chewing on a blade of grass, effing and blinding like an extra in Shameless.

What if I cursed so much I didn’t even realise it anymore and happily threw it into conversation when teaching my child her ABC’s?

Either oblivious to my genuine concern or inexplicably revelling in my distress, my partner told me that this could indeed happen.

Enjoying my horror, he even suggested that swearing during labour (because lets face it, that’s a given) could have distinctly negative effect on my infant’s as yet unestablished vocabulary.

For most of Ella’s life, this concern has been a constant.

Along with her health, her safety, her happiness and her education, I’ve worried myself sick that her mother’s language may be slowly but surely guiding her down a path of delinquency.

Seven years on, I realise my concerns had little grounding in reality when Ella returned from a day out with some older cousins.

Positivey busting with excitement, she revealed that she had learned a new word.

She didn’t even think me or Daddy knew it.

Encouraging her to disclose the ‘magic word’, I eagerly awaited her response.

With a deep breath, she smiled and dropped the F-bomb.

For most mothers, it would have been a moment of utter horror.

Not me, though.

My daughter had never heard the word before.  A child, whose mother had once accidentally cursed when cooing over a newborn, had never heard the word before.

Not only had I shielded her from my own foul mouth, but I’d apparently shielded her from the entire world,

I don’t know how many people will be in agreement, but as far as I’m concerned that’s a win.