The Sexual Education of Sass

I will begin by saying that outside of actually having had sex, I don't know anything about sex.  Except that without condoms you will either end up with babies, or AIDS.

I went to a Catholic grade school from kindergarten all the way through eighth grade.  Here is a list of what I learned about sex in that time:

1.  My childhood friend Sarah told me how to spell sex.
2.  She also told me that penises go into vaginas.
3.  She also told me Jesus was black.  (not about sex but you get the idea)
4.  My mother told me angels put babies into a mommy's tummy and then the stork delivered them.
5.  Plants have both male and female reproductive organs.
6.  Dads suck at hiding their pornography collections.
7. Aerosmith sings songs about oral sex, chicks losing their virginity and creepster pedo dads.
8. Periods have nothing to do with sex.  They are smelly and embarrassing.
9. You can get AIDS when you do a blood brothers ritual and Magic Johnson will come and lecture you about how your life will never be normal but he'll always have your back, yo.

Once it was time for high school, I opted to attend the local public school.  At this point I knew nothing of condoms, birth control, herpes, syphilis, the clap, yeast infections, mono, "moon cycles" or even that I have two holes in my hoo-hah.

This is what I learned in high school:

1.  Mono is not a kissing disease.
2.  Your mother will not enjoy discovering that you are sexually active by way of your boyfriend informing her that you have a yeast infection.
3.  If you've never kissed anyone you're a prude.
4.  If you have a public relationship you are a slut.
5.  How to put on a condom, but not on a banana and not in a classroom.

Here are things we will research tonight, in real time:

HERPES
WOMANLY CYCLES
VAGINA HOLES

Get the popcorn.  It's gonna be an interesting night, y'all.  Happy Saturday!

HERPES

OK, so all my teen and adult life I've been told "Use proper protection or you'll get herpes"  *insert spooky music here*...I've been going around for over ten years trying to avoid something that I'm not entirely sure I do or don't have.  I mean, I've heard it makes you itch and you get red bumps.  Sometimes I itch and get red bumps, but I'm pretty sure that's just razor burn.  Let's look this up....

HOLY CATS.  Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeew.

I think it's safe to say I HAVE NEVER HAD HERPES.

I mean wow.  And, holy burning herpes Batman, check out these stats:

Results of a nationally representative study show that genital herpes infection is common in the United States. Nationwide, 16.2%, or about one out of six, people 14 to 49 years of age have genital HSV-2 infection. Over the past decade, the percentage of Americans with genital herpes infection in the U.S. has remained stable.

Genital HSV-2 infection is more common in women (approximately one out of five women 14 to 49 years of age) than in men (about one out of nine men 14 to 49 years of age). Transmission from an infected male to his female partner is more likely than from an infected female to her male partner.

Hold up, I'm confused.  MORE women have it, but it's more likely for a man to give it to someone else than it is for a woman to give it to another man?  This is why I hate math. 

WOMANLY CYCLES

There is a good reason why I freak out every month about my period not showing up.  It usually happens when I realize I forgot the last time I bled all over a wad of pressed paper and it's coming up on the end of a month.  The reason I do this is because

1.  I can't count

2.  I never learned the logistics of my cycle.  In fact I can't even remember what they call it when I'm not menstruating.  Estrogen something?  I don't fucking know.  HALP

OH that's right!  OVULATION!

Not to be confused with OVATION...although sometimes a good horizontal tango with Husby makes me want give one:

Ovulation:  the expulsion of an ovum from the ovary (usually midway in the menstrual cycle).

Oh, wait.  There's also a menstrual cycle...

Menstruation:  The process in a woman of menstruating monthly from puberty until menopause, except during pregnancy

OK, that's much more helpful.  Now I know the difference.  I think?  See, I couldn't even figure out my kids' due dates without the help of my doctor.  In fact there were lots of clearly stupid things I said to her that earned me a "CHILE YOU IGNANT" look from her on a semi-regular basis.  She probably wondered how I managed to get pregnant at all, since I don't even know which hole I pee out of.

Then again, my lack of knowledge is how I got pregnant both times anyway.  Go me, I fail!  I'm so good at failing!

VAGINA HOLES

(my husband is going to have a field day when he sees my search history tonight)

OK, so I have a urethra (HAH, Hank has a narrow urethra, who gets my awesome trivia reference?) and a vaginal canal. 

Fack, I have a CANAL?  Like Panama?  As in it's like sailing a rowboat down the Panama Canal?  Way to make me feel all woman, thou art loosed.  Fucking Internet.

Now where are they located?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

NEVER look up VAGINA HOLES in Google Images.  I need to puke.  Vaginas are SO ugly, y'all.  So ugly.  I need brain bleach.

But at least I know what is where now...I guess that's a good thing.

This particular blog post was brought to you by this instant Skype chat:

[7/22/2011 2:17:11 PM] Sass: I am pretty sure I do not have herpes lol
[7/22/2011 2:17:24 PM] K: but type 1 (oral) can be passed and become type 2 i believe
[7/22/2011 2:17:33 PM] Sass: Oh I see now
[7/22/2011 2:17:34 PM] K: so he couldve had cold sores ...
[7/22/2011 2:17:36 PM] K: and pass
[7/22/2011 2:17:37 PM] Sass: Right
[7/22/2011 2:17:38 PM] Sass: Yep
[7/22/2011 2:17:57 PM] K: which theres no shame aboutcold sores just because theyre not on your personal business
[7/22/2011 2:18:05 PM]Sass: Nope
[7/22/2011 2:18:07 PM]K: its funny really
[7/22/2011 2:18:10 PM] Sass: I just Googled herpes ROFL
[7/22/2011 2:18:12 PM] K: weird funny not LOL
[7/22/2011 2:18:23 PM] Sass: Do you know, I'm pretty embarrassed by how very little I know about my sexual organs
[7/22/2011 2:18:26 PM] K: when i got that first yeat infection i was TERRIFIED i got herpes
[7/22/2011 2:18:27 PM] Sass: Did not take sex ed
[7/22/2011 2:18:34 PM] K: oh i will educate you
[7/22/2011 2:18:38 PM] Sass: Hooray?
[7/22/2011 2:18:40 PM] Sass: ;)
[7/22/2011 2:18:40 PM] K: ha
[7/22/2011 2:18:53 PM] Sass: ROFL!
[7/22/2011 2:18:59 PM] Sass: HERPES IS A GREEK WORD
[7/22/2011 2:19:00 PM] Sass: IT MEANS
[7/22/2011 2:19:05 PM] K: ive had it all figured out since like 4th grade
[7/22/2011 2:19:06 PM] Sass: CREEPING
[7/22/2011 2:19:10 PM] K: oooooh
[7/22/2011 2:19:12 PM] Sass: (rofl)
[7/22/2011 2:19:19 PM] K: it gets into your nerves and stays there forever
[7/22/2011 2:19:26 PM] K: like mono
[7/22/2011 2:19:29 PM] Sass: TLC's "Creep" has a totally new meaning for me now
[7/22/2011 2:19:40 PM] Sass: Fuck, I had mono when I was 14
[7/22/2011 2:19:45 PM] Sass: I hated that shit
[7/22/2011 2:19:49 PM] Sass: Worst two weeks of my life
[7/22/2011 2:19:51 PM] K: yeah mess
[7/22/2011 2:19:57 PM] Sass: I was mortified too
[7/22/2011 2:20:06 PM] K: tracy says you cant donate blood if you ever had mono
[7/22/2011 2:20:07 PM] Sass: Because it's known as the kissing disease
[7/22/2011 2:20:14 PM] Sass: That's like the gateway illness to slut status
[7/22/2011 2:20:19 PM] K: idk how true this is though
[7/22/2011 2:20:26 PM] K: :D
[7/22/2011 2:20:28 PM] Sass: I don't know either
[7/22/2011 2:20:36 PM] Sass: I thought you'd like that lol
[7/22/2011 2:20:42 PM] K: so yeah
[7/22/2011 2:20:51 PM] Sass: But when I got mono I had only ever kissed one guy and it was two months since he'd kissed me

[7/22/2011 2:22:24 PM] Sass: I totally do not have herpes
[7/22/2011 2:22:28 PM] Sass: It's just razor burn

There you have it, peeps.

IT'S JUST RAZOR BURN.

Mompetition (or, Sass gets stabby and ranty)

Don't be that asshole who thinks their parenting situation is unique.  Mmkay, babycakes?

Look, we're all guilty of judging one another when it comes to parenting styles.  However, we don't like it when people judge us or belittle our opinion on a matter because "we haven't been there."  How's about a fucking truce, you douchebags?  You try stepping in my shoes for one day and then we'll talk about whether or not I have the capacity to understand what's the deal in Grown Up Land.

Someone recently made the very grave mistake of telling me that since I never experienced the feeling of impending doom, I could not understand a particular situation.  This is coming from a person who knows pretty much NOTHING about my pregnancies and birth stories, except for that I had two kids in under a year.

If this person had bothered to ask me a question instead of assuming that because I act all Mary Fucking Pollyanna McSunshineButt that my life is a motherfucking looping hybrid episode of The Donna Reed Show and Leave it to Beaver, then this WHOLE thing could have been avoided.  This person would not have dared to say that to me.  (Personally I think it's rude to use "You don't know what it's like so you have no right to an opinion" concerning ANYTHING, but it's especially idiotic if one chooses to say this when they have no basis for saying it.  Hey, you out there, yeah you know who you are - YOU WERE WRONG.  How does it feel to accuse someone of oblivion due to inexperience only to be informed that this person has an opinion of said matter based on - COULD IT BE - experience?!)

The reason I don't talk about my painful high risk pregnancies, my sleepless tearful nights, my post partum depression, my anxiety disorder and my major depressive disorder is because I HAVE A THERAPIST AND I HAVE LEARNED TO PUT ON MY FUCKING BIG GIRL PANTIES AND DEAL WITH IT.  Okay, so maybe wine and Xanax (mutually exclusive of course) help me put those big girl panties on, but the point is, I keep the hard shit under wraps because it's nobody else's fucking business and dwelling on it is just going to piss me off.

But for the sake of this rant, I am going to give you ALL a little lesson on manners.  And a little insight to my second pregnancy with B2.

B2 is my son.  He will be two on October 5.  He was classified as a moderately high risk pregnancy right off the bat because his sister, B1, was a cesarean and B2 was due to arrive by B1's first birthday.  In case you didn't know, the reason this was considered high risk is because my cesarean scar was still relatively fresh from B1's surgical procedure, putting me in a precarious position of possible uterine rupture or splitting of my cesarean scar due to contractions.

Despite this diagnosis, my pregnancy with B2 was relatively smooth.  He was far easier to deal with than it had been to deal with B1 in utero.  He punched and kicked a lot, but he didn't start up with Braxton-Hicks bullshittery until my third trimester.  Then I got slapped with bedrest and a special diet and terbutaline.  I fucking HATE terbutaline.  I imagine that, if I ever tried speed while having a coronary, terbutaline's side effects is exactly how it would feel.

Then October 5, 2009 came and I was in hardcore nesting mode.  I had been off bedrest for about ten days and I was scrubbing the bathtub WHILE SHOWERING and I felt a contraction tear through me.  This was in the morning.  Well, B2 was not scheduled for his cesarean until the following week, October 12, 2009.  So I convinced myself that it was Braxton-Hicks and went about my day - cleaning, running errands, playing with B1 and caring for her.  I waited until the end of the workday before I finally called my doctor because at that point I was in so much fucking pain I couldn't even move.  They told me to come in to the hospital just to be on the safe side.

My dumb ass had the car for the day and Husby was at work, so I made the brilliant decision of loading up B1 and driving there to get him.  He got in the car and I said "We're going to the hospital."  He asked why I didn't call earlier and my reasoning?  He'd just started this job the week before and we needed the money.  (What's that you say?  OH.  You mean aside from kids who play with poop you have BIG PROBLEMS?  Like OMG, Sass is POOR?!  Wow.  Money problems?  But Sass, usually you are so happy!  Shut the fuck up, asshat, I TOLD YOU SO.  You aren't the only person with problems!)

So we get to the hospital and they begin to monitor B2 and me and it is determined after FIVE HOURS of deliberation that the best solution would be to perform an emergency cesarean THAT NIGHT.  And so my son, my crazy, loud, adorable, cuddly little B2 was born nineteen minutes to midnight, Monday, October 5, 2009.  He had fluid on his lungs because they weren't fully developed.  He was technically two weeks early, after all - his official due date was October 16, 2009.

Now after all those scares, let's rack up B2's health issues.  Colic.  RSV.  Eczema.  Milk protein allergy.  Possibility of autism spectrum (turned out to be false).  Possibility of epilepsy spectrum (turned out to be false).  Possibility of leukemia (turned out to be false).  Possibility of lactose intolerance (waiting on test results).  Oh, and did I mention...

HE LIKES TO FUCKING PLAY WITH SHIT.

My point?  Yes, I DO UNDERSTAND ABOUT THE FUCKING POSSIBILITY OF DOOM.  And when I CALL YOU OUT ON ACCUSING ME OF NOT KNOWING WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT, don't get all whiny lovey with me and say "Oh I am not diminishing your situation, but you didn't have to live with the possibility that you might die."

1.  Saying what you said just diminished what I just told you
2.  MY DOCTOR FUCKING TOLD ME I COULD DIE!  ANYTHING CAN HAPPEN IN SURGERY!  I WROTE MY KIDS, MY HUSBAND, AND MY BEST FRIEND LETTERS IN CASE I DID NOT LIVE THROUGH MY SECOND CESAREAN PROCEDURE IN LESS THAN 365 DAYS!  SHUT THE FUCK UP PLEEEEEEEEEEASE.

Look honey.  I get that you are hugely pregnant and scared and overemotional.  Doesn't give you license to make everyone else feel like shit.  This is not a game about who has the most drama.  It's about respecting people WHO HAVE BEEN EXACTLY WHERE YOU ARE.  Oh and not to mention - when you contradict yourself so many damn times, you start to look REALLY stupid.

Anyway.  That's my stabby rant.  Please believe I will come back with funny shit later this evening.  I think I will write about our dog.

Sass's Tips for Successful Parenting

Hello everyone.  I know it's been a little while since I've posted but to be honest I've been stumped as to what to write.  I could write about Mega the Hut, but I think it's too soon for that as it pertains to my pseudo-family and I don't want to piss anyone off that knows where I live.  I could write about B2, but he was the center of my last blog entry.  Redundancy would be bad I believe.

So today, inspired by my friend Angie, I will give tips on successful parenting.

Tip #1:

ENCOURAGE CREATIVITY.

Children are like tiny tornadoes, but that's okay!  Apparently according to a study that I made up of which I forgot the origins, children thrive in messy environments.  So when your kid has taken every toy she owns and scatters them across your clean living room, making it look like the Toy Monster ripped through your home, breathe easy!  Not picking up their toys fosters their imaginations.  Plus now you don't feel guilty about not keeping your house in tip top shape.  Reward yourself with a glass of wine.

Tip #2:

DON'T SAY NO.

Kids become numb to it over a very brief period of time.  Instead, try more creative phrases.  Like "Stop it or I'll sell you to the Gypsies," "If you break the $500 vase the Vase Monster will break you," or "Don't hit your sister or the police will throw you in baby jail."  Scare tactics work every time.  Plus, it ties in with Tip #1.  You're being creative with your empty threats, thereby encouraging imagination!  Reward yourself with another drink.

Tip #3:

KEEP YOUR OFFSPRING ON LOCKDOWN SAFE.

In today's world, people see the dangerous side of a soft and cuddly teddy bear.  (The eyes, oh GOD, THE EYES!!!!)  It is important that we as parents become vigilant in safeguarding our ankle biters against these atrocities.  In our home, it has become necessary to outfit all doorknobs with doorknob guards and there is a baby gate at every entry. 

In the nursery, there are actually baby gates on the windows because the windows are so huge, and a doorknob guard on the inside of the room.  We have chosen the latter method to get us a couple extra hours of sleep in the morning to prevent our children from falling down the stairs.

If you, too, own a baby gate or doorknob guards, reward yourself with a drink for each individual item of question in your home.  (I have nine!)

Tip #4:

SAY EEJFJTGHUD ERRTHDHDNg EVERDJYING EVERYTHING IN A POSITIVE TONE OF VOICE.

Most of the time children under the age of two have no idea what in hell you're even talking about, so you can say many many things to, about, and around them without hurting their feelings or worrying about them parroting you (because I don't know about you, but my son is only just now picking up on larger words and still has yet to drop an F-bomb).  You can easily say "Honey, I'm so damn tired of all your whining" in the sweetest tone of voice and they will never be the wiser.  You can say "Shut up before Mommy starts swimming in liquor, you awful little gremlin" and they will giggle and go about their business.

You get your stress out and they are back to being happy and non-clingy.  Two missions accodromplisheedsf.  I

If you, too, are a master multitasker, have as many drinks at once as you can handle.

TIP #%:

HIDE THE GOOD STUFF.

I keep mine in the medicine cabinet.  Dammit, now I have to move it...shhhhhhhhhh

Just drink!