My Dirty Little Secret

I'm trying something new.

It's quite hard.

I'm not used to it.

Get your minds out of the gutters (I know what y'all are like tut tut!) people I'm actually talking about stopping swearing! Not what you thought I was going to say was it?!

 I've been a potty mouth for far too long. I wasn't raised to swear. In fact if I ever swore in front of my Dad then I was in BIG trouble. And I respected my parents too much when I was growing up to ever swear at them. So it wasn't until I left home really that it started. I can't even figure out why to be honest! I think I realised that I could make certain statements, or stories come alive and get more of a reaction if I inserted an expletive in it somewhere. From there it became like a shadow for my mouth! Every time I spoke, a non-essential swear word would filter it's little, dirty way through to my sentence.

Let me just say that swearing does not suit me. I've been told this a LOT. I'm a 'nice' girl, I went to excellent schools and have always spoken clearly and have often been described as 'posh' thanks to my schooling. So you can imagine how foreign swearing sounds with a voice like mine! Very out of place.

I've also noticed how many people I know don't really swear, at all. Most of my close friends never swear and it seems so effortless! I've also noticed that when I swear the affect is less of 'wow' due to impact and more flat. Flat as if I had farted in public and people didn't know where to look. I guess you could say I've been noticing how uncomrotable my swearing makes other people! In turn this made me look at it and realise how much it would make me feel uncomfortable too!

I don't like swearing, never have but mostly I hadn't ever thought too much about it really. It's just something I did, regularly. A bit like an addict, it had wound itself in to my vocabularly so tightly I feel recently like I'm learning a new language, one that doesn't feature expletives if the postman is late or if I've got pins and needles. I guess you could say that swearing was like a vocabulary drug and it had some pretty nasty effects!

So I recently decided it was time to stop. I think it was when Joshua started talking and the realisation that my sweet, innocent child could at any time announce my bad language as a choice word of his own, that was when I decided to stop. I know it's the right thing to do, I want to do it, I really want to do it! But it's just so darn hard!

I've gone swearing cold turkey and it's not as easy as it sounds. I will be mid sentence and about to throw in a carefree expletive and will literally try to suck my words back in to prevent the eveil swear word from overshadowing what I was going to say. This results is me looking like a crazy lady, spluttering and choking on her own wording when all I was asked is for "£1.49 please" for my bread and milk. Poor checkout boy, he looked like at me like I needed to be commited to some sort of institute, and I could tell he was trying to figure out what sort! I think I even saw him shoot Joshua a glance that said "Poor kid, with a mother like THAT".

So it's not easy but I know it's going to be worthwhile. I feel much better, fresher since I started trying to stop. I feel like I've not got this dirty little secret anymore! I don't agree with swearing around children and I don't want my son to grow up thinking it's acceptable. The only way I could ensure this was to stop myself. After all I can't tell him off for doing something if mummy already does it, poor kid would grow up to be all kinds of confused!

Mostly though, and selfishly I've done it for me. I don't like swearing, it's happened over night but suddenly I find it offensive, a little like a vocabulary knife is stabbing at you when someone swears. Especially if it's needlessly. I literally woke up one day with this new attitude of swearing literally being something dirty, horrible thing that I don't want to do anymore. And that was enough for me! Lets just hope I can crack it because I don't think there is any treatment for compulsive swearers!

My only remaining problem is baby daddy. His potty mouth is on a whole other level. When I say I had a potty mouth and he has a potty mouth, comparing the two - mine would be half full and his would be overflowing! He doesn't even know he's doing it! I think I may need to remove his tongue or sew his lips together for him to stop! ...Which actually wouldn't be a bad thing!

Love Chloe xx