Tell Me What's the Circumstance of Circumcision?

Hello Blog Fans

The title of the this entry is no great creation of mine, but of the Barenaked Ladies. It's a clever line a song called "I know" from their third album "Born on a Pirate Ship".


A couple of weeks ago, Sorcha took a book, a kids book, out of the library about Egypt. One quiet afternoon while intently reading about the pyramids, the desert and the Nile, she stopped suddenly and with a look of sheer incredulity on her face she asks "Mummy? What are they doing?" I take the book from her to see this (see picture below)....







"Huh...well...that's an interesting thing to put in a kids book..." I said...slightly bemused..

"What are they doing?"

I thought for a few seconds about the best way to handle this delicate circumstance and thought that in this case honesty probably was the best policy.

"Well...I could tell you. Do you want me to tell you? It's a bit icky..."

"OH I don't want to know about icky stuff!!"

"Well, Sorcha, you're going to have to learn about icky stuff eventually. Do you want me to tell you?"

"...OK..."

So, without a full transcription of our conversation, let me just say that, based on the basics of the male anatomy that she knows, I told her as delicately, but as truthfully, as I could with out being too "icky".

"Oh...OK..." she says...looking pretty confused as she tried to digest this new and probably disturbing information about the society in which she was being raised.

"But why are they holding his arms back?" (see picture)

"Oh...well...back then, they didn't have anything to freeze that area with so that they wouldn't feel any pain so it probably hurt quite a bit and my guess is that he didn't WANT to get this done."

And there you have it. I suppose I could have denied knowing what they were doing or said she wasn't ready to know, but I think that would have been a bad thing. She's only 7 yes, but I was too when I started to ask questions about all the "icky stuff". And my answers will be calculated in a way, based on her age at the time she asks, but I will be honest because that's how I roll. She's growing up and unlike the crocodiles in Egypt, I won't live in De Nile.

Until next time,
Cin with the best.