09/17/2015 Hide Your Crazy

I’m going to admit something that may be quite shocking for those of you that don’t “know” me. Those that do know me won’t be shocked at all, but the first step to recovering from a bad habit is to acknowledge it, right? Well, my mouth gets me into trouble sometimes. Not because of gossip or hatefulness, but for the simple fact that I am a smart aleck. And…I love Jesus, but I cuss a little. Sorry mom.

  I’m not a full-fledged sailor. I know how, when, and who I need to turn it off in front of, but I will say that some things are just not as funny if you don’t add a colorful word or witty sarcasm. Yes, I know that is nothing more than an excuse. In the sake of taking baby steps, I’ve been trying to eliminate my inappropriate words (sometimes bad words aren’t cuss words, but politically incorrect and insensitive words). Even if it makes a sarcastic sentence not as funny.

Like when my mother-in-law flagged me down and told me that she heard Carter(one of my 10-year-old twin boys) call Kane (my nephew) a “retard” because he wasn’t playing by some backyard baseball rule, or something. My eyes got big and I was like “where did they learn THAT from?? Probably at school…”My heart broke as she told me how much it can hurt when you actually know and love a person who is mentally handicapped. So I go to call my kids over and talk to them and I hear “Come heeeere!! You have stickers? Well that’s why we buy you shoes!!! … Ya’tards…” coming from my own mouth. Uh…. Whoops.

  Along with limiting my vocabulary to make Jesus happy and set an example for my kids, I have also decided to “spiritually clean” my house. This has been heavy on my heart for quite a while because I’m addicted to scary movies. Not the blood and guts kind, the supernatural, haunting, demonic possession, true story kind. I’m so intrigued, but want ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with that stuff in reality.I was told long ago to keep it out of my house for a number of reasons, but after a bible study by Angela Thomas (thatI am currently attending) personally called me out on this, I knew God was lighting a fire under by butt.“Spiritually cleansing” consists of taking out every movie, book, and game that has a sinful nature or undertone. (Insert mine and Jennifer Crawley’smotto:) “Because if my kids are going to learn a cuss word, they’re going to learn it from ME.”And we laugh and laugh.But that’s just a running joke of ours. It’s not funny when they do actually learn a word or phrase from you. Well, at least not if they consistently use it.

The other day I was minding my own business at home, and my 3 year old, Tucker Tex, was minding his own business running around the house like an ADHD Chihuahua with Tourette’s. I suddenly hear him yell, “nice blinker butthole!” Well, it sounded more like “Nybinkaahh-HO!!” but I knew what he meant. In his defense, he was yelling at the cat, who IS a butthole, but it broke my heart to know he got that from me. I’m sure it’d be much more colorful if he got it from his daddy, so I’m clinging to that positive.

  I had to quit laughing first, then come talk to him about bad words and how it hurts me to hear him use them and how I shouldn’t either. I’m sure I threw in a guilt trip about how much it makes Jesus sad, which I learned I’m also not supposed to do.

A big thank you to“Grace-Based Parenting” on clearing up what I need to work on. Apparently yelling, “After you ask Jesus to forgive you for lying to your parents, you better learn how to fix that fan that you just broke cause it may be a skill you will need for eternity. Hell’s hot!”Of course this is followed by laughs, high fives, winks and “I’m just playing, I love yous!” But it’s wrong. So is telling Hunter (my other 10-year-old twin boy) to tell the kid that always steals hisTaki’s, “I left them on yo’mom’s dresser last night.” I only told him that because I knew his innocent mind wouldn’t get the joke… and it hurt to keep it inside. I’m sorry that most of my hilarious jokes are borderline inappropriate. But to my friends: by “sorry,” I mean “you’re welcome.”

   Learning from my own mistakes, I’m pretty convinced that the best parenting method isn’t a “do as I say, not as I do” method, but a “monkey see, monkey do” method. I mean, it worked for God. Christ didn’t come to earth and drink himself into a hot mess every Friday night, womanize, steal, kill and bar-room brawl his way through life. He lived the way He asks us to live. An example. Unlike Jesus, we’ll make mistakes, we’ll get lazy, angry or start to confuse the world’s way with the right way, but He did give us a guideline.