Potty mouth.

It's great that Mercer is starting to talk more. Communication and understanding becomes much easier and results in less blow-ups, tantrums, and mixed signals. It's cute hearing Mercer say "Yes!" and "Seven" and ask questions like "Your feet are dirty, too?"

However, with the good comes the bad. Starting a couple of weeks ago, Mercer started cursing. The "S" word, specifically. Whenever he dropped a toy on the floor: "Oh sh*t!" Whenever there is a group of people walking: "Oh sh*t. All the people!" Last night, he added "Dammit" to his repertoire.

For the most part, he stopped when Mom and Pop were on vacation and he was with Grandpa for the week. Once Mom and Pop returned, though, he went back to the cursing. Of course, Mom and Pop don't want to be the ones to blame for this development, but cursing in the household has been held to a minimum since Mercer started talking and absorbing information. Phrases like "Oh, man" or "Oh no" are much more commonplace.

We're blaming day care. Mercer tends to repeat things he hears over and over at day care, so its definitely a possibility. We've spoken to the teachers and hopefully we can get to the bottom of it. We're not sure quite how to correct the problem though, whatever the reason for the potty mouth is. We've cleaned up our speech, but what to do when he curses? Punishment? Mercer doesn't really know what he's saying and he's not saying it with any vindictiveness. Ignore it? Then Mom and Pop feel like they're not doing anything. Correct him? That's what we've been trying to do, but we're afraid it's also reinforcing his memory of the bad phrases.

It's a tough f@!#ing nut to crack for f@!#'s sake. This parenting sh*t is hard goddamned work. All the people! Hopefully it's just a phrase, but if he keeps it up, we may just give in and pour him a shot of whiskey.