Because for all of his life (all 3 years so far), we've been asking him if he pooped. It started with his first poopy diaper. Then during potty training, as a parent, you try to look for the poop face or the poop stance, and once your child is (mostly) potty trained, you're asking every hour if she/he has to pooped or if he/she just farted? Was that a poop or a fart is a common phrase in our house. So it's like no wonder the toddler is obsessed with this word-- we say it ALL the time.
However, the other day, I did a completely innocent and reasonable parent ask, of, Jack, do you have to poop? I mean, it's an important question to ask your recently potty trained 3 year old, as it's really not fun to wash yet another pair of stained underwear. He turns to me and says (serious voice), "mommy, you can't say that word." And I'm like, "poop? I can't ask you if you have to poop?" "Yes mommy, we can't say poop." And I'm like shark poop, we can say poop. Of course, I phrase it a little different to him, explaining how everybody poops, bowel movements are part of the human antimony, biology, medical science, blah, blah.
He must have gotten in trouble at school for saying the word poop or poopy. Sure, you shouldn't call someone a poopy pants (thanks Captain Underpants and fellow preschool friends for making that phrase popular). I've definitely drawn the line on naming calling. No calling someone poopy pants (omg, it's so hard not to laugh when writing/reading/saying poopy pants). We've talked how that hurts people/feelings, and he will get a time out for name calling.
But... I don't think it's improper to say poop when real poop is involved. Again, it's a very legitimate parenting question and discussion to be having with your kid. I much rather he tells me he has to poop, then him pooping his pants in the middle of Target. Nobody wins there. Including the customers sensitive to the word poop (clutching their pearls, with their curse word meter set way too high) because their nose is going to have more sensitivity issues than their curse word meter if my kid does poops himself.
Also, I refer back to the science part of poop. It's a part of being human that none of us should be a shamed of, especially if you are 3 years old and have just completed potty training. If you've ever had serious medical issues, sometimes bodily functions (like poop) are involved, and you need to be capable of openly and maturely talk about poop. In the medical sciences, prim and proper etiquette about bowel movements goes out the door; it really forces you to be a grown up about it and accept poop as human biology. So please just keep all that in mind if you get flummoxed about the word poop.
Of course, it doesn't help that I laugh when my child says let's ride the poop train or there's the poop dinosaur or poop flowers smell or other nouns getting a poop adjective attached to them. You kind of get desensitized to the word poop as a parent and an autoimmune patient, so I can't help it when a laugh escapes from my mouth when he says poop. And now that I've written poo a bunch of times, I bet you didn't even realize I switched it up from poop to poo just now. 💩
I know I'm not alone in this kid loves the word poop. I just saw a friend share a picture of a story/letter her child wrote, and it went: Poop poop poop poop poop. Please feel free to leave your own best parent poop story (life's bleach-able movements as Clorox so cleverly coined it) or favorite poop joke or any other favorite poop story (doesn't have to be about a kid in your life) in the comments. Happy pooping everyone (seriously fiber and/or probiotics will help)!
