Crossed another thing off the list of difficult things to explain to my daughter

I don't watch anything scandalous on tv.. just Grey's Anatomy, Law & Order: SVU.. stuff like that, no horror, gore, murder, etc. I try to be very careful to make sure Lily isn't watching if there are "scary" parts.. because she gets scared and hides her eyes. Which I mean, I'd rather have it that way than if she accidentally sees something bad and she just stare at it happily.. so at least I'm doing something right [mommy +1]. But.. she's 4.. and learning about the world.

I convinced her it was mommy's turn to watch something this morning.. and she actually let me. Apparently I was tricky enough in my attempts to get her to allow me to be a person for an hour. So.. I watched Catfish (the tv show). Which is just people. She asks me sometimes when I put on a "mommy show" is it going to be scary.. bad?.. I forget the word she uses. And I'll tell her, no it's just people.

She didn't even ask me this time though- she was already engaged in something. So.. the episode I was watching was about two gay men chatting online. They agreed to meet (they always do, otherwise how would it be a show?). And when they did.. they kissed hello.

Of course I didn't think anything of it- as a grown up I know people are people, love and like whoever you want. And actually I didn't even realize Lily was watching the tv with me, but apparently she was..

And the way she said "boys aren't supposed to kiss" was so plainly.. no agenda behind it. Just like if you saw the moon for the first time and said "the sun isn't supposed to be white."

She had a bowl of mini muffins next to her, so when I explained "preferences" I incorporated them as a concrete example in "our world" (as she likes to call things that are real, not on tv, video games, etc). So I just said well, not everyone likes muffins, right? Some people like muffins and some people don't.. and that's okay. She said I like muffins- and I responded ya, I do too. And that was the end of it.

In the back of my mind, when she said that, I was hoping no one in her life had told her something like that. I'm fairly certain that's not the case.. but you just never know what really goes on when your children are away from you. However, I cannot get started on that- or I will have to get out the protective bubbles and hide everyone under the bed again.

I wasn't really thinking that by 4-years old I'd already have talked to Lily about death (2 dead gold fish last Mother's Day), race/skin color (there is a boy in her class that she says is "brown"- as she says she's "pink"), and now homosexuality. But it's all happened organically and she seems to accept it all as just another thing in life and not a big deal.

What's important is that I didn't freak out about any of it. Externally anyway. The goldfish death was really the worst. For me. I just didn't know what to say to her because I'm not always sure what I believe, but I didn't want to lie to her, and I also didn't want her to be upset. She wasn't. She didn't really seem to care. And when I pushed to make sure she understood there was no fish, it wasn't coming back.. she still didn't really care. It was accepted by her as just another thing.

Just another thing mommy presents her with, calmly. And I think she trusts me.. that I'm not going to lie or harm her with words, ideas, or otherwise. So.. we win. [big smile]