Giving options for new outbursts of frustration....

[timer lady]

maybe you can help. It would/might help the tone in our homes if we cleaned up our difficult children language.

Of course, the common one used here "it hoovers". kt hates that one but is getting a big response in school & at Residential Treatment Center (RTC). They are pushing the other kids to use it AND kt is getting the "honors" for starting the trend, if you will.

Integrated Listening Systems (ILS) worker & I came up with "oh fecal matter" or "oh waste material" for, well, you know.

Another we've worked on is "girl pup" or "woman dog" for that "B" word. "Girl pup" seems to be the big winner at school & at Residential Treatment Center (RTC).

It has been really lowering the tone of anger using these phrases here ~ we begin giggling & sometimes it starts a conversation of what's going on.

So do you have any suggestions for any of your difficult children's favorite terms of endearment or anger spewed out of their angry little mouths.

(Mods, if you feel this is better on watercooler feel free to move it)

 

[Marguerite]

In Australia we use rhyming slang a lot (originated from the Cockney component of early settlers). A suit would be "bag of fruit". Your mate would be your "old china" as in "china plate" = mate. You might be able to use the concept of rhyming slang to come up with some sanitised terminology.

Other terms - instead of referring to someone as a d***head, we refer to them as having circumcision scars on their necks. Or as Richard Cranium.

Another way of calling someone a cat when they're being particularly catty, is to offer, "Coffee? Tea? Bowl of cream?"

Latin is useful. Terry Pratchett (my favourite author) writes fantasy satire, setting his work on Discworld, a fictional world in the form of a disc being carried on the back of four elephants, all of them standing on the back of a giant space-going turtle. One important character in a number of these books is a very cowardly wizard called Rincewind, who faces death often and somehow survives. Because these books are supposed to be sufficiently clean for British children to read (well, British teens, at least) he disguises any swearing by using more polite terms or using Latin. Example - Rincewind, screaming in terror as he yet again faces certain death, says, "Stercus, stercus, morituri sum." This translates to "oh sh**, oh sh**, we're going to die."

Another phrase of Pratchett's which I also use is another polite but medieval alternative for a common phrase - when something bad is happening and everything is rapidly turning into a real mess, Pratchett describes this as "the midden hit the windmill." I've also heard this called, "the excrement hit the air conditioning."

Isaac Asimov once sent a story to his favourite publisher and obviously the publisher didn't like it - the publisher sent back a small slip of paper on which he had written the formula for butyl mercaptan. This is the chemical that makes skunks smell so bad! Also, as mercaptans are a chemical responsible for some of the more odorous fecal smells, that could be an alternative word for you - "oh, mercaptan!"

I'm told Yugoslav is most satisfying to swear in. I like to use German. Or you can use Geology and refer to a type of rock, known as schist.

Swearing in other languages can be useful. easy child 2/difficult child 2 at work often says, "merde!" which apparently is not so offensive in French as the English equivalent. The French are a strange people - they get offended if you call them a cow or a blue pig but don't seem to bat an eyelid at "merde!" or "Mon Dieu!"
But then - in Australia we have our politicians using language that would curl your hair, in formal situations in parliament, even when it's televised into schools. And one of our political parties had as its slogan, "We'll keep the bast**ds honest!"

Maybe you could use some good old Aussie slang? Take a leaf from our former PM (several PMs ago) Paul Keating. He raised (lowered?) parliament to new standards of language use, when he called his colleagues scumbags. Ratbag is another good one. Louse, bludger, dingo, galah, drongo - all publicly acceptable here, but satisfying to utter when you're annoyed with someone. "You stupid galah! Ya flamin' drongo! Why'd ya hafta go and do that for?"

Marg

 

[DaisyFace]

How about "BEEP"....actually make the censor noise.


as in "O BEEP!!!"

or "Or this really BEEEEEEPS!"

or even "BEEEP you!"

Don't like my ideas?

Go BEEEP yourself!

(No, I'm kidding! Please don't do that!)

 

[Marguerite]

difficult child 3 already does this - he's done it for years, it really confuses people.

Marg

 

[flutterby]

I don't mind those words and if those were the only words difficult child 2 used, I'd be thrilled. It's the derogatory language and other things that bother me. And there is no substitute for them. I just don't want to hear them at all. Some of the expressions kids have come up with are just really gross. I can't even think of a way to type them so that they would be understood without being offensive. For that stuff, he gets flicked on the head if he's in range. His mom and I have kind of taken roles so that he's not always feeling picked on by one person. Language is one of my roles.

difficult child doesn't swear - at least not around me.

easy child didn't swear around me until about a year or so ago. And now it's getting to the point of too much. But...if I tell him to substitute with other expressions he'd just use them ALL the time - and loudly - to be a pest. And that would be more annoying. I've tried it in case you couldn't tell.

But, I have to say...I'd rather hear carp (with the 'a' and 'r' reversed) than fecal matter. That one's just a bit too descriptive for me.

 

[everywoman]

Words I personally use:
Fudge---
Shoot, Shoot, and Double Shot
Hokey Pokey
Darn it
Muscle Stoker

 

[artana]

When my difficult child was 5, my fiance was really mad at the car in front of us. He started to say, "What the..." but caught himself in time. At that same moment, my difficult child yelled out, "Chicken." And in our house, "what the chicken?!" has become a preferred phrase. In fact, mother in law liked it so much she bought us a chicken pillow.

 

[DaisyFace]

What the chicken!?!?

That's too hilarious!

--DaisyF

 

[trinityroyal]

I tend to go with Winnie the Pooh type words.
"Oh Bother"
"Silly Old Bear"
"Heffalump!"

Also, 1960's style British insults.
"You Eunice"
"You're such a girl's blouse"
etc.

It's hard to get hopping mad when someone calls you a girl's blouse.

Latinate ones work well too.
"That fellow has a cranio-rectal inversion."

So far, none of this has made the slightest dent on difficult child's foul mouth. If he were spouting off near a Stevedore's convention, they would be complaining about the language!

 

[ThreeShadows]

http://www.amiright.com/parody/60s/themoodyblues20.shtml

 

[ThreeShadows]

I have a long list of Latin curses, if any one is interested just pm me!

This one seems appropriate for my current circumstances: antiquis temporibus, nati tibi similes in rupibus ventosissimis exponebantur ad necem.
In the good old days, children like you were left to perish on windswept crags!

 

[Mayapple5]

Our difficult child has been using stupid which gets on our nerves a whole lot. I believe there is a girl at school who calls her that. I'm not even sure she understands its meaning. She calls us all stupid. We have switched it to a game of "weird". We try to think of things that are weird and she then makes everyone take a turn. Once she said, "Can you come back to me, I can't think of anything right now." Oh, how funny! Just right out of the blue.

I do believe if she knew other words, and eventually she will hear them, she will begin to use them.

 

[KTMom91]

We're working on the old-timey ones, like Egads! Instead of "pitching a s***fit", you're "in a tizzy." If nothing else, it makes Miss KT laugh.

 

[DaisyFace]

You know--

It's usually not so much the words themselves that are the problem, but the tone or manner in which they are said. We try not to swear in our house, but every movie we rent seems to contain innappropriate language.....and we all hear these words outside the home....and so if somebody "slips up", it's not the end of the world.

on the other hand, difficult child can be pretty rude and offensive just by the way she uses regular old English. And she thinks she's clever because technically, she's not swearing, she's not using bad language....but she's being completely rude anyway. I hate it!

--DaisyF

 

[timer lady]

I want the tone of anger out of here ~ the suggestions I've written have really gotten kt to start giggling & many times stops her meltdown just like that.

It's been fun coming up with cool new terms that make us giggle ~ kt & I start winking at one another (another positive as eye contact is wonderful for attachment). kt loves bringing them to school ~ she calls herself a trendsetter.

I'll be looking at the Australian favorites as well as 3 Shadows suggestions. This is turning more into a fun project & helping tone of voice.

I've been using this with wm as well.