4 year old asking where do babies come from?

[8paws8legs]

Wasn't really sure where to put this so went for Aibu as always seems to get good answers.
So my 4 year old son has asked a few times now how mummies and daddies make babies, where they come from etc? It always seems to be at bedtime so have fobbed him off a bit and said we will talk about it tomorrow etc but what do I say? He has asked several times now so I need to give him an answer but not sure how to make it age appropriate???

Just start factual and simple. A couple of sentences might be enough unless he’s really fascinated. When her sister was born my (then nearly 3yo) was really interested in how the baby was fed, the umbilical cord etc. She had no interest in how the baby got in my stomach in the first place but was interested in it’s life in there. I showed her some videos of the egg dividing and growing into the baby (baby centre has some good ones).

‘Mummy’s tummy’ usually suffices. If they’re extra curious and want to know how the baby gets inside Mummy’s tummy just say something about a special cuddle between a Mummy and Daddy. No need for masses of details with a four year old.

One of the funniest moments in my teaching career was in a Y5 sex Ed lesson when a fairly streetwise girl who understood the concept of sex from things like EastEnders and playground gossip suddenly realised that sex was the same thing as the ‘special cuddle’ that her mum had told her about. I think that was also the year that all 3 of us teaching it were massively pregnant!

DisinterestedParty

Right. You’re taking my comments out of context. I didn’t say ‘I never got molested as a child so it’s fine’. Nothing of the sort. No survivor bias at all.
My comment there was clearly to the above comments about Midwifery.
I’m not sure why you’re being so rude and what you think you gain from it?

I told my son a fairly accurate version of it, and then had weeks of questions like:

What do sperm smell like?
What colour are the eggs?
Do sperm have a favourite colour?
Do the sperm think it's a holiday?
Does the egg want to get fertilised?

It was an enlightening time!

The stork brings them from Paris, easy.

The younger you tell em the truth the less embarrassing it'll be for all involved later down the line. They wont even remember how they know.

Keep it simple- egg from mummy, seed from daddy. Baby grows in tummy and comes out of vagina or through a cut in tummy.
Egg and seed meet in special cuddle in bed.

Hasn't she ever asked you what her vagina is called? It's so strange not to tell her. What does she think her wee comes out of?

Not her vagina for a start!

It’s not strange not to sit there naming my three year old’s body parts. We talk about trains and the clouds and her lunch - if she asks me what her vagina is I’ll tell her, but there is nothing “strange” about it.

don't understand how your dd could be 3 and knows she has a bum but not a vagina? Do you just use a pet name for it or of you actually mean she doesn't know that part of her body exists? Because the latter sounds extremely unusual to me.

And you don’t need to understand. It’s none of your business.

Supertrooper98

I don’t subscribe to that so can’t read it. I’m quite comfortable with how my 3 year old is getting on, though. If she asks what her vagina is I’ll tell her. So far, there has been no need.

Just tell him how it happens! It's not a secret, after all. There are lots of children's picture books that might help.

You really dont need to make a big deal of this. A child of 4 probably doesnt yet need the whle story. Do not fob him off or fudge, just answer each question from a four years olds perspective and answer truthfully without elaboration or moving on to complex answers. For many the first and only answer needed is from the Mothers tummy. Move on as reqired but not before the relavant question is asked. By 6 they are usually ready to look at books with you, age appropriate. Dont make a mountain out of it

@Vulpine I totally agree.
My 4 year old was told in an age appropriate way and was just like “hmm, ok!” and off she went back to playing.
The subject of babies and how they come out came up with her friends at school when I’d recently given birth to DC3. She was proud as punch that she could answer their questions because she witnessed the birth of DC2. I thought her teacher was going to kick off about it, but she actually was pleasantly surprised when she got wind of the conversation and heard that my daughter had told her friend that “my brother was in Mama’s belly, then she got some really big tummy aches and pushed him out from her pagina” - accurate but not inappropriate.
(Just need to work on the pronunciation of “vagina” )

I knew by age 5 that the man puts his penis is the lady's vagina and that a seed comes out and meets the lady's egg and they mix together and become a baby that when it is ready comes out of the lady's vagina. This was in the 1970s. I didn't find it shocking or particularly interesting and I didn't understand why other children giggled about sex.
So I'm rather surprised that so many people forty years on don't
t think it's appropriate to tell children the truth.

I told my DD that women produce eggs and men produce sperm, and if the egg is fertilised by the sperm it grows into a baby in the woman's tummy. She did ask how the man put the sperm in the woman's tummy, but i just told her that that is a conversation when she is older, she did ask how much older and I managed to placate her with saying in a couple of years.

I was taught sperm not seed sorry

"A very kind man gave us some of his seed which comes out of his penis. The seed was put up inside Mummy's vagina and it met up with a tiny egg inside Mummy's tummy. They mixed together and became a tiny baby that grew and grew, bigger and bigger, until it was time to be born out of mummy's vagina."

We watch YouTube videos of baby animals being born (elephants and cats and giraffes...) and talk about it ALLLLLL the time. She started showing a passionate interest at about 3.5.

She was created via donor insemination. She knows how babies are more conventionally created and she knows how she was created.

Keep it simple but factual.

But just a word of advice, please use the proper terminology when talking about penis/vagina. If not, this can have have an impact if the child is ever abused and trying to disclose something.

@MWNA we watched lots of animal birth videos in the run up to DC2 being born, and then eventually we watched a very chilled human birth video. We had DC2 at home so I wanted DC1 to be prepared for what she might see if he happened to make his arrival during the day when she was awake - which he did. She wasn’t remotely scared or worried about any of it! I remember her coming to me when her new brotger was seconds old and saying “Wow! Hi baby!”

I don’t understand the point of “mummy’s tummy”. Keep it simple, but keep it actually true. “mummy has something called a uterus, that’s here, near her tummy - that’s a special place for the baby to grow”.

I think it should be explained factually and honestly.

I also don’t like the whole “when you love each other” on it’s own, because kids think they love lots of people which I feel might just confuse them.

I think it should be “once you’re a adult/grown up/certain age and you find someone you really love (like mummy and daddy do) then the daddy can put a seed from his penis into the mummy’s vagina, that’s what makes a baby grow. Nice the baby is finished growing the mummy will go to hospital and the baby can be born. Sometimes through the mummy’s vagina and sometimes through her belly.”

They’re going to have questions and they is no point in beating around the bush when it comes to learning about our bodies and how they work.

Another vote for Clare Rayner’s body book

Just be factual and stick to the questions he's actually asked. But be prepared for a bit of scepticism. With slightly older children (Yr3), when we tackled this topic, most were fascinated, but one little chap declared "My mummy and daddy wouldn't do that, it's rude!!" He was one of four siblings.....

Tell him the truth