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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

The word 'belly'

198 replies

eighteentwentytwo · 27/04/2023 18:24

I'm a southerner in the north and I'm wondering if 'belly' has the same awful connotations that it has where I came from.

My son is using it all the time and I hate it! I would prefer he said 'tummy'. AIBU?

OP posts:
midsomermurderess · 27/04/2023 21:14

CoffeeCantata · 27/04/2023 21:02

I hate this word - absolutely loathe it.

Not here to make moral or linguistic judgments - just to express my opinion!
It makes me cringe/gag each time I hear it. I think it must have horrible connotations for me for some reason, evoking images of beer bellies, morbid obesity, Sir John Falstaff bursting out of his doublet, farting, shirt buttons straining etc etc. It also rhymes with jelly and smelly which somehow seem linked to it in my subconscious. To me, a belly could never be a thing of beauty.

I HATE the term 'pregnancy belly'. Although tummy can be twee (depending on the context - it's fine for children) I find it less repellent than belly any day of the week.

What most people refer to as their tummy/belly is the abdomen. Stomach isn't right because that's a bit further up - it's not the rotund protuberance we call the ....arrrggghhh 'belly'. Blleeaacchhh...

Bloody hell.

gelliprintcess · 27/04/2023 21:23

Sometimes you wonder how people survive in the world, if a harmless word like 'belly' is the cause of such distress!

Juanne · 27/04/2023 21:31

Tummy, how old are you 2?

saltinesandcoffeecups · 27/04/2023 21:41

SummerLover01 · 27/04/2023 19:00

Quit yer belly aching

😂

That gave me a belly laugh 😆

blubberball · 27/04/2023 21:42

girlmeetsboy · 27/04/2023 20:14

I also hate the word bum

This made me laugh!

Dartmoorcheffy · 27/04/2023 21:49

This has to be one of the most bizarre threads I've ever read on here. I'm northern and use belly,tummy, and stomach interchangably .. just asked southern DP his view and he says the same. Never knew that the word belly could be so class divisive lol

Rockingcloggs · 27/04/2023 21:52

It's belly! Tummy is fine if you're younger than 2 years old and even then it's twee.

jcyclops · 27/04/2023 21:58

The Boeing's wheels failed to come down resulting in a belly landing.
Paperchase and Cath Kidston both went belly up this year.
Erdogan misses rally due to delhi belly.
Belly Laughs comedy festival returns after Covid.
Prince Harry returns to the belly of the beast.

muddlingthrou · 27/04/2023 22:10

WeMustGetOffTheMountain · 27/04/2023 18:29

If I serve something tasty at tea time, my 9yo loudly exclaims "Get in my belly!" in a hilariously broad northern accent. Not sure you'd like to come for tea at our house 😂

Is your 9yo quoting the Scottish character from Austin powers?? That was his catchphrase!

Saz12 · 27/04/2023 22:46

So what do you call that bit?
If "tummy" is twee, "belly" is crass, then what? Intestines? Gut?
"Stomach" is just plain inaccurate, "abdomen" too vague.

IMO, "stomach ache" is that swallowed-a-brick food poisoning feeling, "tummy ache" is much lower down, (so could be norivirus, malaria, menstrual, or something else), and "bad guts" or "rotten guts" is the shits being refered to by a proper farmer.

endofthelinefinally · 27/04/2023 23:09

It would be great if people could just use the correct anatomical names for body parts.
There are so many posts on here talking about stomach pains and lots of suggestions and advice, only to find 20 posts later that the pain is in the abdomen, not the stomach, so all the advice is inappropriate.
As pp said, the stomach is a smallish organ in the top of the abdomen, partially behind the ribcage, where the food arrives when you eat.
The rest is the abdomen, divided into 4 quadrants, left upper and lower, right upper and lower. The rest of the organs are neatly arranged in the abdominal cavity.
That's it.

VestaTilley · 27/04/2023 23:41

YANBU! Vile word.

MaydinEssex · 27/04/2023 23:48

I'm from Essex, parents from East end of London, both tummy and belly are fine in my opinion, belly button, tummy tuck, Delhi belly, belly piercing, tummy ache, why would it worry anyone?

MumsDebt · 27/04/2023 23:55

I'm a Londoner.

What's wrong with the word "belly"?

TheShellBeach · 28/04/2023 00:00

Okunevo · 27/04/2023 18:44

But what word do you use for adults when you don't mean the stomach? Like inside but a pain in an organ below your stomach, or outside, the bit you show in a bikini?

Show quote history

Abdomen.

XenoBitch · 28/04/2023 00:01

When I hear the word 'belly', I just imagine my dad's pregnant looking gut and how proud he is of it.. and it makes me feel a little sick!

TheShellBeach · 28/04/2023 00:08

MumsDebt · 27/04/2023 23:55

I'm a Londoner.

What's wrong with the word "belly"?

It's a horrid word.

Papernotplastic · 28/04/2023 00:08

I was told not to say it as a child. I think that it was considered a bit vulgar, like saying bum instead of bottom.

BanjoKnockers · 28/04/2023 00:10

Cunt is out of the question then?

Papernotplastic · 28/04/2023 00:14

Chaucer was a fan of both.

Melroses · 28/04/2023 00:34

Iwantmyoldnameback · 27/04/2023 19:09

We have Stomach dancing here in the South 😂

My middle class grandfather used to sing a delightful ditty called Pee, Po, Belly, Bum, Drawers. My grandmother hated it.

Show quote history
Grin

Pee po belly bum drawers Flanders and Swann

Pee, po, belly, bum drawers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSrXqOI9988

jcyclops · 28/04/2023 00:41

The part of the body below the breasts and above the pubis is a waste.

CallieQ · 28/04/2023 00:55

I do love a nice plate of pork belly after a night out belly dancing Grin

myveryownelectrickitten · 28/04/2023 01:38

Northerner, but also a historian - “belly” was indeed traditionally considered vulgar: my lower-middle class aspirational grandparents (born in the 1920s) refused to use it as it was considered not “polite”.

I hate it myself, but more because I just hate the sound of it - it makes me think of “smelly” and kids’ rude rhymes in the playground! I never like the sound of “—elly” as the end of a word! “Kelly” is my least favourite name in the world 😂

myveryownelectrickitten · 28/04/2023 01:42

Melroses · 28/04/2023 00:34

Grin
Show quote history

Ha! Yes definitely 😂 (for anyone who can’t see the video, the lyric is “Ma’s out, PA’s out, let’s talk rude / Pee Po Belly Bum Drawers…”) My older relatives loved a bit of Flanders & Swann but also hated this one 🤣,