Why do kids learn so easily what they are not supposed to learn?

I try to be a good example with Little Spanish Pinay. I swear, I make the best effort. But I have this bad habit of uttering a vulgar when I get surprised or when something falls off. And the frequent word I say? Vagina! I don’t exactly say the english word vagina but the equivalent of it in my language. One dinner time, I was feeding LSP and trying to cool off the food from the spoon by blowing on it ::might be gross to others but hey, it’s a Filipino thing:: and suddenly the food flew out from the spoon. Obviously, I blew too hard. To which I exclaimed puke! Pronounced puh-keh. It wasn’t even loud and I said it just once! ONCE!

Hubby knows the word so he gave a quick disapproving look and immediately I felt bad that I said it infront of LSP but I thought, it’s ok. It was just quick and she might not even heard it. Another be-careful-with-your-words-next-time-look from hubby.

So we continued with our dinner. LSP eats her dinner on her own now but I still try to sneak in some food in her mouth from time to time to make sure she eats something. She’s still in a phase where playing with food is the same as eating the food.

Few minutes passed by, LSP was busy with her food while hubby and I was having out little chat while eating. Suddenly we heard it. She said the word. Puh-keh. Hubby and I exchanged looks of horror. My mouth open, I looked at LSP. Apprently while she was trying to fork her food, it slipped and fell off the floor and she said the word again.

I’m like …No, It can’t be. I must have heard her incorrectly.

We tried not to react and instead drive her attention to something else. But hubby and I were like OH.MY.GOSH mouthing the words without sound and with eyes wide in shock. She drank her water and it spilled off and she then said it again. It was kind of hilarious but…

MUST.NOT.LAUGH.

She can’t see this as something funny nor she can’t see us reacting on it or else the word will be forever engraved in her recording-like mind.

Then I thought it’s ok, it’s ok. I’m sure tomorrow she’ll forget about it. I just need to make sure she doesn’t hear it from me again.

The whole night we didn’t hear the word from her again. The following day, she was playing with her toy caserole with few cereals in it to “cook”. She took a toy spoon and started mixing the cereals in her toy caserole. While mixing, a few cereals spilled off and she said puke. We were so wrong. From then on, every time something from what she’s doing falls off or spills off, she’d say the word.

I can’t believe how fast can an 18-month old learn a word like that! She even learned the full concept use of it. Maybe I can take this positively and just be happy that she’s a fast learner. Not. SHE.MUST.UNLEARN.IT.

I tried to use some other words everytime I’d “accidentally” drop something and let her hear me on purpose but she will just look at me like “mami, you’re saying the wrong word”. I tried to use books! bed! bear! and many other “cute” words but nothing works. She wouldn’t repeat. I later on realized those are silly words to use as an expression. I know, I’m getting desperate. But the last thing I tried that seemed to be working is oooops! She’d say oooooosh! And she’d smile and sometimes laugh. There are still time that she’d say THE word but I really hope she’d completely unlearn it!