I'm Giving Up Cursing For Lent

For those of you who don't know me, I'm a practicing Catholic.  And today is Ash Wednesday--the first day of Lent.  For the past few days, I've been discussing with my children the idea that we should be giving something up, or doing something extra for Lent.  Being that last night was Fat Tuesday (for non-Catholics: you eat it up and enjoy because Ash Wednesday is a day of fasting and reflection), we discussed, as a family, what sacrifices we would be making during Lent.

My husband is giving up caffeine...which means his morning coffee.  He does this every year so I wasn't surprised.  My daughter said she was going to give up gum.  Usually, I try to do something extra...like go to daily mass at least once a week, say the rosary, be nice to people I don't particularly like (that was a hard one).  But this year I decided to go old school and give something up.  And as I was sitting there with my kids, a light bulb went off...I decided to give up cursing.

Yes, you read that right. I'm going to stop cursing.

Cursing, cussing, swearing, using foul language...basically I can't be a potty mouth for the next 45 days.  Yes, I counted.  The good news is that once Easter rolls around I can go back to my salty language :)

When I told the kids last night about my decision to give up cursing, they laughed at me.  And I mostly keep it clean around them!  There was that week a few months ago when we almost died while in the car...and they heard some pretty colorful language out of my mouth...and I may have made some hand gestures to go along with the language...but, in my defense, we seriously were almost crushed by a tractor trailer...and they are old enough to know not to repeat me.

After they finished laughing at me, my kids gave me some guidelines...helpful little munchkins they are.  Not only am I not allowed to use the obvious foul language (the f-word, the b-word, etc), I'm also not allowed to use words like H-E-double hockey sticks.  Seriously with this???  To me, that's a “good” four letter word!  Plus, there is to be no cursing on facebook or my blog.  I was told that I can't even curse when I'm alone because “God will know”.

So, will this no-cursing be the end of me?  Will I be able to hold out?  I really need to find some interesting, and acceptable, substitute language.  If you have any suggestions on Lent-friendly word substitutes, please leave them in the comments section below.  I'm a former New Yorker...with an Italian background...I need to express myself somehow!

Without my big fat potty mouth, I feel like I've given up my superpower or something.  What have I done?

PS...My son wants to give up farting in his sister's face for Lent.  My intention of telling him that he needed to pick something appropriate came out all wrong.  What came out instead was, “You can't give that up for Lent”.  He smiled and laughed.