Life Laughs: The Naked Truth about Motherhood, Marriage, and Moving On

by Jenny McCarthy

  Here are some excuses that you might want to stay away from:

  Honey, there is this weird bump on my vagina.

  Sorry, honey, I haven’t taken a bath all week.

  Oh no, I think I left a tampon up there for the past three weeks. (That even grossed ME out.)

  Most of these would work, but you do eventually want your husband to have sex with you again, so choose your excuses wisely. Now, some asshole out there reading this might think, Something must be wrong with her sexually. No, from every woman I talked to this is an absolutely NORMAL thing that happens in EVERY marriage. Unfortunately, most husbands don’t know we go to this extent to get out of sex, but it’s true.

  So the next time your vagina feels closed for business, you can try the honest route and communicate why you’re too tired for sex or make it easy on yourself and simply start scratching.

  Potty Training

  I’ve always found it fascinating how men are able to whip out their penis and pee in any parking lot or any available alleyway. For us babes out there it ain’t so easy. I’m sure all of you have tried it at least once: the squat, the release, and then the horrid pee stream that shoots out in every direction, soaking your shoes. Then we’re left there searching around for some kind of leaf to wipe with while the guys simply just shake “it” off. Yeah, I might have pee envy, but I’m still glad I don’t have the meat and potatoes that they have to deal with every day.

  Growing up in a house with three sisters and no brothers we never really had a problem walking into our bathroom at night and enjoying a sit-down. The toilet was always down, and there was never any pee on the seat. My dad even peed sitting down. I asked him why once and he said, “I don’t know, it’s just more comfortable to sit.” I thought that was genius. Why not sit? Once they do, their penis is going to hang in the down direction anyway, so why not relax and enjoy? Well, I guess if the man was blessed with an extra-large dong it could possibly slump low enough to hit the water, but c’mon, most of our husbands are not built like a professional basketball player, if you know what I mean.

  I also find it funny how men pee in urinals next to each other. They’re constantly whipping out their penis in front of other guys. They say they don’t look, but you know they take a peek once in a while to check out the competition. No wonder they get pee stage fright. Even when I was in the bathroom with John there would be a seven-second delay before he could turn on the hose. I guess if we women had to pee standing up in front of one another we would get stage fright too. I really can’t imagine standing there and pulling out my vagina and peeing on a wall talking to the girl next to me about yesterday’s General Hospital episode. Weird!

  So needless to say, when I starting living with my boyfriends later on in life, I quickly experienced the annoyance of the toilet seat left up or, even worse, the surprise wet seat. There truly is nothing worse than sitting on a wet seat. Actually, I take that back. Sitting on an airport toilet seat you thought you dried off but had some surprise drops—that’s worse. Some stranger’s pee. But we’re talking about our husband’s pee. Still gross but not revolting.

  I’m currently in the process of teaching my three-year-old how to pee in a toilet. I had him watch Dad a couple of times because like father, like son, right? It was working until I realized that I needed to potty-train John at the same time as my three-year-old. If he’s gonna teach our son how to pee, you can be damn sure he’s gonna teach him right. So now it’s lift, point, AIM, fire—AIM being the optimal word here—and then shake, lid down, and flush. There, I just saved my son’s future wife endless nights of falling into the bowl. Which I’m sure has happened to YOU too!! Now that’s freaking gross!

  So if you can’t train your man to aim accurately or keep the lid down, simply open his car door and pee on his seat. Then he too can enjoy the excitement of surprise pee.

  Get Naked and Naughty!

  Once you’ve tried every sexual position that you feel comfortable trying, what’s next? What do you do to spice things up? Because, let’s face it, it gets to be pretty stale after a while. Like going to get your tires rotated but using the same screws over and over and over again. Let me begin with simple ideas to spice things up and then I’ll get to the raunchy ideas. First things first, try talking dirty. If you’re already saying stuff like “Oooh, I’m getting wet” and “F*ck me harder!”…you’re off to an okay start. If you’ve never said anything like that and are completely repulsed, please don’t read the rest of this chapter. I think there is a rerun of The Sound of Music playing on a cable channel somewhere, but if you’re a curious, naughty little woman, keep reading!

  After so many years sex gets old, so in order to spice things up you must investigate what secretly turns your man on. Simply ask him what fantasies he pictures. What fantasies would he love to see happen? And then run with it. You can’t get jealous, though. We all have secret fantasies. Even though I picture myself rubbing my crotch all over George Clooney, I’m not going to jump him on the red carpet and actually do it. Like if your guy has a thing for Britney Spears…try bringing her into some scenario. While you’re having sex with him, ask him what he would do if he came home from work and you and she were in bed together. THIS does NOT make you gay! It’s just a fun fantasy scenario to get turned on by. The scenario itself doesn’t turn me on most of the time; it’s watching him get so aroused he can’t control it, and I’m forced to scream “Penny Marshall, Penny Marshall!” just to keep him from popping the lid. Feel free to tell him some of your fantasies also. If it involves other people, use a celebrity name or just the word “guy” in it because God forbid you should accidentally bring up his best friend. BIG NO-NO!!!

  Once you’ve mastered some really sexy dirty talk, it’s time to take it to the next level. If you are willing and open, porn could be a real turn-on. Once again, if this offends you at all, I think The Sound of Music is still playing. All other naughty, curious women keep reading! The first time I saw a porno I was at my cousin’s house. (Isn’t it always at your cousin’s house?) I think I was ten and I could NOT believe that a man was kissing the place where she goes pee pee. My cousin and I were screaming, vowing to never EVER let that happen. Now, of course, it doesn’t happen enough. But anyway, as I got older and have gone through enough relationships, I’ve found that watching an occasional porno film can be fun. It’s easy foreplay. The key for any beginner is to get a porno that has girls in it who are bigger and not as pretty as you. This way you don’t feel insecure compared to some hot silicone porn star who can deep throat. Amateur porn would be a good start. There is no professional lighting and the girls are real people. I’m telling you, if you haven’t ever watched one with your man, go out and get one to surprise him. It will turn him on so much he probably won’t be able to get past the opening credits without losing his load. If you’re too embarrassed to go to a store, order one online. There’s plenty of them out there.

  My last little idea actually came from my best friend from Chicago. She and I planned a girls’ trip to Las Vegas recently, and we were talking about sex—the good, the bad, and the ugly. She told me she left her husband something behind that he could enjoy while she was gone. Just to sort of spice things up. If you’re NOT a celebrity, this is a really fun, sexy thing to do. She made her own little video for him—doing her own thing, if you know what I mean—and left the tape under his pillow. I personally thought that was a GENIUS idea. That’s a perfect example of how to completely turn on your man and keep things spicy. It also makes a really cheap birthday present.

  So the next time you feel bored in bed, tell your husband that you’ve got a new movie for him to watch. Pop in the tape and watch the excitement on his face as he watches you on TV performing circus tricks with your vibrator. I guarantee you’ll turn him on more than any bimbo porn star ever could!

  The Horoscope Addict

  The first time I ever heard what horoscopes and fortune-telling was all about was when I was in the sixth grade. My mother
answered my question about the supernatural and certain people’s ability to tell the future by telling me it was all rubbish. She said only God knows the future, but every morning I would catch her reading her horoscope in the newspaper. She would get really excited about good ones and reject the bad ones by turning the page quickly, stating, “They’re full of baloney.” By the time I got to the eighth grade it became my morning ritual. Before I left for school, I would flip open the paper and then ask a question to the universe like “Will Gary try to get to second base with me after school?” The problem was, the horoscopes I read at age twelve never gave the adolescent answer I wanted to hear. It usually said, A business venture will soon unfold and a promotion will be offered to you. What could that possibly mean to a twelve-year-old who wanted to get felt up?

  As the years went on, I kind of let it go. I went through puberty like every girl should, lost and confused. Then, when I was in my early twenties, fortune-telling came back into my life with a big bang. I was walking past one of those palm-reader shops with the big neon hand blinking in the window. I had just dropped out of college, was totally in debt, and was living back with my parents. I had nothing to lose and needed a little direction, so I opened the door, hoping for some wise soul to tell me I had a purpose in this lifetime other than being really good at curling my hair.

  I walked in, sat down, and pulled out a crumpled ten-dollar bill. The bug-eyed gypsy woman laid out my tarot cards and began to interpret what my life’s destiny was. She told me I was about to move out west and I was going to become famous. I started laughing because I had just gotten out of work, where I made Polish sausage in a butcher shop for eight hours a day. I still had the aroma of pig under my fingernails, and this woman had just said I was going to become famous. She continued to say things like, You will also become a writer and publish some books. I shook my head and told this foolish woman the only book I had ever read was Green Eggs and Ham and that I bought all of my college essays from “smart people” in school. I left feeling duped and ten dollars poorer.

  About six months later, I was driving cross-country to Los Angeles. I was dragging a small U-Haul filled with my college futon and TV. I had completely forgotten what the fortune-teller had said to me until I crossed the California border. “Holy shit, could that crazy bitch be right?” I was moving out west in the hopes of doing anything other than making Polish sausage, but the idea of having any sort of success made me smile. Shit, I would have been happy as a Bob Barker beauty.

  Surprisingly, things seemed to happen exactly as she predicted. The negative part of this is that I became a serious psychic addict. For years I would dig out the best psychics and swerve my car into any spot that had an opening in front of a psychic shop. Then I learned how to read tarot cards and was giving readings to my friends and I even crashed some chat rooms, pretending to be a psychic. If you ever got a reading from someone on the Internet in the years between 1995 and 1998, I can guarantee it was probably me. I would come home from work and be online until dawn reading people. If people had only known it was ME giving them advice they would probably have shit themselves. Eventually all this stuff came crashing down on me and bit me in the ass. I was going through a really bad relationship, and my career was just as lost and confused as I was. I decided to find the best-of-the-best tarot reader, who supposedly did Madonna in her pre-Kabbalah days, and beg her for a glimpse into something brighter along the way. My reading turned out to be awful!! She said my career was going to go into a slump, and the guy I was with was really bad for me and I needed to get out. She went on and on until I made her leave. I kept dismissing her as a bad psychic, but she turned out to be right. I kept doing my own tarot cards and getting the same answer no matter how I altered the question. Finally I told myself to let go of all this shit and figure out my own path. When people put negative things in your head and that’s all you think about, it’s inevitable that you’re probably going to make it happen. I finally took control of my own life and started making things happen on my own. Once in a while I will still read my In Touch horoscope, but that’s about it.

  So if you ever feel like getting a glimpse into your future, think twice. Not only because you might hold on to any negative predictions and make them a reality but also because that fortune-teller could just be me!!!!

  Is That a Lobster in Your Pants or Are You Just Happy to See Me?

  We’ve all seen those commercials where a woman is walking through a grassy field wearing white and the wind is blowing wistfully through her hair. She is talking about not feeling as fresh as she could be. These commercials usually come on at the worst time. For instance, once when my dad came over for a visit we were sitting on the couch watching TV when this horrid commercial came on about douching. I can take any good tampon commercial, but this was just darn right embarrassing.

  I remember when I was going through puberty and I asked my mom what a douche was because I’d heard some girls talking about it at school. She looked at me and replied in a strict Catholic mom tone, “Douches are for sluts.”

  She went on to tell me that women have their own cleansing machinery in the vagina, and that our period cleans things out down there. She said douches were probably invented by some guy who was looking to make money. Personally, I think they were created by some guy who was married to a stinky vagina and was desperate to clean things up, but I still got my mom’s point of view. I guess that message stuck in my head pretty well because to this day I still have never douched.

  That being said, I’ve still had those “not-so-fresh” days. It’s really kind of embarrassing, especially if you have to go buy a cream for it. I usually make someone else go buy it for me because the last thing I want is to be recognized at the market the one day I’m buying medicine for a yeast infection. At least it comes over the counter now. Remember when you had to get a prescription from your doctor?

  I asked my doctor why men don’t get yeast infections. He said they get them in a different way. When a man has a yeast imbalance he gets that toe fungus under the nail. I’ve seen guys with this before, and it totally grosses me out. I’d much rather smell like sushi for a day than have that toe growth that lasts almost a year.

  My worst fear is having a problem down yonder and not knowing it’s even there until my man’s head pops up from below with a look of confusion. Frankly, I think they’re brave for going down there on a good day.

  So if you wake up with that not-so-fresh feeling, throw on a white flowing dress and find the nearest grassy field to run through. It seems to work for those women on TV.

  Stop Checking Out My Man, Bitch!

  Even when I was a little blond bird in eighth grade, my twelve-year-old boyfriend would get jealous if I put on my Maybelline clear lip gloss. It didn’t even have a tint of color in it, yet jealousy poured through his veins and he begged me to take it off. Relationships that followed seemed to repeat this pattern of jealousy. Why do some men get jealous when their own woman looks sexy? I don’t get it. There are some assholes out there who might tell their wife she needs to lose a few extra pounds, and when the wifey does shed the weight and starts wearing flattering clothes, the man then loses his mind, calling her a tease. We can’t win.

  It’s human nature to want to protect the things that are “ours,” but it crosses a line when it comes to getting jealous over a miniskirt. I wish men would start to realize that women don’t dress for other men. When we get dressed up to go out, you can be sure that every woman is ramming through her closet, trying to figure out what the other women are going to be dressed like. Our husbands need to know that we don’t care about turning on Snausages. All we want is to be hip showing off the new blouse we just got at the mall. And hoping no one else has it.

  On the flip side, we women have our own color of jealousy that runs through our veins. The most obvious example is when our man looks at other women when we are with him. I’ve become more amused by it, but when I was pregnant with some pretty low self-esteem,
it would kill me. It would actually drive me to tears. I’ve come to realize that men will ALWAYS look at other women. It’s inevitable. Sometimes they’re not even pretty. It just takes a skirt and a pair of heels. Walking past construction sites is a perfect example—anything with boobs will be gawked and cooed at.

  So mild jealousy happens with most of us. When it gets out of control, I think it’s because there is an underlying lack of trust. Trust is crucial in any solid relationship. If you don’t have it in marriage, I highly suggest reevaluating yours. The hard part about that word is that there is no action that revolves around it. Trust is simply something you have to put in your heart and hope for the best.

  We can trust our husbands all we want, but most women still don’t truly know what the hell goes on at those goddamned bachelor parties in Vegas. Well, guess what, ladies! You will now. I crashed one in Vegas recently, and I can’t wait to tell you everything. It’s pretty shocking, so if you don’t want to read this, move to the next chapter. For those who need to know…here’s what I saw.

  On the hotel floor where I was staying there was a pretty rowdy group of boys having a bachelor party. I’ve always wanted to know what really goes on and decided to invite myself to the party. I figured they wouldn’t mind if “Jenny McCarthy” joined their festivities, and this way I would get to see what I’ve always wanted to know—if boys cheat!! I walked into the room and greeted the boys with a big hello and saw about ten to twelve men on couches with women naked upside down on their heads, working for tips. Okay, that didn’t really surprise me that much. They looked shocked as shit when they saw me standing at the door, and I said, “Oh, please don’t mind me. I love watching.” That led to a load roar, and I knew I was part of the boys’ club. After watching the strippers perform wrestling moves with each other and put vegetables up their butts the party slowly started to move toward the bedrooms. I wasn’t really aware of this because I was talking to my girlfriend, who I dragged along. We soon realized we were the only ones left standing in the room. The party boys were all locked in the bedroom with the two strippers. So I knocked on the door and (surprise, surprise) they didn’t want to let me in. Gee, I wonder why? But I was clever and used some chick magic words and they pulled me and my friend in. What I saw was something I always knew happened—I just didn’t want to believe it would go as far as it did. Half the room was having sex with one girl on a chair and the other half was watching the best man give it to the other girl from behind. Needless to say, my girlfriend and I felt VERY uncomfortable by this point and excused ourselves from the party. I saw exactly what I was hoping I wouldn’t see. Boys cheat. Not all boys. Some were just watching, but I think there are more cheaters out there than not.