posted May 04, 2012 09:38 PM            

I cannot remember asking her where babies came from or even having the talk about puberty. God, I was lost. Lol. I don't know how I found out about sex, but knew from a very young age that there was something people were excited about. All of my friends from pre-school knew something as well and I'm amazed how at such an age we picked up on it. None of us could say that our parents or older siblings told us, we just knew somehow.

My mother never told me anything about sex unless you count "If you get pregnant, I will kill you" (that's religious Southern mothers in a nutshell for you). What I know, I learned in college classes. I didn't become comfortable with my own sexuality and in my own body until I started bellydancing at 19. I'm not a prude and never was; didn't even buy into the "born again virginity" load of crap a sex ed counselor tried to make me and other girls believe in my Catholic high school.

No matter how far I've come from this mentality and confusion, I cannot fully undo the damage. Should I have a daughter of my own, I would teach her from a young age belly dance as it has helped me to accept myself, sex is not a sin and won't send her soul to hell, and allow her to ask questions without fear. I would encourage her to be herself to the fullest without getting in the way of her confidence.

posted May 04, 2012 10:01 PM            

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Passion, Lust, Desire. Check out my journal

posted May 05, 2012 02:36 AM            

She's also been instructed on various means of self-defense, including krav maga as well as the excellent and easy to understand book The Safe Zone. I've had her practice her voice as well as her moves with me. Of course I make sure she realizes not all males are monsters, and some make very good allies against those who are, but one does have to be prepared for worst case scenarios, dirty tricks, and ready to be assertive against self-serving ploys to pressure her into doing something she doesn't want to. She's mature for her age and very proper (she makes me think of Hermione in Harry Potter) so I'm not too worried about her making really bad decisions since I've made sure she's not naive (I'll never understand how people think ignorance protects kids) and with a good chance of handling herself and even defending herself if she ever has to. She knows she can ask me anything, and she's made me uncomfortable at times with some questions, but I'm always honest with her, and while I tell her of the dangers and advise against many things I also tell her how to minimize the dangers should she choose to engage in any sexual activity (though I can't help but hope she waits until she's older of course). And I've let her know Scarlateen can help answer any question that she's too shy to ask me (and I've taught her how to use the library).

To a much lesser extent I've done the same with the boy who is currently 9, with an emphasis on avoiding or otherwise thwarting molesters. After he saw a movie with sex in it a couple of months ago, however, he asked me many questions that I wasn't ready for, but I was as honest (if sometimes vague) as possible. He gets the same self-defense training as well.

I've done so because of my own upbringing. My family didn't tell me much but then I didn't ask much, either (when I did it was more about social aspects than about the biological issues). Granny gave tips on how to deal with the flow but I think I learned more from other girls. School was pathetic. I think we were 12 when the boys and girls were separated and shown a vid on puberty for our gender and no questions were allowed and even to see the vid we had to get signed permission from a parent. In high school they got ridiculous in trying to scare us out of sex in a variety of ways while doing everything to keep us incredibly ignorant (and our teacher obviously had issues on the subject given her extreme discomfort, though we had a guest speaker as well as a lesson plan she just referred us to), the consequence being we didn't trust them and ignored the real dangers with the false ones (and actually there was some really bad BS taught to us so while it was bad to ignore everything they said, doing everything they said could've been bad and dangerous as well). Ironically, I'd have waited a couple of years before having sex had I had an adult I could've trusted to counsel me against the bad advice of my sexually active best friend but I didn't trust any adults to tell the truth (there was Granny but I wasn't allowed to call her as she was long distance and I didn't want to have to explain to anyone why I wanted to call her). I suffered from naivete in others ways as well, and as a result I won't keep any child I'm responsible for ignorant and naive the way I was, nor will I destroy my credibility with them the way the adults "protecting" me destroyed theirs with me when I was a kid.

Btw, a hilarious film IMO is Mean Girls, just one of the reasons being the scenes about sex ed that made me laugh hard as it reminded me of how full of ignorance (misspells chlamydia, for example) & hysteria ("if you have sex, you will die") my high school sex ed was, among other things. I think it being a hyperbolic (only slightly so, however) imitation of my own experiences with sex ed in high school was what made those scenes so funny to me.

posted May 05, 2012 04:38 PM            

My eldest (then 7) read the first and read it to our youngest (then 4). I let them giggle, ask questions, and discuss as they saw fit.

When they got through that one, I gave the second to her and told her that this one isn't yet for her sister. The same deal followed (giggling, asking questions, discussing).

posted May 05, 2012 10:19 PM            

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Passion, Lust, Desire. Check out my journal

posted May 07, 2012 11:38 PM            

Well, my kids are still young. We have covered everything about strangers and kidnapping.

I'm answering my older kids' questions as sensitively as I can, without shoving them out of their comfort zone.

My mother told me too much, too soon. I wasn't ready for it, I was indignant and resentful. It was weird: she was like half puritanical Catholic and half free-love hippie. I felt like I was damned no matter what I did.

Sorry if I sound bitter...I just had a few serious objections to my mother's style of parenting while it lasted, and this was one of them.

@Pixie Jane, I love your thorough answers.

posted May 09, 2012 09:53 AM            

quote:

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It's also VERY important that teens be told how their decisions about sex will affect other people besides them, and that their actions have consequences not only for themselves, but for others, too, and that they have to take others into consideration.

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That is wisdom.

I knew a guy whose mother used to put out baskets full of condoms for him and his friends to help themselves to.

She didn't realize how her openness and outright encouragement translated to pain and heartbreak for some of the girls who got involved with these boys.

quote:

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That said, I also feel that teens should be taught about the positives of sex, too, such as the possibility for emotional as well as physical intimacy

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Here's where I am conflicted because my own experience was...conflicted. It was a blessing to love and be loved with such intensity, but WHAT a burden to lose that, and not know how to handle the pain.

Every child is different and ideally, parents or loved ones would look at the birth chart to see what special issues might arise for their child in this area. Ideally, someone might have said to me, "Don't have a relationship in your teen years, you will take it WAY too seriously!"

Interestingly, if my mother had been alive, she would have prevented me from having a serious boyfriend.

I don't know whether that is insane, and would have wrecked my relationship with my mother, or the best thing that could have happened to me.

But I am definitely leery of my daughter getting too deeply involved, emotionally and physically, when she is a teenager.

posted May 09, 2012 10:43 PM            

quote:

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Just answer the questions honestly as they come up, no matter the topic, no matter the age. Not make it out to be a big deal, just a natural part of life.

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posted May 09, 2012 10:56 PM            

I don't feel as though I could ever have sex with a person who has negative views regarding sex.
I can be understanding of them and of course I can empathise with their situation growing up - if their parents simply didn't teach them anything positive or they ignored the subject.

But for some reason - I have an instant repulsion reaction.
If a man said to me what Deliah just posted here, I would instantly feel as though - "I will never have sex with this guy".

posted May 10, 2012 07:45 AM            

Everything else I learned from an intensive study at youth church... which was surprisingly open and non judgmental about the issue. Non religious parents were called in, our youth group got split up into sections away from the pastors, and we spent an entire year simply talking about sex. It was amazingly informative and one of the few things that I think my church did right.

The one thing I take away from my youth and would try to remember if I ever had a daughter is, when I was 15/16 I was SO FREAKING HORNY. I was ready to jump any random person off the street and looking for anything to relieve the pressure. Luckily the person I lost my virginity to (at 17) was an incredibly good guy, because frankly at that point I would have done -anything-.

It's one thing to say, "Don't have sex until you're older." But it's quite another being in that situation and having the constant overwhelming desire to just. get. laid.

It may seem silly or awkward but, I wish someone would have been kind enough to slip me a vibrator hidden in my room and instructions on toy care... and then never say anything about it. I was a freaking saint to be able to hold off as long as I did, I'm proud of myself for that, but the sexual frustration is something I will never ever forget.

posted May 10, 2012 08:20 AM            

quote:

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It's one thing to say, "Don't have sex until you're older." But it's quite another being in that situation and having the constant overwhelming desire to just. get. laid.

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posted May 10, 2012 09:29 AM            

quote:

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Originally posted by Sashar:
Honestly, I learned most everything I ever wanted to know about sex from my three years younger sister. I was young and naive, she was pretty worldly. She was about 7 and I was 10 when we first started talking together about sex, stupid silly stuff at first, which as we grew older proceeded into more in a more in depth understanding of what we were discussing.

Everything else I learned from an intensive study at youth church... which was surprisingly open and non judgmental about the issue. Non religious parents were called in, our youth group got split up into sections away from the pastors, and we spent an entire year simply talking about sex. It was amazingly informative and one of the few things that I think my church did right.

The one thing I take away from my youth and would try to remember if I ever had a daughter is, when I was 15/16 I was SO FREAKING HORNY. I was ready to jump any random person off the street and looking for anything to relieve the pressure. Luckily the person I lost my virginity to (at 17) was an incredibly good guy, because frankly at that point I would have done -anything-.

It's one thing to say, "Don't have sex until you're older." But it's quite another being in that situation and having the constant overwhelming desire to just. get. laid.

It may seem silly or awkward but, I wish someone would have been kind enough to slip me a vibrator hidden in my room and instructions on toy care... and then never say anything about it. I was a freaking saint to be able to hold off as long as I did, I'm proud of myself for that, but the sexual frustration is something I will never ever forget.

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posted May 10, 2012 04:30 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by mockingbird:
I'll agree.
Given how I was (started experimenting on my own at about 12), I'd say that it's just prudent to find a way to introduce masturbation to kids once the hormones start flowing.

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My wife took my teenage son's LCD monitor out to the backyard, made him watch as she smashed it with a hammer.

That was my son's lesson in masturbation. The message was well conveyed.

Well, that's still a couple of notches less severe as saying, "son, you're going to hell."

Well, I'm just presenting the conservative viewpoint. Sometimes, the abstinence message does work.

My parents told me nothing, and I was as messed up as can be. My wife's parents told her nothing, and basically told her she should consider herself dead of she ever were caught with sex, and it worked. She abstained completely.

She expects both her sons to conform to that standard.

posted May 10, 2012 07:41 PM            

quote:

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Alfred Kinsey's 1950s studies on US population have shown that 92% of men and 62% of women have masturbated during their lifespan.[19] Similar results have been found in a 2007 British national probability survey. It was found that, between individuals aged 16 to 44, 95% of men and 71% of women masturbated at some point in their lives. 73% of men and 37% of women reported masturbating in the four weeks before their interview, while 53% of men and 18% of women reported masturbating in the previous seven days

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It is not like smashing his LCD screen will prevent him from masturbating. He will just learn to hide it better.
Since basically *nothing* can prevent him from masturbating. It is like trying to stop someone eating. It is a drive and an instinct for a great majority of people.. and there is nothing unhealthy or wrong with this.

posted May 10, 2012 07:46 PM            

quote:

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Sometimes, the abstinence message does work.

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Often it does not.

quote:

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it worked. She abstained completely.

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And just like people who were abused sometimes end up abusing others.. she is now trying to control her sons and make them abstain.
A for Effort.

However, due to gender differences.. she will not be successful.. Maybe if she had girls, the whole LCD screen smash-up would've been more frightening and efficient.

On a separate note... Please get her psychological help if you care about her.

posted May 10, 2012 08:25 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by YoursTrulyAlways:
My wife took my teenage son's LCD monitor out to the backyard, made him watch as she smashed it with a hammer.

That was my son's lesson in masturbation. The message was well conveyed.

Well, that's still a couple of notches less severe as saying, "son, you're going to hell."

Well, I'm just presenting the conservative viewpoint. Sometimes, the abstinence message does work.

My parents told me nothing, and I was as messed up as can be. My wife's parents told her nothing, and basically told her she should consider herself dead of she ever were caught with sex, and it worked. She abstained completely.

She expects both her sons to conform to that standard.

I don't expect the good folks in this forum to relate or understand.

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Not going to lie. I don't relate or understand even a little. Quite the opposite, I have a violent opposed reaction to this. It is surprising and terrifying to me to know that people would pursue this kind of angle when dealing with sex and masturbation.

Can you imagine how screwed up a Venus/Mars/Pluto conjunction in Libra, as a child would react to something like that? It would have seriously had the exact opposite impact on me as the message she was trying to convey. It would be horrible, I would have been a prostitute at 18.

omg, I don't even want to think about it! That freaks me out.

posted May 10, 2012 09:41 PM            

quote:

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I have a violent opposed reaction to this

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You are not alone on that. I didn't want to be as passionate about it, simply because I think YTA is aware that many people would disagree and criticise this behaviour.
And if he has mentioned this to others in the past, I'm sure they also had negative reactions.
So I didn't want to reiterate the obvious.

posted May 10, 2012 09:56 PM            

Oh yeah it works. She gets what she wants. If the penalties are harsh enough, you can enforce anything. Hell, I'll even give up caffeinating myself if it gets me into serious enough trouble. It'll plain not be worth it.

He sure doesn't do it at home. Not in any computer we own. Not on his phone. Not on any electronic device. And he doesn't have enough money for his own secret cell account. Although I joke that she won't be able to stop some girl from sexting him on IM with half naked pics. IMs can be deleted so easily with records.

It's not done in school for sure because his schedule is so incredibly tight. If it's done elsewhere, all power to him, and as long as it's out of sight of his mother, it's out of mind. I was no saint myself.

Yes, it works. You can beat fear into anybody if you want to. I told his mom that he'll be like a tiger let loose at college, and she knows I'm right. Well, that's college and he won't be living under his mom's roof. I reminded him of the consequences should he misplace his you know what. Forget about the cost and responsibility of raising a child. That's the easy part. You'll still have to be answerable to your mom.

For now, he's as clean as a whistle when it comes to girls. Everything is supervised, and he doesn't have time to even socialize in school. His schedule is jsm packed and he has enough AP and music teachers breathing down his neck and watching his butt.