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I have a daughter who is almost 16 years old. Big surprise, she
has a boyfriend. I also have an ex-wife, mother, stepmother, 5
sisters, grandmothers, aunts, female cousins and all the rest of
the usual cast of family members. I have always been somewhat lenient
and liberal when it comes to raising my daughter. Some would describe
it as 'spoiling' her. I tell them that's my right, and she seems
to be turning out pretty well despite it. I do not let her wander
into dangerous situations without giving her as much as I can in
the way of education, advice and tools or weapons as I can, but
I do allow her to explore her world, learn and make judgement calls
as long as I think she is prepared to do so without serious harm.
These female family members have a very restrictive view of how
I should deal with my daughter on issues of her budding sexuality.
They are appalled that I allow my daughter and her boyfriend to
'lay around necking'. They think that's just terrible. They would
never approve of such a thing, they inform me without hesitation
and with much condescension. Their mothers never allowed it either,
and would have been horrified at the thought.
But let's examine the reality of the situation, shall we? Has
that attitude EVER worked in all of the history of mankind at decreasing
the possibility that our young daughters will not become sexually
active? I think not, and to support this notion, I call to the
witness stand those female members of my own family that were raised
in exactly that way.
I cannot think of a single one that did not start having sex
in their teens, EVEN WITH that restrictive upbringing. All of them,
every single one, was having sex at ages that range from 13 to
17. The evidence of this is clear: Nearly every one of them had
their first babies between the ages of 14 and 18. This includes,
but is not in any way limited to, 3 of my sisters, my mother and
my grandmother. I can only think of 4 females out of all of them
that I can't say for sure were having sex before they got out of
high school. So did it work? Clearly, no it did not. Not even close.
That method is a clear-cut failure.
Let's step outside my own family and examine this phenomenon.
Is there any doubt that most girls are raised with this same puritanical
view that I'm talking about? I've seen it all through my life in
the women I've dated, married, their sisters, mothers, cousins,
aunts, friends and so on. All brought up in very restrictive environments
by parents that would NEVER allow their little girls to 'neck'
with some boy. And MOST of these women all have the same evidence
I described earlier: a first pregnancy between the ages of 14 and
18.
Do we even have to talk about boys and their sexual urges? Good.
I've got enough on this plate already.
Do any of these people remember what it was like to be a teen?
I do. It's an age of discovery, an age of 'necking', an age of
testing limits. It always has been and it always will be. There
is no way to stop it, short of locking the kid up, which is against
the law. What they're doing, what we DID, is completely natural.
It's the way life works. If you try to stop it, they just find
more secluded places to do it. That's it and that's all. That's
no solution.
What is there left to do then? Education is the only answer I
can come up with. We, as parents, must confront the problems we
know to be real in real ways. We cannot expect that our children
will simply 'say no' any more than we did. If our worry is pregnancy,
then it is our job as parents to educate the child on that as much
as possible. If it is disease, we must educate on that topic. We
cannot simply tell the child "no".
"Just say no" never worked for anything. Not for drugs, not for
booze, not for sex. "Just say no" is a failure every time it's
tried. It is our duty and our job as parents to prepare our children
fully for the circumstances we KNOW they will encounter during
this period of their young lives.
There is also the issue of trust. It's easy to say you trust your
child. It is another thing to really do it. If you have given your
child the educational tools to deal with these types of situations
in real-world ways, then you have a better chance being able to
trust that child to make the 'right' choices as they are presented
with situations that will tax their young, raging hormones.
As previously stated, we can't just lock them up. Any time your
child is not in your direct line of sight there is the possibility
that they are necking or having sex. That's just the way it is.
They WILL be out of your sight from time to time. Get used to it
and plan for it. If you feel you've given them the education and
emotional tools to deal with situations in responsible ways and
that you can trust them to make the right decisions, then show
it by actually trusting them to do the right thing. This doesn't
mean stop talking or questioning them or urging them to consider
all the scenarios and consequences of their actions. It simply
means that trust means GIVING trust.
Every minute that my kid is necking with her boyfriend in the
same room where I'm watching TV is a minute they are definitely
not having sex in some secluded and hidden spot where I don't know
what's going on. There's an added benefit. She and I have a mutual
trust and respect for each other. We can talk about sex, disease
and pregnancy without losing our minds. We have that kind of relationship.
I treat her as the adult she is becoming.
If, on the other hand you are too uptight to talk with your child
and give them the emotional tools necessary to deal with these
types of situations; if you are unable to do more than say "I don't
allow that, and you're not allowed to do that", then you need a
new plan for your child. You obviously cannot trust that child
and my advice is that you stuff their wallets and purses full of
condoms and get the girls on birth control immediately.
That's it. Those are the choices. Trust or do not trust. Educate
or do not educate. Provide the emotional tools or do not. Those
are the choices that face every parent, but for crying out loud,
let's get off our high horses and face reality on the issues. No
one should ever be surprised that their teens are doing the same
things their parents and grandparents and great-grandparents have
done throughout the ages, no matter what is said, threatened, allowed
or condemned.
You want reality? Listen to the words in the songs your kids listen
to. That's the reality you're faced with. You can turn off the
radio and tell them they're not allowed to listen to that crap,
but the reality is, they're going to hear it somewhere. We cannot
stick our heads in the sand and think it's not happening just because
we're not seeing it.
Now make no mistake. I do not advocate or encourage or even approve
of my daughter having sex at this young age. I discourage it and
she tells me she will wait. I hope she does wait. I really do.
However, I'm smart enough to know that EVERY girl has ALWAYS said
the same thing to her parents, right up until she got pregnant.
It's not that most are intentionally lying about it. It's that
in a moment of heated, hormone-induced passion, they cannot always
resist and keep that promise. Even as adults, we have difficulty
with such things. I won't bring up the affairs my wives have had
to support this statement, as I think it is self-evident to most
at face value and needs no further proof.
Forget your gut instincts in dealing with these issues of hormones
and hearts. Use your brains instead, and try to understand that
this is the way of life, of human sexuality, and that these feelings
and desires have always, and will always, start in the teen years.
That's reality. Deal with it. Am I off my rocker?
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2002 5:45 am on The Atheist
Network Bulletin Board.
Reproduced with the permission of the author. Buck
Cash |