did anyones parents *actually* talk to them about sex?
its been a plot point in like every TV show and movie about raising kids for like centuries at this point but does it actually happen?
i think "the birds and the bees" speech is entirely a ficticious construct
its been a plot point in like every TV show and movie about raising kids for like centuries at this point but does it actually happen?
i think "the birds and the bees" speech is entirely a ficticious construct
Comments
And no, I've never had that conversation specifically with my sons, although I have talked to them about toxic masculinity and how to behave with women.
I'm a firm believer that if you don't talk about these things it contributes to the stigma and discomfort around sex. It makes kids significantly less safe, from abuse and from accidents, to stay silent about sex
It’s starts with where babies come from
I think lying about it (stork) is a mistake. The physical act can be explained appropriately to any age
Does that count?
That was a fun call to take from he priest.
Similar deal with my kid but more focused on online creepers
This is because my parents did NOT have the conversation with me until menses had already started and I was freaking out 😕
My wife passed away so I have done ‘the talk’ with my kids, including my quadriplegic son for whom sex will be different.
It was *really* hard to get support for it, even with funding raised and budgeted
We were trying to start earlier and address consent in general at K-1 and then build on that in 2-3
I have a child just coming up to puberty and I plan to have the Talk.
My parents never had the talk with me, but a book about sexual matters mysteriously appeared in my room when I was 12.
And I got my kids the "it's not the stork" book when they were little and their whole lives (teens now) I've been talking about it in age-appropriate ways. It used to be just "where do babies come from" and morphed into "here's how YOU don't have them before you're ready.'
We've mostly had to talk about gender identity + pregnancy;
(I'm a prof.)
but my brother forbade me from talking to them! and even hid the fact that i was trans from them.
In the UK kids get sex ed at 8, 13 and 15. Our teenage pregnancy rates have collapsed. Was 30.9 conceptions per 1,000 in 2001 then fell to 13.2 conceptions per 1,000 women in 2021.
that was our one and only formal conversation on such topics 💀
I figured she’d forgotten about all that until a week later we were in a park and two dogs were play humping each other and she shouted “Look mom! They’re making babies!!”
I decided right then and there she could learn anything else she need to know on the streets like everyone else.
They already knew about menstruation because they had walked in on me in the bathroom.
All with correct terminology and no euphemisms and age appropriate.
No storks or gooseberry bushes in my house.
If they are old enough to ask they are old enough for an accurate and honest, age appropriate, answer.
(Old French "kids explanation" which I assume no one really believed except maybe in sheltered super upright upbringings: boys born in cabbage, girls in roses 🥬 🌹) (Stupidest thing ever)
At least in my circles. 😉
I'm pretty sure that's not what "The Facts Of Life" was about.
The sci-fi movie Enemy Mine also gave me weird ideas about how childbirth happens.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-sex-change-capital-of-the-us/
(Also, that article is an old one; Telluride hasn’t offered reassignment surgery since Dr. Bowers relocated to California.)
The point of posting it was in response to how Colorado became linked in popular culture.
i'm the kid getting bullied because of course i am
(this is just a clip no way am i sharing all of it lol)
https://youtu.be/8fMJ0bUWj9c?si=rJEH7WrhY6oY641f
(What’s that post about “weird how I need all these doctors for official recognition of stuff that the bullies in grade school sniffed out instantly”?)
https://bsky.app/profile/midnightmasseffect.bsky.social/post/3lpcp3bha522e
"It's a foot-powered transportation device, with two wheels, pedals and a chain."
"Oh. Can I have a bisexual for Christmas?"
With my parents? No. Not until I was pregnant at 16.
-20/10 experiences growing up
So… yes?
When I had my daughter I swore that it would be an ongoing, age appropriate conversation w/out judgement. I hope I succeeded
Judy Blume, Judith Krantz, Jacqueline Susann, Erica Jong, and a few filmstrips got me only so far
Yes
In all the stereotypical warnings about consent and taking care not to throw away the first time, and not get a girl pregnant, etc etc.
I am sad if there was a gap and Gen Z did not hear these things
There was nothing about trans identity in there and very little about queer identity.
Did not do wonders for me.
yeah, my parents were pretty religious and conservative and still had the talk with me and my brothers. as i did with my children.
When I went throught the change at age 12 on a family vacation, she had to explain to my 10-year-old brother why I couldn't go swiming with him
"I'm too young to be a grandmother!"
Those “perfectly normal” books by Robie Harris are great too
I didn’t give my daughter the talk. She would have died. Her stepmom did.
I referred both to Scarleteen.
I never talked to my mom about sex, but we had many good convos about reapect, kindness, and relationships, and her not really wanting to be a grandma yet and why.
I think I learned most of it from friends and their older siblings.
mom might of???? idk cant remember if she did
At the time I was super grossed out
I did not bring in any babies nor a hairy knuckled man & I'm a lesbian. So...mission accomplished?
Was gynophobic for awhile afterwards, but thankfully came out of it as we grew up.
...I did not need them, it turned out.
i was like, 8 or 9, so it wasn't anything overtly explicit or graphic, just facts. She even mentioned that it doesn't need to just be man + woman.
Anyone that we love, and loves us becomes part of the family, no matter what kind of love it is. My parents have taken in kids/young adults whos bio parents kicked them out, or just needed dinner and a place to sleep.
The explanation was an INCREDIBLY unhelpful "it's a sheath that goes over the penis"
Like...tf is a sheath? At least compare it to a balloon!
I was *YOUNG* when they told me and after they did, I immediately told my little sister.
Or maybe it was just puberty, I don't recall. Would they talk about sex to 11-year olds?
The rest was reserved for shaming and disapproval after i moved in with a dude as an adult.
I guess that’s a “no”
It was a very good talk if maybe somewhat late since I had already discovered the Dragon Riders of Pern series at our local library by then.
There were no signs.
sorry, kid, I work in maternal child health and none of this embarrassed me!
we came out fine
I've never had the talk with my kids who are now 22 and 17. Mostly because they're girls. And they seem well adjusted and intelligent... At least about that. Other stuff... Oy. 🙄
I think I did better with my daughter, but left it to my husband to talk to our son.
The birds and bees were not discussed until I was too old, like 17.
When I hit first puberty I got a book (aimed at people of the wrong gender of course) that was supposed to answer the kinds of questions that an early-teen supposedly would have. It answered very few of the questions I actually had.
my spouse and I sent our kids to Unitarian Sex Ed so they got to hear way more than "the basics" lol
I LOVE that you’re explaining things as they arise in conversation.
When I was growing up was when AIDS was first a Big Deal and there was a gay and HIV+ person in our family so that made the conversation more necessary about those issues.
my high school had okay sex ed as well, the rest i learned from porn
a mixed bag overall
my kids are an absolute wellspring of info for their friends, and have had the knowledge and support they need figure themselves out
She also taught us true history from age 5-8, so my teachers struggled against my far left views 😂
i had already learned that p goes in v from the World Book Encyclopedia entry on "Sex."
(and the horror is not in re: cassettes)
Ironically it was all wasted on me, because there was never a chance I was ever going to have any heterosexual sex. But I knew more about it than most of my straight peers did.
My mom did an unnecessarily thorough job (she had taught sex ed to middle schoolers.)
feels really weird reading these stories that apparently happened in our universe
Yeah. So. That
happened.
We never talked about it.
My parents were weirdly repressed as hell yet not entirely anti-sex? Like I avoided purity culture but remember slut-shaming.
It was probably a bit too young
I hate them for that, but that was then.
If I were to have children, I would definitely tell them.
Trauma.
Yes, we had many conversations about sex.
I took a lot of kids books about bodies and sex and read them aloud to my kid last year. And he will have OWL.
We did have the 1960s videos at school in 5th grade (in the 1970s) so that is something.
"Most bird boys don't have a pee-pee, they just kind of shit their sperm onto their girlfriend's backside. But they're better off than bee boys, because ...
/1
"... when a bee boy finally gets together with his lady love HE EJACULATES SO HARD HIS BALLS LITERALLY EXPLODE THEN SHE PULLS HIS PEE-PEE OFF and all his intestines fall out and he dies."
I mean, if we told kids about the birds and the bees we'd traumatize them for life, right?
(end)
I mean, in the US, Republicans want to teach sex education as abstinence-only.
That oughto to do it.
https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/bizarre-love-life-of-the-anglerfish.html
But my mother is in no way normal