Stimulating Conversations

Howdy from Texas, y’all!  Since it was a holiday here in the states yesterday (and I spent that holiday in a car driving from Arkadelphia, Arkansas to Dallas, Texas to Houston, Texas) we’re doing Girly Parts a day late this week.  Also, I can tell you that there is nothing in Arkansas.  I’m totally serious.

This week, we’re going to talk at something a little different than “how do I have orgasms?!” because I had a bit of inspiration the other day.  Y’all know I like to put a little bit of feminist theory in my sex ed as evidenced by my body image post, so this week we’re going to talk about something the mothers I hang out with tend to worry about a lot.  Namely, we’re going to talk about raising your daughters to have a healthy relationship with sex, granted I don’t have children but I do have parents and I have lots of friends who are in the same boat as I am.  As a result, this article will be more about theory than practice.  However, if someone would like to write an article about the practice please use the “contact us” button at the top there and I’ll see if we can work out an interview or something.  This is a lot harder than just raising a feminist daughter, because nobody wants to talk about sex with their children.  Sex is shameful to the vast majority of people, and we transfer this shame onto our  children when we try and talk about it with them.

First, if you’re going to be trying to raise a strong, sex positive daughter, you need to become sex positive yourself.  Your attitudes about this is going to be the biggest help or hinderance in this situation.  You can try and get a better life for your daughter without having to become something you’re not, however.  It’s just harder.

Another extraordinarily important thing is to have a healthy sex life with your partner.  Obviously not in front of your kids, but you do want to be physically affectionate and demonstrative.  Children who perceive their parents as having a healthy sex life are more likely to have a healthy sex life themselves.

So far, this has been pretty general, I know.  But you need to get the foundation and the walls up on a house before you can start painting and decorating.  If you can have a healthy life, the rest is just window dressing.

Now, let’s start getting into “The Talk” and how to talk to your kids about sex.  Imagine this:  You’re sitting in the car and your child says, “Mom, where do babies come from?”  and then what do you do?  If you’re like most people, you get flustered and make some shit up about how “when a mommy and a daddy love each other very much, they have a special hug…”  and your kid internally goes “BULLSHIT!” because I bet they know a kid whose parents aren’t married or they have a relative who got accidently knocked up or have seen a TV show where someone has an “uh-oh” baby.  So here’s my suggestion:  Practice.  What are the big questions you’re anticipating?  “Where do babies come from, why don’t I/you have a penis, what’s a penis/vagina/orgasm?”  figure out answers that will be age appropriate and what you want your children to perceive.

Where do babies come from?  Well, sometimes when two people are grown up, they decide they want to do something called sex.  The man puts his penis in the woman’s vulva and sometimes that makes a woman pregnant which means she’s going to have a baby.

Theoretically, the best method for discussing sex with a child is to use biological rather than moral descriptors if you don’t want your children to have hangups about discussing and having sex.  Morality can come when they’re a little older and you have the “becoming a man/woman” discussion.  Again, stick to descriptors and use the right name for everything.  I think most of us remember our “Talk” as being pretty shitty.  I’ve heard some real doozies, including a book I read where the author’s mother told her sister, “Women have eggs.” and then the phone rang and the mom forgot what was going on.  That is not how to should do it.  Carve out some time when you both have free time but don’t have a lot of people hanging around and won’t have any interruptions.  At the end, you may want to offer a book for further reading.  You can email us for suggestions based on your situation, but rest assured they make books for every occasion of explaining The Birds and The Bees.

Finally, when I say “use the correct terms” that means say “vulva” instead of “vagina” unless you actually mean the tunnel through which babies pass.  You may notice that even in this column, I use the word vulva frequently in situations where most would say vagina.  That is because the two are not interchangeable.  The vulva is actually analogous to the penis.  The equivalent statement to “girls have a vagina” would be “boys have seminal vesicles”.  The the word “vulva” encompasses the entire external female sexual system except for the uterus and ovaries.  If there is any chance of something touching it without some serious prep work, it’s in your vulva.  The reasoning is that using “vagina” equates sex with an act that is soley for reproductive purposes and therefore not pleasurable to women, only to men.  If you want to encourage your children to make female pleasure a priority in their future relationships, vulva is the correct term to use.

And remember, kids!  It’s not swearing to say the name of a God-given body part!  So don’t act like it!