(I wrote this post four years ago on my Wordpress Blog, but I stand by every word and the book recommendation.)
My daughter is six, and recently while at the zoo, we had the following interaction.
Zookeeper (indicating a group of adult rhinos and a baby rhino): They are on a Species Survival Plan. The AZA comes to look at our rhinos, evaluates their health and genetic history, and then tells us which two should be mated in order to produce the best outcome. This little guy has been selected to be the next breeding male for our zoo, and he's here getting acquainted with our girl rhinos. When he's older, we'll be told which rhino he'll be paired with to mate.
At this point, the zookeeper helpfully walked off.
Daughter: Mom, what does that mean? 'To mate'? What does that mean?
Me: It means to try to make a baby together.
Daughter: How do rhinos make a baby together?
Me: Well, you put a grown-up girl rhino in the same area with a grown-up boy rhino, and...sometimes they make a baby.
Here I paused and waited for the obviously inevitable question of, yeah, but just how exactly do they make this baby?
Daughter: So...you put a boy rhino and a girl rhino in the same area...and they'll make a baby.
Me: Sometimes they'll make a baby. Not always. Or sometimes they'll try and it won't work. And sometimes they just won't try at all. Oh, and they have to be grown up rhinos who are old enough to make a baby, too.
And I waited again.
Daughter: And the Species Survival people get to choose which rhino has to make a baby with which other rhino?
Me: Yes, in the zoos they do. But in the wild, the rhinos would choose for themselves.
Daughter: Okay, so, you put a girl rhino in with a boy rhino and if they want to and they are old enough then they can make a baby.
Me: Yes.
Oh, my God, I was sweating by now. I just knew the next question would be the big one that would require the full explanation.
Daughter: Okay.
And that was the end of that conversation. But obviously it isn't the last time this will come up, nor should it be. And the last thing I ever wanted to happen is for this to end up being me:
Julia Sweeney talks about sex with her daughter with hilarious and horrifying results. Please watch this. You will cry laughing.
So, in preparation for what is clearly an upcoming conversation (or series of conversations over the course of many years), I started looking for books to help me get age appropriate talking points in order.I very quickly found a rather troubling reality about the sex-ed books out there--most of them were very wrapped up in the cultural presentations of sex as something spiritual in nature, a beautiful life-time event, a gorgeous merging of souls and bodies, that produces almost magically a souled and personified creature within the woman's belly. I mean, don't get me wrong, the books gave the information needed to understand how sex works to make a baby, but the books also placed sex in a framework of a culture that sees sex as something to be dressed up in the window curtains of wonder and magic, in order to cover it with a sense of mystery and secrecy, leaving behind a whiff of sin. Many books placed a large emphasis on chastity and purity while presenting sex as a near soul-twining event that is beautiful, intimate, and elevated above all other forms of interpersonal communion.
I find these messages to be damaging. Sex, quite frankly, takes some getting used to, and it's not always (or even often) a beautiful lifetime event. It can be awkward, and weird, and sometimes a little uncomfortable. If it's not with someone you care about (and even if it is with someone you care about), it is sometimes embarrassing, or strange, or disjointed. Sex can be a lovely soul-twining moment. It can be beautiful, intense, passionate, amazing. But, you know what? A lot of the time, it's just fun, hot, awesome, boring, dull, entertaining, amusing, awkward, weird, satisfying, whatever, and it doesn't do anyone any favors to make sex out to be something it's not.
Also? All of that has nothing to do with how babies are made. Babies are made by a simple biological function, and love and wonder and soul-twining have nothing to do with it. Babies are made in all kinds of situations where this idealized version of sex doesn't come into play at all. (Shocking though that news may be to that asshole, Todd Akin.)
All I wanted was a book that would:
a) give the facts about how babies were made, actually made, without the religious overtones that were implicit even in the 'non-religious' books.
b) embrace my desire for my daughter's future sex life to be safe, consensual, respectful, pleasurable, responsible, and fun, without it having anything to do with the beauty of human intercourse and the gorgeous intertwining of souls to make a baby.
So far this is my favorite.
A father who looked to be about forty-five asked one of us a question, and as he spoke, it seemed as if he was voicing the dilemma of an entire generation. "How can I give my daughter a healthy attitude toward sex," he asked in earnest," but prevent her from having any?" If you know where this guy is coming from, this book is for you.From the product description on Amazon.com:
If you’ve ever tried to tell your six-year-old how babies are made or your fourteen-year-old how condoms work, you know that grappling with telling your kids about sex can be a sweat-drenched exercise. But it doesn’t have to be. Everything You Never Wanted Your Kids to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid They’d Ask) is a one-of-a-kind survival guide that will help you stay sane through every stage of your child’s sexual development. After interviewing scores of parents and analyzing decades of scientific research, two nationally respected, Harvard-trained physicians share their expertise in this brilliantly insightful, practical, and hilarious book that has fast become the leading resource for parents of toddlers to teens. This indispensable guide covers all the bases, including:• What to expect at each stage of your child’s development and how you can influence it from birth onward
• What to tell your kids at every age about sex and how to get the conversation going
• What to do when your five-year-old turns up naked with the girl next door, your toddler is rubbing on her teddy bear, or your six-year-old walks in on you having sex
• How to avoid unnecessary clashes with your middle-schooler while managing privacy, crushes, and what to wear
• How to encourage your teenager to use contraception without encouraging her to have sex, and how to help her choose the method that’s best for her
I absolutely and without reservation recommend this book. Oh, and you can buy it at any age. It's got good information for all stages of a child's development. You can buy it HERE.
(Crossposted from my Wordpress Blog.)
