Parenting and Sexuality

“As our children grow, they need information taught by parents more directly and plainly about what is and is not appropriate. Parents need to teach children to avoid any pornographic photographs or stories…talk to them plainly about sex and the teaching of the gospel regarding chastity. Let this information come from parents in the home in an appropriate way.” – Elder M. Russell Ballard

Developmental Issues or Milestones

It is first important to understand what is “healthy sexuality”.

• The concept of healthy sexuality (or sexual wholeness) goes beyond abstinence only (though abstinence is important)
• Individuals who have remained abstinent can still struggle greatly with sexuality during marriage
• LDS doctrine emphasizes that the body and spirit combined represent the soul of a human and that unless the body and spirit together are united and perfected, true joy is not achievable (D&C 93: 33-35).

Young Children

• It is not out of the ordinary for very young children to be interested in their bodies and to touch themselves
• When kids are younger, help them understand their bodies, difference between boys and girls
• This is normal and natural and does not mean they are dirty or will become a pervert
• Parents should not respond in shaming ways and should not over-react
• Parents should use distraction as their primary mode of dealing with these issues in young children
• Explain to children how their wonderful bodies work and celebrate them!
• Refer to body parts with the correct names

Older Children

• May see sexual latency during early childhood
• Puberty may begin as early as 7 or 8 in girls, and 9 or 10 in boys – be aware and start talking about it sooner than you’d planned
• First menarche usually 12, first spermarche 14
• Boys and girls who are prepared for puberty and sexuality report much better experiences than those who are not prepared
• When kids are older – let them teach you what they know through FHE or open conversations/questions.
• Avoid shaming and object lessons that are used to instill fear, sexuality is the metaphor
• Masturbation will likely be a struggle, it’s important to be open and loving and let your child know that it is a struggle for many people and they can work through it too.

Research

• Parents who don’t talk to their children about sex have children who are more likely to conform to peer norms
• Parents with higher scores on support, control, and knowledge relate to a delay of first sexual intercourse, safer sexual practices, and higher sexual competence
• Father-child sexual communication is often infrequent and awkward, but it has a positive impact on children’s sexual beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors
• Parents are reluctant to discuss sexuality because:
  • Limited sexual health knowledge
  • Believing adolescents aren’t ready
  • Discomfort discussing sex
  • Demographic factors

• Research suggests most parents wait until their children are sexually active to start talking with them about sex
• Religious parents are more likely to believe their children are not interested in having sex and that they are not sexually active
• Religious teens are more likely to experience STDs and teen pregnancy because sexual experiences are unplanned and they are less educated

Another note on parenting and sexuality.

Last semester, I took Dean Busby and Tammy Hill’s class, Healthy Sexuality in Marriage. I wrote a paper at the very end about parent-child sexuality communication. I researched it heavily and discovered barriers parents often face, but this communication between parents and their children is crucial in helping children learn important information to help them make healthy sexual choices now and in the future. So I included my paper from that research here so I can read it later: Parent-Child Sexuality Communication

Concerns or Issues with Parenting and Sexuality

1. How do I as a parent combat metaphors and analogies that are often used that are fear or shame based? And what do I talk about?
2. How do I even bring up sexuality with my child or teen? Especially, if they don’t want to talk about sex? My parents never talked with me about sexuality at all. It was almost a bad word our my house.
3. How do I strengthen my relationship with them so they are comfortable talking about sexuality with me and will come to me with questions?

Addressing Concerns or Issues

1. I think when it comes combating metaphors to what to talk about, understanding they why of being sexually pure is important. Teach them the emotional, spiritual, and behavioral consequences of being unchaste before and after marriage. And help them understand they are not alone in any struggle with sexuality. It is especially crucial that they know their worth is never less or lost if they make a mistake. I can also follow up with them when they talk about sexuality and chastity in church or school so I know what they are being taught. This way I can clarify anything that wasn’t taught quite how I think it should be as a parent or answer any unanswered questions. Overall, we should teach them correct principles and then the why behind the principles. Other tips included from lecture:

• Avoid sexual metaphors, just talk with your children openly
• Explain to children why they have these feelings and reassure them they are natural and normal. Then talk with them about how beautiful they can be within the bounds of marriage and why learning to control them is so important
• Share with your child some of the struggles you might have had with controlling your sexual behaviors or emotions as a youth
• As much as possible each interaction with the child should build trust, openness, and connection with the parent as a bridge to the spiritual messages that can only be understood and lived many years later
• Be patient! This is a lifelong journey for most of us, we can not expect our teenagers to have perfected this area of their lives
• We also need to celebrate the gift of sexuality and what it can be in marriage, and then help our children to learn how to keep these amazing powers within appropriate bounds both before and after marriage.

10 tips to help parents avoid teen pregnancy

1.Be clear about your own sexual values and attitudes

2.Talk with your child early and often about sex – be specific

3.Supervise and monitor your children and adolescents

4.Know your child’s friends and families

5.Discourage early, frequent, steady dating

6.Prevent your daughter dating an older boy

7.Help teen have options for the future that are more attractive than early pregnancy

8.Let your kids know you value education

9.Know what your kids are watching, reading, and listening to

10.Have a strong, close relationship that is built from an early age (Walker, lecture 17)

http://www.thenationalcampaign.org/resources/10Tips.aspx

2. I need to remember that I don’t need to be perfectly sexually healthy to raise sexually healthy children. I can educate my children about their sexuality, despite the fact that mine did not. I think I first need to change the conversation and foster a “culture of openness”.

• Change “how”
  • be approachable, open, non-reactive
• Change “when”
  • not a single conversation – many and early
• Focus on “why”
  • emotional, spiritual, healthy sexuality (not just behavioral)

• It is not too early to talk with your children about sexuality
• It is not too late to improve as a parent

If my child doesn’t want to talk about sex, be proactive! This is your chance to prearm them instead of cocoon them. In lecture we discussed:

• Cocooning is linked to earlier sexual debut (Atienzo et al., 2009), more adherence to peer norms about sexuality (Whitaker et al., 2000), and unsafe sexual practices.
• Pre-arming prior to sex is linked to teens reporting that parents are the best source of information about sex (Whitaker et al., 2000), delay of first sexual intercourse, safer sexual practices, and higher levels of healthy sexuality (de Graaf, 2011).
• LDS parents are really the best at pre-arming.
• 

Here are a few things from lecture that we discussed to try:

• Allow your children to put questions about sexuality in a jar and pull one out and address it each week
• Have a family home evening on sexuality and let your children teach
• Find a special time (twice a year?) when you go out with your child and make sexuality part of the conversation
• Talk about sexuality openly from an early age – let children know it is okay to talk about and to ask questions
• Have the parent who has the better relationship with the child talk about sexuality
• Make it a whole family discussion that is open
• Create situations where they don’t have to look you, like participating in an activity together.
• Use media to talk about sexuality if it comes up in a movie. Don’t just ignore a scene. Talk about it openly.
• Examine how I am feeling, what are you comfortable with, what are you not comfortable with? And figure out how to talk about those subjects. It’s ok to say, “Let me and Dad think about that before we respond.”

I think when it comes to what to talk about, understanding they why of being sexually pure is important. Teach them the emotional, spiritual, and behavioral consequences of being unchaste before and after marriage. And help them understand they are not alone in any struggle with sexuality.  So we should teach them correct principles and then the why behind the principles. Other tips included from lecture:

1. Avoid sexual metaphors, just talk with your children openly
2. Explain to children why they have these feelings and reassure them they are natural and normal. Then talk with them about how beautiful they can be within the bounds of marriage and why learning to control them is so important
3. Share with your child some of the struggles you might have had with controlling your sexual behaviors or emotions as a youth
4. As much as possible each interaction with the child should build trust, openness, and connection with the parent as a bridge to the spiritual messages that can only be understood and lived many years later
5. Be patient! This is a lifelong journey for most of us, we can not expect our teenagers to have perfected this area of their lives
6. We also need to celebrate the gift of sexuality and what it can be in marriage, and then help our children to learn how to keep these amazing powers within appropriate bounds both before and after marriage.

3. I think you can’t talk about sex unless you don’t have a good relationship with them. So I can ask them what I can do better. I can improve my relationship by:

• Reasonable demands for maturity
• Set limits and expect obedience
• Listen patiently to your child’s point of view
• Encourage participation in family decision making
• Be involved (but not hovering)
• Find something to praise your child about every day
• Find time to spend together, just you and your child
• Do something that your child wants to do, but you might not normally do (play hide and seek, have a water fight, play a favorite video game)
• Ask you child (or spouse) what you could do to improve your relationship with your child – be open to feedback

Teaching Healthy Sexuality to Our Children

In Dean Busby and Tammy Hill’s (2016) class “Healthy Sexuality in Marriage,” they really stressed, especially when it comes to teaching your kids and within your marriage, to use the personal line of revelation. One child will likely learn differently than another/need to be taught differently. Below are key points from that class that I want to remember as a parent.

The ABCs for Future Generations

• Age appropriate information
  • Talk about things 5 years prior to their first sexual desire (usually occurs at ages 9-12).
• Begin at birth
  • If you can’t say penis, vagina, etc, how can you expect to comfortably talk about it with your kids, teens etc.
  • It may seem weird, but she suggested saying things like “you’re going to have a menstruation etc..” while rocking them as a baby – helps you become more comfortable and they won’t remember what you say – it’s more for you than them.
• Correct terminology
  • They advise against using nicknames like tallywacker etc. when referring to a penis. Use correct terminology to teach them about their body.
• Dialogue!
  • This is not a time for lecture. It’s ok to say, “Can I tell you tomorrow? I need to pray about how to tell/talk with you about it.”
  • Explain in context of marriage
• Express gratitude to them
  • For the body and sexual capacity
  • For if they approach you with questions. Creates a supportive, welcoming environment.
  • She told the story of when she noticed her teenage son looking at the Victoria’s Secret store in the mall. Later, she calmly said she noticed his interest and asked him what he felt. She expressed that she was grateful he was attracted to women and then directed the conversation to why he was feeling those feelings. Helping him understand that attraction is natural and normal. She had to explain that the things that attraction can lead to are beautiful things, just in the right time – marriage. It’s about sexual direction not sexual repression.
• Frequent conversations
  • More than once in a lifetime chat
  • Transitions are a good time – elementary school to middle school etc
  • Some kids are less prone to ask questions so you’ll need to bring it up
  • Be at the crossroads (when they come home from school/outing/play date) so you can talk with them. If they have questions/something happened – you’re the first educator
• Give one on one private time with each child
• Honesty

Other Good Principles

• Parents should help kids learn what they can say/do with sexual feelings
• Give permission for child to talk about how hard it is to control feeling/desire to do something (in class they talked about masturbation or pornography, but can be applied to other topics)
• It’s ok to talk about it, open about struggle
• Accept self as sexual beings, appreciate it
• Sexuality is natural, healthy, beautiful – kids can learn to appreciate/control self with time and effort
• ALWAYS express appreciation and gladness that they were able to talk to you
• Sexual wholeness model – there are spiritual, emotional, and physical dimensions
  • Don’t use fear based/shame based models – many metaphors can be damaging/teach incorrect principles without meaning to. It can be easy in the LDS culture for people to feel they need to use shame based teachings to stop any “mistake” from happening, especially with young women. It can be well intended, but be super harmful
    • Chewing gum analogy
    • China plate being shattered
    • A bunch of others…

• (Busby, D. & Hill, T. Class lecture: The ABCs for Future Generations, School of Family Life 395R: Healthy Sexuality in Marriage, Fall 2016).

Reference unless otherwise sited/linked:

• Walker, L. Class lecture 20: Parenting and Sexuality, School of Family Life 240: Parent Child Guidance, Winter 2017