SA Mom Bloggers Share Their Questions About Sex Education: Tell Us Yours And Win a Birds and the Bees Toolkit Worth R1000!

Generations of parents before us have had to deal with the inevitable question: “Where do babies come from?” but perhaps they did not have to deal with the same influx of media and blatant sexual innuendos from all directions as we do today.

I’d like to know what are your challenges in facing this topic? You can win a prize if you comment with your questions below.

But first, some stories from our South African Mom Bloggers, and how they coped with some awkward questions about sex and other related topics.

1. Andiswa: How do I have Sex Ed with an eight year old boy without freaking out or embarrassing myself?

Andiswa found herself in the awkward position of dealing with her son who had typed the “s word” three times into Google Search. She wrote about it in this post: When is the Right Time for Sex Education?

Her approach was to find out where he found out about the word and then answer his questions and she left it there.

While I acknowledge that, the S word thing was the beginning of many to come; I certainly want to be the first go-to-person concerning anything and everything. I want my son to know the value associated with the S word and the responsibility thereof, I want him to know the role sexuality plays within life. I want to teach him the appropriate behaviour, and how to treat the opposite sex.

I know I will not always get it right, but I would rather fail trying than entomb my head in the sand while praying and hoping that he figure everything out by himself.

2. Melanie: What do you do when your child chooses “Where do I come from?” at the library?

Melanie thought she was off for a peaceful jaunt to the library (Let’s Talk About Sex (Wait, what?”) when one of her girls decided to pick up “Waar kom ek vandaan?” They wanted to read it every day after that.

Angie now knows that the piece of Daddy is called sperm, and that Mommy has eggs. We’re sticking with “God puts them together and puts them inside Mommy” for now.

This was more information than we’d intended to give the girls at this age, but we’ve been careful not to give them too much information. We’ve been guided by the questions they ask when they look at the pictures to gauge how much to tell them.

Melanie asks: What do you think? When is a good time to start explaining sex and reproduction to your children?

3. Leigh: What do you do when your five year old daughter finds your menstrual cup?

Leigh is a doula so she explains this advantage in How I explained menstruation to my daughters (age 4 and 6).

the words vagina and placenta and sex and discharge (etc!) are all part of my daily vocabulary, so my girls have always grown up with (mostly) the correct terms for everything.

This is how she explained menstration to her daughter: (I think this is an awesome way of explaining it)

You know when a baby grows inside a mom’s belly, it grows in her womb? Womb sounds like room doesn’t it? Well, the womb is like a room for the baby. (Many giggles trying to say womb and room as she struggles with her R’s.)  

What is in your room? A bed? Well mommies’ bodies are so clever that every month they make a bed in case mommy and daddy make a baby there.  

What carries food and life around our bodies? Yes, blood! (We had this discussion before.) So our clever bodies make a special bed out of special blood to feed a baby just in case. But if we don’t put the baby there, then the bed gets old, and it has to come out, so then the blood comes out by your vagina, but it isn’t bad blood like when you get hurt, it’s very special blood. So we use the cup to catch the blood so it doesn’t make a mess, isn’t that clever? Then next month mommy’s body makes a whole new bed in the womb / room and it starts all over again. Isn’t that amazing? So when you were a baby in my belly, you had your own room, my womb! And you climbed into the bed my womb made and that’s where you grew and grew and grew, getting your food and oxygen from my blood until you were big enough to come out. Aren’t you glad there was a bed ready for you? 

4. Sharna: What to do when your six year old asks: “What’s sex?” in When is the right time for the talk?

I informed my little man, in the most appropriate way that I could, that sex is something very special between people who love each other and are committed to each other. I don’t think he got it, but he was happy with that answer and so we went on with our day as if my heart had not just broken into a million tiny pieces with the realisation that he is growing up.

…There is one thing that I want my son’s to always know and do. I want them to always feel comfortable with speaking to me or their dad about ANYTHING. I want them to know that there are no boundaries as to what they can discuss with us. I want our communication to be as open as possible.

5. Celeste (aka Reluctant Mom): What do you do with multiple awkward questions in the car? in Creating a World where differences are just different.

I did not want him to be embarrassed because he did not know, and would then be made fun of.

With this in mind I set forth on a brutal journey of making sure that Connor could talk about sex in an almost matter of fact fashion.  He was going to know all the “biologically correct” words for parts of the body, and no one was going to embarrass him or make him feel awkward.

All these good intentions backfired on her when her child asked about a short man: “MOM – WHY IS HE SO SHORT??”

Right, back to the drawing board on not creating children who are judgmental.  I thought after the anal and blow jobs conversation I was home free, it would seem not.

6. Celeste: What do you do when your nine year old goes to a party and hears incorrect information about oral sex?

Celeste found herself in this situation. So Have You Had the Talk Yet? The One About the Birds and the Bees?

Since then we have sat with them and helped them understand that it would be so much better for them to come to us with things they had heard at school that they were unsure of or that sounded strange instead of relying on a whole broken telephone system of getting information about something.

Celeste also has a list of useful book resources on her blog post.

-It’s Perfectly Normal (puberty and sexual health)

-It’s Not the Stalk!

-Sex is a Funny Word (comic book)

-The Period Book

 

 

I’ve got some questions for you and you can win a prize for contributing your answer.  You have until 7 September to submit your questions. One lucky winner will receive a “Birds and Bees toolkit” worth R1000.

The questions will be answered by the CONNECT-ED Buddy.

 

The questions are:

I want to know, what worries you the most when it comes to your child’s sexual education? What would your top questions about sex be in regards to:

• Talking to your children about sex;
• Questions you are scared to ask your children when it comes to sex;
• The details of their sexual activities; and
• Communicating your concerns around sex, etc.

So, what are you waiting for? Share your questions in the comments below about your child’s sexual education and win a really cool prize! The prize will include the Connect-Ed book and DVD.

(This competition is open to SA residents only)

(This post was sponsored by Durex.)