I’ve needed to document a conversation I had with my girls but due to being sick and busy with end of the school year happenings I’ve had to put it off. I saw an awareness commercial that I wanted to post on my FaceBook about the “R” word. While searching for it online I ran into blog on the same subject that was very well written. One thing led to another and the add for the persons next blog caught my eye. It was called “let’s talk about sex” – http://www.theredneckmommy.com/2010/03/08/lets-talk-about-sex/ – lol. It was a woman’s story about not just when to talk to her kids about sex but other related issues like when was her first time, etc. If you wanna know her response read the blog.
I’ve been thinking about that similar question lately. My girls are teen and preteen and both have had the basic talk about how babies happen both by me and their schools. But what about the surrounding subjects, the ones considered taboo but widely practiced like oral, fetish, dry sex, masturbation and so on. Eventually they will likely learn about these things and who is gonna be tellin them about it, or even showing them? Ak! I’d like to have them prepared and educated, but certainly not to early as well as too late.
It’s nice and ideal to educate them in a slow – it’s no big deal – keep them innocent kind of way. But then there are unforeseen events that happen that step up the education process or at least force us to catch up. Last week was such a week for my girls. Or maybe it was, still not sure of the repercussions.
It started with my mom and step dad visiting me Mother’s Day weekend. The weekend was so hectic and when my folks visit their energy level is very high. WE live in an apartment barely big enough for me and my four kids so having company naturally means we have to adjust something which is intensified cause my folks presences filling every inch of the place, there is just no room for one to find peace. I didn’t mind them visiting as long as it is just over night but it turned into more than that and I got the impression they had no intention of leaving for quite some time. There was a lot more going on and the stress level was too much so I made it clear they needed to go in the nicest way possible. And that they did. Much to my surprise the next week they let me know they were coming again supposedly for my daughter’s birthday.
The week prior I had an appointment or two every day and then my daughter had a slumber party leaving my house a mess, well more of a mess than usual. I told my mom I didn’t mind them coming but they couldn’t stay with me. She assured me that was fine because her husband was taking her camping anyway. They did arrive in the Ukon with the tent and camping supplies but didn’t end up camping the whole time they were here they said because the cabin was too small and expensive. I never brought up the fact that they had brought a tent.
They got a hotel the first night and I figured they would do the same the next. Late that night I got a text saying they couldn’t afford the hotel rates so they were staying with the neighbors who live directly bellow me. I texted back that if they had told me they were stuck I would have let them stay.
Now, let me tell you about this neighbor who lives bellow me. It’s a single mom who has a few grown kids, a high school son who only stays with her once in a while and a very active fun pretty little ten year old home-schooled girl. This lovely very friendly girl spends a week or two weeks visiting the neighbors and playing with the kids. The other week to week and a half she is hardly seen but either home or gone somewhere, it kind of alternates like that. On her, what I will call, social weeks she is often at my house playing with my kids and has spent the night from time to time as well as having my kids over.
I remember the first time I introduced her mom to my boyfriend. My boyfriend and I were walking up stares and she was just ahead of us. She had turned around to see who was behind her and I said hi and introduced them. She was polite and greeted him then gave me a very negative odd look as she went into her home. About a week later she knocked at my door and very politely let me know that my bed bangs against the wall and squeaks terrible often at about five in the morning. She told me how she heard the noise and felt awkward when her daughter asked her what that noise was. I apologized for making bothersome noise and thanked her for coming to me about it. I’m surprised at how people of religious convictions against sex expect others of a different religion or no religion to feel bad or embarrassed as well, but frankly I don’t. However, I don’t care to wake people out of their sleep. Personally I didn’t hear the bed banging and squeaking but it is an apartment so there is a good chance others hear what is going on better than the person making the noise. Gotta love thin walls and apartments! sigh!As much as I don’t want to wake anyone it was disappointing to learn they were such light sleepers cause spending time with my boyfriend while my kids were sleeping was more ideal then when they were awake in the morning, afternoon and evening, that’s for sure.
Back to my folks… Some events took place and my mom and I got into it on the phone. My mom accused me of being a whore and my kids being animals and that having a boyfriend was putting them in mental and possibly physical danger and so much worse. I asked her if she had been talking with my down stairs neighbor about this stuff and she replied, “not just her, there were several people”. Apparently the answer was yes.
I also want to add that she voiced her concern about me dating a man that was married. He is separated but she likes to use words that get reactions. Funny thing about this is that in Michigan I dated a “white” man who was separated. My mom and Fred met him and spent some time with him and really liked him. When I broke up with him t didn’t matter to her why I did, she liked him and was upset with me. So why doesn’t she like my boyfriend now? He’s half Mexican, plane and simple. Like most raciest folks, she says she is not. And there was a time she wasn’t. But ever sense leaving United Fellowship House Of Praise and marrying Fred she has taken on a bitter attitude toward African Americans. I wasn’t sure about other cultures but my boyfriend told me that when I wasn’t around she said really bad things about Mexicans and he had to hold his tongue.
There is a lot more to that story but that would lead away from the subject of this story. After all this happened the downstairs neighbors daughter came to my door to see if my daughter and other neighbors daughter who was over could play. I told her to come on in and she told me she was not allowed to. I had her repeat what she said.
The other day my daughter told me she knew why the little ten year old couldn’t come in. She said the little girl told her that the last time she spent the night she saw my boyfriend and I go into my bedroom at bedtime and lock the door and figured we were having sex and told her mom about it.
Now here’s the part where I get to find out just how innocent my girls still are. They told the little girl that was silly because their mom did not want another baby. I love my girls! I also loved that their thoughts were still young and unencumbered. But… what about now? Now I don’t know how they think. That little girl stole some childhood time from my girls and I’m not happy about it.
The child had played at my house up until my moms visit to the best of my memory. I already knew the girls mom and my mom had “talked” about me but now I was realizing the little girl had been in the conversation as well. Did she really think my boyfriend and I were having sex behind closed doors? Or did that thought get implanted in her mind by my mom and her mom? At first I wondered why a child so young and supposedly protected by her mother would have such a thought. Then I wondered if those two ladies even thought twice about talking about such a subject in front of her. So it is possible it was actually not just the child, not just her mom but my mom, the one who said she was concerned my kids would be mentally hurt, that may have put the idea of sex in their heads.
Later my daughter went to play with the child and another neighbor’s daughter. The subject of my mom and how she hurt the other neighbor’s daughters feeling came up as well as some other things. When the subject of my boyfriend came up the downstairs neighbor’s daughter said, “doesn’t he have a wife?” My daughter said something about him being separated that the other girl assured her he was divorced.
The truth is he is separated. He has his reasons why he is not in a hurry to divorce and I am well aware of them. I had told my mom several weeks ago that if we ever married it wouldn’t be for a long time if ever. We both have been through enough and when the time is right we plan to live together but weren’t in a hurry for that either. In the mean time he has his place and I have mine and we spend what time we can together which isn’t much due to our schedules. As far as that little girl’s comment about him being married, where did she get that info? Humm, now that’s not hard to guess.
So my kids and I did have another “talk”. This time the subject was more about how sex isn’t bad or a sin but should be respected and the dangers of disease and how age is an issue and the heart attachments as well. That’s about it for now.
You just never know by what avenue big subjects like this will come at your kids. We can do our best to be prepared but we can’t catch everything coming at them. I believe the best thing we can do is to provide an atmosphere that allows out kids to feel free to tell us anything and everything and know we will take them seriously but not get angry or judgmental and be able to talk openly about it.
Both pics found on google search.
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