You should never feel uncomfortable about talking to your children about sex and relationships because the more they know the better for their future. In the same vein, there is also nothing comfortable about leaving your children unprepared for the real world.
We often believe that talking to the kids about sex and intimacy is exposing them to immorality rather than letting them know its importance and break the innocence that they are already known via the power of technology. I learned recently a young girl stabbed her older husband to death in the northern part of Nigeria a few months ago.
I believe as parents we can do better in making sure our kids are not left behind, growing up unprepared for what the world is going to throw at them will leave them feeling we never care. Feeding them with enough information will give them the zeal to want to learn from you as a mother for a girl child or as a father for a boy child.
When they are lied to or overprotected they seem to want to know what is behind bringing the panties down. Avoiding sensible information about sex in an open discussion with your child about consent, menstruation, puberty stage, and emotional well-being denies them the skills of making informed decisions or choices.
This I will call a rope to a thread on slippery ground, for they stand greater chances of being taken advantage of by someone intentionally playing on their ignorance. Below is written advice from scholars of teaching your kids about sex published on krisvallotton.com.
Celebrate sexuality.
It’s God’s idea, and He talks about it throughout the Bible. He’s not nervous about sex and He made it to be beautiful and desirable. In Proverbs 5:18-19 it says, “Let your wife be a fountain of blessing for you. Rejoice in the wife of your youth. She is a loving deer, a graceful doe. Let her breasts satisfy you always. May you always be captivated by her love.” That’s in the book of Proverbs—the book of the Bible known for sharing wisdom! Isn’t God’s heart for sex beautiful? Sex is something that should be celebrated, not hidden.
2. Teach them the power of sacrifice.
The goal of a healthy sexual culture is not to get rid of the desire for sex, but rather to manage the appetite for it. We must stop using shame to do this. Teach your kids that saying no to temptation now means saying yes to a better future. The value of their virginity is in the battle it took to keep it. It gives them something valuable, that they’ve had to sacrifice and fight for, to give away to the one they love on their honeymoon night.
3. Teach them to manage their desires from a young age.
This principle begins when they’re young! Think about how your kids cry out for candy bars. We can teach them to manage this desire by telling them they need to wait until after dinner to have candy.
This trains them in gratification delay so that when they’re older they’ve already learned how to wait for good things. We can’t always get what we want when we want it, and every child needs to learn this lesson from a young age. It will only help as they manage their sexual appetite when they’re older.
4. Don’t punish them for purity.
We can’t create a positive by enforcing a bunch of negatives. In other words, we can’t just motivate our kids into purity by saying “Don’t have sex because you could get pregnant!” Rather, release and empower your children into fighting for their purity.
Paint a picture and give them a vision of the importance of waiting so that they’re motivated by a strong “yes” to something beautiful, instead of a weak “no” to the temptation that’s motivated by fear. Instead of motivating by punishment and shame, help them make a battle plan, and always support them in keeping to it. And here’s the kicker—if they fail, God can restore anything, even your child’s sexuality.
5. Create a safe place for them to talk about sex.
Have age-appropriate conversations with your children about sex throughout their lives, so that you don’t just constrict communication to “a talk” but rather a normal part of your family culture.
The principle of the first mention comes in here. It says that when we hear about a subject for the first time, it becomes the foundation by which we determine what we believe about that subject. Everything else we are told about it is then weighed against the foundational core values we learned. In other words, the first time we hear about a subject it creates lenses that we will continue to have any time we look at that subject. Let’s be the kind of parents who create the lenses and perspectives that our kids view sex through.
Let’s instill kingdom virtues in them by talking about God’s value for sex. If it is difficult for you to talk to your kids about sex, practice with your spouse. Get comfortable with it so that you don’t project awkwardness or shame when you begin to have these conversations.
The more we shy away from this vital information from our kids, the more danger we should be looking out for. Having said that it is high time we work on who, where an when we allow our kids to visit families and friends for holiday or passing a night. Though it is popularly known that the girl child is commonly known for been molested, I want to let you know that boy children are also in the same predicament by so-called aunties and friends. We often yell at our kids rather than teaching them.
It is important to discuss sex with them and be very positive about it, letting them know what is good about sex will keep their mind positive and knowing why sex is worth waiting for and guide them about its moral and when it is appropriate to give it a trial. Though this may be challenging for most parents because we probably didn’t grow up in a healthy sexual culture.
Today I want to encourage you to break that pattern and begin a new culture with your family! I pray that you would have supernatural wisdom and be equipped with arrows of purity and morality. I pray that you would know how to bring light where there is darkness, and I break shame off of you and your home in Jesus’ name.
I release a joy over you and a celebration over sexuality, that you would carry God’s heart on this subject. I have learned to engage my son Oluwatobiloba and daughter Adekunmi in a sex discussion in other to better their lives. These two will turn 18 in a couple of days, I wouldn’t want the world to teach them both what I failed to do as a mother. Until next week but please sit your teenagers down this weekend and talk about sex with them without yelling, shouting, or cursing as typical African parents.
