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Recently, Harris Interactive conducted a Sex Talk Survey on behalf of Seventeen and O (not that O, The Oprah Magazine). This was an online survey and included 1,122 girls ages 15 to 22 and 1,098 mothers who have daughters ages 15-22. Not a large sample group, and not a good sample group for accurate statistical data (i.e. no estimates of theoretical sampling error can be calculated because there was no scientific methodology used) but the results were interesting.
For example ...
Maybe these results don't surprise you - this is an "older" age group. I'm not surprised 22 year olds are having sex, but I am a little disturbed at the extremely high number of girls having unprotected sex. Interestingly enough, do you know which group of people are seeing the greatest increase in the number of AIDS cases? Yes ... heterosexual women.
The other side of this study addressed girls who had "The Talk" with their mothers - three in five of respondents saying it “influenced” their sexual choices positively.
For example, of the teens who had talked to their mothers prior to having sex ...
Are we, as parents, not talking to our girls (and boys) about sex? These results, although not scientific in nature, would indicate that we aren't, but that maybe we should be.
Remember that Birds, Bees and Purity post I did? Cam and I have had several open discussions about sex since then. Not only have we talked about the reasons it is best to wait to have sex, but we've talked about what to do if he doesn't wait. We've talked about masturbation (a topic I think we tend to see as taboo in this society - especially for our girls). We've talked about the importance of condoms - ALWAYS!
Are these difficult discussions to have with our kids? Absolutely, but the days of herpes being our greatest concern are long gone. I believe kids need to have accurate and honest information to make the best decision they are capable of making. No one wants their 15 year old daughter to come home and announce she is pregnant, nor have their 15 year old son come home and announce that he is going to be a father. And those are not, by any means, the most dreadful outcomes.
Talk to your kids about sex - before they make uninformed decisions on their own. Trust me, if you don't talk to them, their peers will, and that, if nothing else, should scare you into action.
For example ...
- Fifty-six percent of the girls who are no longer virgins said they’ve had sex without any form of birth control and two-thirds of them (66 percent) kept it a secret from their mothers.
- Nearly one-third (30 percent) of the 15-18 year olds in the survey said they had oral sex; about double the number mothers of girls in that age group know about—or even suspected (14 percent).
- Three-quarters of teen girls who have lost their virginity say they’ve engaged in sex without a condom.
- One-third of sexually active students reported engaging in vaginal or anal sex without a condom within the past three months, and one-fourth had four or more partners.
Maybe these results don't surprise you - this is an "older" age group. I'm not surprised 22 year olds are having sex, but I am a little disturbed at the extremely high number of girls having unprotected sex. Interestingly enough, do you know which group of people are seeing the greatest increase in the number of AIDS cases? Yes ... heterosexual women.
The other side of this study addressed girls who had "The Talk" with their mothers - three in five of respondents saying it “influenced” their sexual choices positively.
For example, of the teens who had talked to their mothers prior to having sex ...
- Sixty percent said it influenced them.
- About one-quarter (26 percent) of girls said having “The Talk” with their mothers has made them practice (or plan to practice) safe sex. The same number said it made them wait (or plan to wait) longer to have it.
- Eighteen percent of girls said talking to their mothers made them use (or plan to use) hormonal birth control.
Are we, as parents, not talking to our girls (and boys) about sex? These results, although not scientific in nature, would indicate that we aren't, but that maybe we should be.
Remember that Birds, Bees and Purity post I did? Cam and I have had several open discussions about sex since then. Not only have we talked about the reasons it is best to wait to have sex, but we've talked about what to do if he doesn't wait. We've talked about masturbation (a topic I think we tend to see as taboo in this society - especially for our girls). We've talked about the importance of condoms - ALWAYS!
Are these difficult discussions to have with our kids? Absolutely, but the days of herpes being our greatest concern are long gone. I believe kids need to have accurate and honest information to make the best decision they are capable of making. No one wants their 15 year old daughter to come home and announce she is pregnant, nor have their 15 year old son come home and announce that he is going to be a father. And those are not, by any means, the most dreadful outcomes.
Talk to your kids about sex - before they make uninformed decisions on their own. Trust me, if you don't talk to them, their peers will, and that, if nothing else, should scare you into action.
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13 comments:
It's getting to the point where it starts younger and younger. I blame the parents for being too permissive and not being frank with their kids about sex.
Another problem is the sexualization of children in our mass media. Kids are being socialized by the TV set rather than their parents.
Well, once you start, it's pretty hard to quit... Education about this subject is a must!
Well said, Dana!!
"The Talk" needs to be an ongoing discussion starting as early as possible, starting when they're learning proper words for anatomy and comfort with their own bodies. If parents started out this way it'd be easier to ease into the more difficult conversations later because kids learn it's ok to talk about everything.
One of my biggest rants and concerns is that, yes, hormonal birth control is great but I've seen too many mothers take their daughters to get on BC in lieu of having the talk and then the girls think "ok great, I'm on BC so I don't need condoms, right?" Well BC can fail and it doesn't protect against STDs.
Lastly, higher self-esteem and self-respect can contribute to better condom negotiation and use. And teaching your children to respect themselves and others doesn't even require an uncomfortable conversation about sex, it just requires ongoing work and care. I think it's something so many people struggle with, especially girls, when they're getting pressure from a partner to have unprotected sex and they just give in.
(my apologies for the long comment, this is one topic the Divas regularly try to tackle in our conversations hehehe)
This is one of things that drives me crazy. Whenever the subject of sex education in the schools comes up, so many people scream that the gov't shouldn't be teaching kids about sex. That's the parents job.
But, judging from most surveys done, and from teen pregnancy rates, std infection rates, the number of abortions performed each year and so on we find that parents AREN'T doing THEIR job.
And, we could go all day discussing the NO CONDOMS ALLOWED public policy position of most school districts and the Church. Not to mention the abstinence only policies, and the negative affects these policies have actually had on society and how they have put people at risk.
Not to mention the whole "Condoms fail 50% of the time" bullshit meme that conservative groups have pushed for years resulting in fewer people using condoms believing that they wouldn't make a difference anyway.
It's not easy to do, but it really is the parents responsibility to have these talks. Parents are supposed to protect their children and refusing to have this talk with their kids because it's uncomfortable or because of religious beliefs is down right criminal.
Great post Dana, and something all parents neeed to hear until they DO have the talk.
I'm proud to say I'm a parent who has talked openly with my kids about sex and pregnancy ever since they were young.
I caught the Oprah show on Friday and the was a sex expert who said that mothers should teach teen daughters about masturbation and should even buy daughters vibrators because the girls will be in charge of their own sexuality and not rely on a guy to give them sexual gratification. (Damn that is a long sentece.) I am not a prude, but it seemed a bit much to me.
Hammer, I agree with all of what you said and am even more amazed that parents don't see this!
Buff, I find it interesting that parents think the school can touch on anything other than the basic mechanics in their few hours of "sex education"
Doomed, thank you!
Diva, you can stand on your soapbox in my comments any time! I think respect is often left out of "The Talk" Seems many parents want to focus on "traditional" sex and pregnancy prevention, but don't touch on sexuality as a whole.
Jay, as I've said here before, I will encourage Cam down the path of abstinence, however I will also give him accurate and realistic information. I would be doing him a disservice if abstinence was the only option I covered (IMHO)
Bina, good for you!
Karen, I read about that and must admit my first response was ... ummm ... NO! But what she said made logical sense. Fortunately, I have a boy - I can pretend he goes through so much lotion because he has dry skin.
My exhub refused to have any kind of discussion with my older girls who live with him, one is pregnant as I type and has had 3 scares already.
My youngest girl lives with me and she is very aware and very alert. She says that she is too young to think about it (13) but we have talked often and she tries to advise her friends. She says that she doesn't want to mess up her youth and her life plans by doing something irresponsible - she'd rather wait on sex and be uncool than be changing diapers instead of enjoying Spring break :-D
My kiddos are quite a bit younger. But recently I've been feeling as if I'm failing in making my daughter 'more informed'.
*must get on that*
I am although, a HUGE fan of information information INFORMATION.
I think the fact that children from families that have "the talk" show a better awareness of safe sex isn't surprising.
Such children will no doubt come from backgrounds that are more supportive, more wholesome, and, probably, a little wealthier.
The other kids that don't get "the talk", that are perhaps left to their own devices, I would suspect come from different backgrounds.
The nub is: If everyone got "the talk", would safe sex responsibility improve overall? Cynically, I suspect it would be marginal but, yeah, probably it would.
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