January 2009 Archives

I think the tendency is for parents to stop or slow down talking to their kids about sex as they age. From the experiences of the parents I teach, it sounds like, for most of us, our parents tried out a couple of conversations, told us to ask if we had questions and that was it.

Several women in the last month or so have told me they thought their parents figured they were smart and wouldn't do anything stupid, so the conversation stopped. If it had started at all.

It makes a lot of sense to me that parents stop talking to kids about this once they hit the later teen years, 16 and on. They are clearly able to navigate the world at large, they don't seem interested in talking to us about anything, their friends are full of information, and well, really, who wants to talk about sex anyway - with anyone?

But they do want and need to hear from us. There are so many things that happen in the later teen years with friends and relationships. They need us to help them navigate the crazy world they are entering.

They are still kids, after all. There is new research showing our brains aren't fully developed until 23-25. Fully developed brains need help and that means us.

So, stick to your early habits of talking about everything - your kids will someday thank you for it!

January 22 is the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade decision - confirming the right of American women to terminate their pregnancies.

If you know me at all, you know I am pro-choice.

Regardless of your beliefs about abortion, you need to talk to your children about what it is and your beliefs about abortion. They will come to thier own decisions about abortion, which may differ from yours. How will you manage this?

1 in 4 US women has had an abortion. What are you doing to help these numbers go down?

With our new administration, and new sex ed programs in place, I am hopeful we will see a corresponding drop in the teen and unplanned pregnancy rates and a corresponding drop in the abortion rate in our country.

In the mean time, I'll keep working on you parents out there to make sure your kiddos can make informed decisions about their sexuality. Even if I have to drag you kicking and screaming to the conversations.

Researchers were beginning to see some leveling off of the drop in teen birth rates a couple of years ago and now we have the numbers from the Centers for Disease Control and they aren’t pretty.

Birth rates for teens aged 15 to 19 rose by 3.5 percent in 2006. This is the largest growth in US teen birth rates in almost 20 years.

What happened? Well, it could be that our government spent $176 million dollars on abstinence only programs that have little positive long term impact on teen sexual behavior. Or maybe seeing stars like Brittany Spears and her sister have babies at very young ages makes teens think being pregnant and having a baby is easy and fun.