Knowledge is power but sometimes it's a burden too big to carry just yet. Life is a very long journey and I don't believe that we should add the weight of "the sex talk" to our children's shoulders before they're strong enough to carry it. In fact, I don't think we should add the weight of a lot of things until they're ready.
When the kids at my daughter's school first started talking about sex she was in 4th grade. The boys were discussing it and she kept her distance because she said they were "gross" and she didn't want to learn anything from them - especially not about sex. Smart girl. It's not always boys who bring the knowledge but I imagine a lot of times it is. I really can't blame them though - half of their brain has been thinking about their penis since they first found it at two months old. I have a son, I remember the first time he was quicker than I was during a diaper change and managed to grab ahold of it. It was like Christmas, his birthday, and Fourth of July all at once - I think fireworks went off. If he could have had a thought bubble floating above his head it would have read something like, "An extra arm! A squishy one! Why didn't you tell me!" And that's it - from that moment on, half their brain is learning while the other half is wondering what their dangly little friend is doing.
You really can't blame them - I mean, honestly ladies, if your boobs were jiggling around all day, brushing against your shirt, bouncing when you ran - you'd be half thinking about them too, right? Yeah, we would. I'm convinced that if women had ruled the world around the time that bras were created there'd be over-the-hip-one-eyed-snake-holders instead of over-the-shoulder-boulder-holders!
Anyway, so most often boys bring the knowledge of sex to school. And girls pretend they don't care but then come home and ask their mothers. That's what mine did. In fourth grade! I nearly had a heart attack. She's smart, she could have handled it but did I really want her to? Did I want to weigh her down with that and all the unanswered questions that came with it? Split second parent decision making time......so I said, "well, sweetie, I will tell you if you really want to know but I think of innocence like a hallway - sex is the last door in that hallway. There are a lot of doors to discover all sorts of things through but sex is a one way door. Once you open the door on that knowledge you can never come back to this hallway and find out what's through the other doors. The entire world is on the other side of that door, but you've got a lot of time left to discover that side still. Think about it and tell me when you're ready. " I got a year and a half of innocent discovery before the video at school confirmed her suspicions and the door was opened. And I'm ok with that - for my tiny person, 9 was just too young to carry that kind of knowledge.
That's not to say that she completely changed in that moment - there wasn't much change at all actually. And she's still innocently discovering all kinds of wonderful things. But her acceptance of people kissing in movies and then the scene going dark was different, she now knew what that darkness was hiding before the next scene appeared. Like I said, once you go through the door - you can never go back. And once they go through that door - WE can never go back. At that moment in time, the axis tilts and your baby is now on the other side of childhood, the side where growing up is the destination, the side where you have to step back and let them make mistakes, let them fall, let them carry their own pack.
I don't like that side. It makes me want to have ten kids so I've always got one that still needs me until it's time to have grand kids. Wait, that's crazy talk - someone slap me!
Back to the subject, just because a child asks doesn't mean we have to tell them yet. My kids have always known how babies are born, they know that in nature it takes a male and female to make a baby, an egg, a new flower, whatever. I never lied to them about any of their questions and I never sidetracked them, I just let them decide if they were ready to carry that yet. Kids are smart, they know that there are things that they don't know yet, and things they aren't ready for yet. Sometimes they ask and they don't even really want to know - they just can't let the question go unasked. Adults are like that too.....except we ask and have already formed an opinion so the answer doesn't really matter!
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