How old were you when your learned about sex?

[Deleted]

Who 'taught' you?
Was it accurate information, detailed, bare minimum?
Would/did you do it differently with your own kids? What age did you tell them 'the whole deal'... ?

This is money related... as pregnancy and std(s) have definate financial consequences...

[dianartemis]

8 years old. It was age appropriate. I think my parents managed to go into greater detail than my sex ed class as I got older.

[marjar]

Back in the dark ages, my parents. Schools taught some in high school, but it was more biology than sex. I graduated HS in the early 70's.


The first girl in my class to get pregnant and have a baby was in 8th grade. We had a lot of pregnancies. Small town and not much to doa
and most kids were clueless.

[marjar]

Back in the dark ages, my parents. I was 9. Schools taught some in high school, but it was more biology than sex. I graduated HS in the early 70's.


The first girl in my class to get pregnant and have a baby was in 8th grade. We had a lot of pregnancies. Small town and not much to do
and most kids were clueless.

[Gardening Grandma]

When I was 12, my mother sat me down and talked to me about what she referred to as "The Pitfalls of Life". When she was done I was terrified to ever let a boy kiss me. I was convinced that he or I would not be able to control our behavior and I'd get pregnant.

With my own kids, I tried to simply answer their questions as they asked them and when the opportunity presented itself. When I thought my sons might be sexually active, I sat them down and gave them The Condom Talk.

[ihearyou2]

5 or 6 we talked about it in the playground. One of my friends had the scoop, amazingly accurate other then one funny point that I was told.

[angel007]

I was 10, and my 18 y.o. sister took me for a "drive" and told me. All I remember is getting upset, and trying to get myself out of that car, while it was moving! She was accurate, detailed......and never spoke of it AGAIN...lol~!

I initially told my 2 kids when they were each 10 yrs. old, as well. By the time they were 16, they were sick of having "the talk".....lol...

[Cookies Galore]

I don't remember my mom saying much, aside from "if you have sex I'll kill you." She is going to murder me right now.
In fifth grade we had the "what's the happening to me?" talk, the one where they separate the girls and boys and talk about periods and wet dreams (is that what the boys talked about?). In 7th grade health class we started with sex ed, watching the childbirth video, all that fun stuff.
I had a childhood friend who contracted HIV when I was a sophomore in high school and by my junior year I was a certified peer educator. I went around to area schools talking to kids my age and younger about proper condom usage. My high school was one of the first high schools to show panels from the AIDS quilt, which made me so proud. I had a good base education through my schools, but I had an interest in sexuality and health, so I did a lot of research on my own.

[Tennesseer]

I think I was five. We had a club. To become a member, we had to drop our shorts and show our fannies to Sandra Miller. The birds and the bees were thoroughly discussed.

The club was active until Sandra Miller's mother caught us in the woods during one new member's initiation.

After that we knew everything.

[Deleted]

I honestly can't remember ever having 'the talk'... i did the deed when i was 14 (15?... why is it so hard to remember my childhood/adolescence?), and it wasn't a suprise or anything, so i knew... i'm just not exactly sure now, at where i got my information...

My kids have watched the business of being born... so they know how babies get out... and we're not exactly strict with other things that might reference sex... but i'm sure they don't know all the details... and i'm thinking i best get to the topic with the 12 year old soon... i have a few books in the house i've referred him too before, and offered to discuss... but so far he hasn't come to me with any thoughts on the subject...

[MN-Investor]

I don't remember how old I was when i asked Mom about it, probably about 3rd grade, and she gave me an age appropriate but totally misleading answer. "Well, a mommy and daddy pray to God, and God causes a baby to grow inside the mommy." Of course I didn't question it.

So I was quite surprised when my 7th grade confirmation class (maybe about 1965?) had essentially a sex-ed class. Actually, they had a recording that they played, then the pastor's wife, a very nice RN, was there to answer questions. I guess I'm glad they did it. My mom was very modest - I can't imagine her ever discussing sex with me.

I graduated from high school in '71. We had one of the smaller classes - we kept losing girls to pregnancies. Back then, if you got pregnant, you dropped out of school. That's just the way it was. Economically - since this is the Money Board - that couldn't have been good for the girls. Or their babies.

Cities have always publicized the first baby born in the new year. Remember when it was a scandal if the first baby was born to an unwed mother? I think there were lawsuits because cities did not want to give those mothers the gifts that had been promised to the parents of the first baby of the new year.

[Deleted]

In 5th grade, public school. I can remember thinking why in the hell would you want to have sex? All it leads to is STD's and pregnancies.

DH went to catholic school. They were very clear that sex felt great - but you'd get hairy palms and burn in hell.

[DVM gone riding]

My mother was a midwife so i was VERY young when I understood that sex=babies (I also have two older brothers). I was a LOT older when I finally figured out that adults "did it" just for fun
I would say four and 9-10 if I remember correctly for the above, 10-11 when I got the whole "this is how your body works lecture"
I think my parents did a good job and it was generally age applicable-they never had to sit me down and explain the birds and the bees

[MN-Investor]

"DH went to catholic school. They were very clear that sex felt great - but you'd get hairy palms and burn in hell."

My DH went to a Catholic grade school and he couldn't understand why the nuns would tell the boys not to spend too much time washing themselves, if you know what I mean. It just puzzled my DH at the time.

[cronewitch]

I was 17 and didn't have a clue what sex was until it was too late. I never was told but figured it out. I didn't know what it was called but figured out that must be how girls got pregnant so I didn't do it again for over a year until I was finished with high school. I didn't know of any forms of birth control. They told us about condoms to protect soldiers from catching something in wars at the very end of Jr year in high school. They explained they prevented the spread of VD but not anything about how to use them or what they looked like.

My parents didn't tell us anything they assumed the schools did that. If girls got pregnant I didn't know about it except I heard a rumor about one girl in senior year and she disappeared.

[haapai]

I attended several different elementary and high schools and kept on missing the formal sex ed class. In retrospect, this didn't hurt me much since I didn't have much interest in sex but I spent a big chunk of my early twenties marveling at the oversight.

In early sixth grade I attended a couple of sex ed classes before it was discovered that I was supposed to be taking home ec. I remember being laughed at as I was told to go join the other half of the class in the lunchroom. I transfered to a different school soon afterward and never got to take the interesting class.

In late seventh grade, somebody let me take the sex and drugs textbook home for a couple of days. I'm not sure whether the class had already been taught to seventh graders and I had missed it or whether it was just being passed around. It was a fairly exhaustive, possibly college-level textbook that was published in the mid-seventies. I think that I paid more attention to the drug section than anything else. The book was definitely not prudish and the pleasurable aspects of each drug were mentioned along with several reasons for not taking them.

I attended eighth grade in a conservative country. My parents sent me back to the US for high school in 1981. That particular school had a pretty good sex ed program in eighth grade but absolutely nothing in the high school.

I graduated from high school in 1986 absolutely furious that AIDS had been mentioned only twice by my high school teachers. There was something new under the sun that we needed to adapt to and they'd all punted.

Luckily, my liberal arts college picked up the slack pretty quick. They inundated us with information that they had every reason to believe had not been covered in high school and included condoms in the information packet. They did this a couple of years before other colleges started doing the same thing and several years before safe sex made into high school and later middle-school classes.

I'm part of the generation that was simultaneously being told that good people didn't need to know anything about AIDS and seeing people dying of it. (Remember AZT pallor? I got pretty good at recognizing it.) I don't think I'll ever forget that hypocrisy and stupidity.

[Small Biz Owner]

Age 15 in a high school education class. Then at 19 in person

[Deleted]

I think the sex ed class was When I was in grade six. Technically they told us everything but there were a few things that I could not picture. I kept asking questions trying to get clarification. The teacher thought I was being a smart ass and wouldn't answer me.

[daennera]

I grew up in a pretty rural area and was involved with horses, horse showing...............and horse breeding. Until the age of about 12, I thought sex was all the affectionate stuff couples did (kissing, hugging) and then there was the breeding to make babies.

At 12 I finally realized that what I was calling breeding, adults were calling sex.

[sheilaincali]

5th grade, they separated the boys and girls and told the girls about their "changing bodies". In Jr. High we had a more in depth sex ed class as part of gym class. My dad taught the sex ed class for the 8th grade ccd class that Catholics have. Fortunately he was wise enough to quit before I was in 8th grade.
Otherwise my parents never said boo about it to us kids. I would leave my mom a post it note when I needed "female supplies" and she would purchase them and put them in my bathroom.

Starting "doing it" at 15 and am to this day amazed I didn't get pregnant in high school.

We make our 12 year old son watch mtv's 16 and pregnant and teen mom with us. Every episode we talk to him about the importance of safe sex. And I remind him that I do not want to be a grandma before I am 40!

[kimber45]

I remember my sister giving me the encyclopedia open to the page on sex. I think I was about 8 she was 15. We did have classes at school in 5th? grade.

Starting "doing it" at 15 and am to this day amazed I didn't get pregnant in high school.


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Same here, I was 20 when I did get pregnant (was already engaged at the time). DS will be 24 soon. I can't remember how old he was when we started the "talks".

He tells me he is careful, he doesn't want to make me a grandma yet either

[thyme4change]

Funny, I was just thinking about this, and how I will handle it differently than my mother did.

My mother took me into a dark room and handed me a book. I never did read the book, nor did she follow up. I learned the nitty gritty on the playground.

We had sex ed classes, which were probably pretty good - but I was in like 7th or 8th grade and all I remember watch a film (yes the projector, feed through type) where they were talking about STDs and they showed how if one person gave it to someone that person could give it to 5 more people and those people could give it to 5 more people each. And one of those people could give it back to the same person that started it. They had a graphic linking all these cartoon people together. Even then I remember thinking "Boy, what a bunch of sluts."

[marjar]

Jan 26, 2011 21:15:56 GMT -5 Cookies Galore said:

I don't remember my mom saying much, aside from "if you have sex I'll kill you." She is going to murder me right now.
In fifth grade we had the "what's the happening to me?" talk, the one where they separate the girls and boys and talk about periods and wet dreams (is that what the boys talked about?). In 7th grade health class we started with sex ed, watching the childbirth video, all that fun stuff.
I had a childhood friend who contracted HIV when I was a sophomore in high school and by my junior year I was a certified peer educator. I went around to area schools talking to kids my age and younger about proper condom usage. My high school was one of the first high schools to show panels from the AIDS quilt, which made me so proud. I had a good base education through my schools, but I had an interest in sexuality and health, so I did a lot of research on my own.

Wow. We had the class when I was in 3rd grade. Either we were more progressive than I realized, or the schools knew we were a town with a sex problem.

[thyme4change]

This thread is causing me anxiety. My daughter is 8. She's never really asked any questions at all. Either she is oblivious, or I am. Both are completely plausible.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

I was six when I learned how babies are made (female egg + male sperm = baby). I don't remember the exact details but my mom was pregnant with my brother and I asked a ton of questions. I do remember her using the opening to Look Who's Talking as a visual.

Age nine when I learned about sex and puberty because I took it upon myself to educate hte girls in the neighborhood about menstration after I found a pamplet of my mom's from the gyno office. So we had the talk because I got in BIG trouble with the other moms.

Had formal sex ed in 5th grade and was bored to tears because I already knew it all. Remember being separated by sex to watch "the video' and wondering what the hell was so secret about the boys' video that we couldn't be in the same room. Remember everyone getting together to compare videos afterwards (so much for trying to keep it a secret).

Had sex education again in 8th grade where they tried to scare the shit out of us by talking about STDs.

Took Microbiology in college and saw actual pictures of people with various STDs, that scares you a lot more than talking about it.

Also have taken Human Phisology, Developmental Biology and Molecular Genetics.

I have found there is such a thing as too much information. I was a paranoid wreck my entire pregnancy because I know about one in a million type things most regular women don't. Drove my DH insane.

[haapai]

Maybe she's figured out that she can learn more by watching, listening, and reading, than by asking questions.

I figured out pretty quickly that asking questions made my parents extremely uncomfortable. Their answers weren't terribly articulate. They also had an annoying tendency to change or remove whatever had prompted my curiosity. Not asking questions was pretty much the key to me learning anything.

[NomoreDramaQ1015]

My mother has always been pretty open and kept it age appropriate. My mom's philosphy was pretty much if it isn't taboo then it isn't going to be all that interesting.

Which was pretty much it for me. When you know all the clinical details it pretty much takes the mystery out of it. No teenage curiousity here, already knew it all thank you.

My dad to this day pretty much plugs his ears and goes "la la la la, can't hear you! . la la la la".

I plan on being as open with my daughter, no question is off the table and I'll try my best to keep it an age approprate answer.

[Kung Fu Panda]

Funny: I just explained it to my DSs at 8 and 9. My 8 year old says the funniest thing..."Dad, how do you do that through your clothes?" Once I interated that you had to be naked...there was a lot of yelling "Gross!! Yuck!!" and that was the end of the conversation..

[Kung Fu Panda]

Oh..and me? My Mother was a nurse..I got a box of condoms for my 14th birthday, however she didn't think to tell me NOT to open that gift with all my buddies and family at the dinner table...THAT was REEEEAL funny mom, Thanks!!

[Deleted]

"girls and their periods and boys and their wet dreams"

Doesn't really seem fair... does it?