My two girls have reached the age where they are soon going to start Sex Education (or whatever its called these days) at school.

I’m happy to be a good modern father and discuss whatever issues arise in an open and honest manner – while silently turning red. But it does make me think of the only sex eduation I got from my parents: the day before I left for university my mum said “be careful where you stick it…..”

In retrospect this was good advice. Or maybe she was talking about fingers and spinning disc rotors. She didn’t elaborate.

What well meaning but possibly misleading advice did you get from your parents when growing up?

Keep it clean boys and girls!

Nothing at all from either of my parents.

The nearest anyone came to giving me advice was when I was leaving a friends house to go to meet some girls one evening and his mum shouted from the kitchen “You boys remember to always box with your gloves on”. We all knew what she was saying.

Keep away from the girls from ……. they’re promiscuous.

Cheers for the tip off Mam.

When my Mum got my dad to confront me over the stash of grot mags she’d found in my wardrobe, all he said was “I’m very disappointed in you. You could have told me where you kept them”

After I’d left home and had had at least one sexual relationship that she knew of, Mum said “Your Dad never had a chat with you about the birds and bees. Maybe he should. He might learn something.”

I’ve tried to be open and honest with my eldest. He’s now 14 and over the last year his large group of musical friends seems to have shrunk to just him and a very nice young lady, so he gets regular reminders about rules and responsibilities.

His 10 year old sister is about to be locked away in a convent for an indeterminate length of time.

Bizarrely, the best piece of advice I was ever given about the opposite sex was from my first boss (female and hot)……”beware of women, they are all out to trap you, be careful!”
I think I may have taken it a little to heart.
Matt (45, single, never married) 😆

^^^ exactly the same advice from my first boss (a female bank manager)

“Do you need some friends?”
“Nah, I’ve got loads of friends at the party, Mum”

Oh to be 15 again.

I got no ‘chat from my parents, it was all from school and mates. My 12year old son came home from school the other week after his first sex education class. He was pi$$ing himself laughing saying ‘I now know how babies are made’.
As the old saying goes, I am glad I have 2 boys so only have to worry about 2 pricks, girls on the other hand, and you have to worry about every prick.

dont get them pregnant
open and frank discussions were held about sex but i dont recall any chat in particular.

All i have done with my kids [ male] is talk about consent but they are still too young to be interested.

I will be open, honest and not at all embarrassed

whilst i dont want to talk about sex with anyone/everyone i do find it strange how we all know we all do it and no one talks about it

I might also say if you dont do things you wont discuss on a public forum then you are probably not imaginative enough 😉

At our school for some reason sex ed gets dumped on the science teachers. Puting the condoms on the tiny polysterene willies was actually quite funny. Even funnier when I later remarked to the female teacher who organised it how small they were and she replied that she had done a lot of research and they were average sized!! Needed an emergency clean shirt that day as coffee went everywhere, to this day she still cant understand why I found it so funny.
Another time I had to talk to a group of boys about masturbation and cleaning their bits. I followed the powerpoint to the letter and at the end it said ask if they have any questions, so I did and then answered them as honestly and yet clealy as possible….complaints were made…I’ve not been asked to do it again!

My parents grew up in the 40s/50s (they were married in 1957), their advice, given sparingly was both incredibly twee and amusingly overdue. I’d been seeing a long term g/f for a year before my mother asked me to “take precautions”.

I’ve twin stepsons, aged nineteen. Their mother and I have been very frank with them, the main worry for me is of consent and respect. I don’t care where they put it, so long as it’s reciprocal and appropriate care is taken. As a teenager, I was the first friend on the scene when female pals plural had been the victim of assaults. I can’t even begin to rationalise it, so I didn’t pull any punches when I sat down with both boys to talk about it.

My daughter found it weird when I did “the talk” after her first experience. Calm and matter of fact, no judgement but I asked that she made good choices rather than poor ones. She wasn’t impressed with the deed itself but it was to be expected given the circumstances.

Mrs is a Nurse so in typical fashion eldest knew a penis was a penis, a vagina was a vagina and about periods and puberty and stuff by the time he was 5-6. My input was roughly 0%.

They started talking about it in school about a year or so ago in year 4 or 5, he was unphased.

My parents never discussed it with me at all, however, working in education we get the safeguarding policy thrown at us in every conversation possible. We’ve just gone through our yearly staff development week and had a ‘safer recruitment’ session. The person leading the session made a good point that really hit home. We expect our children to speak to us when something happens, however, we’re too embarrassed to speak to them. I hope people dont just wait for questions and actually start the conversation first, not to make us cringe and be embarrassed but to protect them.

Most people when caught offending are aged 45 – 49 and by that time they have already committed over 100 sexual assaults. They will target people who they know wont speak out, who are too afraid, they will talk to young people about sex who have perhaps never had anyone speak to them about it.

Although it was slightly weird finishing it, trying to peer around corners trying to catch people in compromising situations!

P-Jay – Member
Mrs is a Nurse so in typical fashion eldest knew a penis was a penis, a vagina was a vagina and about periods and puberty and stuff by the time he was 5-6. My input was roughly 0%.

Same for me. My wife is a urology nurse so she has always been very matter of fact about that kind of thing!

whilst i dont want to talk about sex with anyone/everyone i do find it strange how we all know we all do did it and no one talks about it

😐

That ‘oral sex’ was simply people talking about sex.

I spent my teenage years being looked after by my grandparents- the only advice was “make sure you respect those girls”, which to be honest was good advice.

I think my mum bought me “Where did I come from” when I was younger.

Imaginative baby sitters and friends’s naughty older sisters – what more do you need?

Both our two had sex and relationship education right through primary school and we’ve always been honest when answering questions, so never needed to have The Talk.

I remember pretending that I didn’t know anything when my parents had The Talk with me, despite not learning anything from it.

Father of a 15yr old girl and owner of a shotgun… 😀
In fairness to her she is sensible but all that could change when booze arrives on the scene..
They call it Personal Development nowadays.

I don’t remember my parents ever discussing it with me – well at least not until I was into my 20s and in a relationship which obviously to anybody*, even my mum, involved having sex and she said something about respecting my girlfriend. I went to a Catholic school.

*though I suppose it might be “obvious” that’s what my current “relationship” involves 😐

To avoid The Talk, just buy your kids a subscription to Teen Vogue. They had a section on anal this month.