Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Help Teach my Son about Sex

I need help. And this is nothing to do with Business or Finance. I need help to be a better father to my only son. No, it's not that I have been a bad father. Not that there is anything life threatening or emotional about it. It's more serious. I need help to teach my son about sex.

Last year I was driving with my son for company when a bike zipped across with the gal clinging on to the guy. "I hate girls", quipped my 11 year old son. "They do not let the guys drive properly and they end up with accidents", he said to my question Why? Let him learn his own way, I thought priding myself to be on the "papa don't preach" brigade.

I always think that we have to learn it ourselves. The hard way.

Contemplating on my life situation recently, I felt pretty happy about it. I have ongoing battles with things like anger, conceit, etc but I feel that I have taken "pole" position in my race against them.

Smug and happy, I was not ready for a question popped up by my son some days back, "What is sex?"

I squirmed. "Aren't you listening to me?", my son demanded after I refused to react for many moments. My mind was working furiously. I can't tell him that he's too young. He might get worse information from his friends. Can't he ask somebody else. Who?

"Well...., err......, it's something done between a boy and a girl...", I muttered aloud weakly. My son nodded understandingly trying to hide a wicked smile. Thankfully, he did not probe further!!

My son will be a teenager next year. He tells me that I am his friend.

But will he ask and discuss sensitive matters? Could the generation gap between him and me been putting him off? What if I had a daughter? Maybe my wife would have taken care of her. But wouldn't I be more worried in case of a daughter?

What answers do I have? What is the best answer? Am I capable of giving the right answers?

Or am I bothered about something which would solve itself? I should not worry as it is not a big issue?

I looked around on the net. Got some answers here and here. But I guess translating theory into practical advice, as in my case, I have a lot of work to do.

Growing up is a never ending thing, it seems, and the learning process never ends. We jump to conclusions and somewhere conclusions jump on us.

Life rebegins at 39. Or is it that life rebegins every year? Maybe every moment!!

Meanwhile do let me know with ideas on how to go about giving sex education to my son. Thanks.

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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

:D
Tough situation to be in...When he did pop the question, I presume he did have a little info about sex. So, I presume you can ask him something like, 'So,wat do you know about it?', and see how much he knows. If he does say the right stuff, I guess you can simply agree with a few points more..Otherwise, you can prompt to correct his misconceptions...

Unknown said...

Thanks Anand for the perspective.

Anonymous said...

Hey Ranjan, I agree it's bit difficult to hanlde children, but do you think his mother would have been able to answer his question.
Nope... Its not that easy for mothers too. Infact you should feel good that your child still considers you as your friend and has put such a wonderful and sensible question to you.
Now , sit down with him and start a conversation or a chat about what does there friends know about sex and how much does he knows .....try to find out whats goign on in his mind and then give him the true facts about sex and infact safe sex and the responsibilites of a grwon up teenager,Try to answer all his questions very honestly and also ask him to put any questions when evr they cross his brain. That way u can solve his curosity and dont find excuses that a single parent cannot handle a child properly,
Its the way you deal and hanlde the situations and not the other way round.
happy time... Cheers
Bindu

Unknown said...

Thanks Bindu for taking time to write in your thoughts. I really appreciate this.

Thanks to this post, I guess I'm doing a better job