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LEAVING YOUR CHILDREN SOMETHING TO LOVE BY/SOME ANSWERS TO THESE MISASSUMPTIONS REGARDING SEXUALITY: HOW TO TALK EITH PARENTS ABOU SEX

19/05/09

The couple braced themselves, looking at me with a “what have you done?” stare. Their son looked down, then shyly looked at me instead of his parents. “Okay. Here it is.” He never looked at his parents, but looked at me as if to say “watch them die right here in your office.” “Dear Mother and Father. Do you think a sixteen-year-old boy should have sex?” He looked down as if waiting to hear two thuds of falling parental figures.

“Okay. Here goes,” said his mother. “We’ll see what we have learned from Dr. Pearsall.” She meant she was about to see if what she and her husband had learned about super marital sex really worked at this serious time in their marriage, this very sexual time. “Yes and no.”

Their son did the adolescent flop. This is a rapid motion of slouching down in a chair while murmuring toward the sky some not quite audible profanity of disbelief at the redundant stupidity of the parent species. This is also known as the “I told you so” slide.

“No, wait,” said the father. “I know what she means, I think. Nobody thinks of their own kid of sixteen as much older than eight,’ really. We sure don’t think of you having sex. But we are not as’ dumb as we look to you. We know everyone is sexual. We know every sixteen-year-old is having some type of sex. So no, we wish you didn’t. Yes, we know you do and will. No, we hope it won’t be intercourse. Yes, we hope it’s necking, even masturbation, because it’s just natural. It’s as hard for us to think of you having sex as it is for you to believe that we did at your age and still do. I didn’t have intercourse then, and neither did your mother. But we necked up a storm. I would go home and masturbate and feel guilty as hell. So there, I said it.”

The father did the parental drop. This is a much slower easing into a chair, with lowering of the head as if in prayer for some special parental dispensation, and waiting for the next barrage or challenge. Parents of adolescents can’t slouch down too far because they may be to tired or too weak to unslouch. They do it as an appeal for the slightest form of mercy or empathy from their teenager.

“You did it, Dad?” said the son. “Far out. I mean, far out.” The mother looked at me as if to ask, “He isn’t going to ask me more is he?” The son looked almost startled. He went into the adolescent fidget, cracking his fingers and making noises with his mouth that seemed prerecorded. “Okay,” he said, lingering on the O and the kay. “Let’s eat, I’m starved.”

As all parents of adolescents know, the eating reflex signals a recuperation, a rallying for the next battle. It also means that, for now, their teen will break bread with them. In this case, it means that a more open and direct discussion about sex could take place.

As the family rose to leave, and the son and father shook my hand, the mother gave me a big, long hug. As she left, she looked back and raised her hand high. Her first two fingers were crossed.