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Ask yourself “What are the most important and valuable messages about sexuality that you want your youth to receive?” Then ask your youth “What are the most important and valuable messages you think youth should hear from adults?” These questions are at the root of sex positive families; they help us to remain aware of everyone’s values, beliefs, and needs and practice empathy.
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Remind your adult self and your youth that sexuality (however that spectrum is personally defined) has the potential to be an affirming and empowering experience throughout a person’s life when boundaries, respect, and expectations are clear. This reminder helps to frame all conversations in a positive light, prevent our conversations from becoming a fear factor list, and be open about our personal values and rules as a family.
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Affirm consent as a non-negotiable basis of all healthy, positive relationships. Help your youth talk openly and comfortably about how they feel and how to ask for what they want and need in all life situations. Strategize ways to accept situations when we don’t receive what we want, need or ask for. Being aware of what a person wants is as important as knowing what they don’t want in a sexual situation. We must be prepared to support our youth around shared responsibility in knowing how to say and hear yes or no from a partner, current or future.
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Include pleasure, physical and emotional, in your conversations at every opportunity. Youth often ask me why adults are so negative about sex and embarrassed about the fact that sex can feel good? I remember one youth saying to me “If sex is really as scary as adults make it out to be, why do many people want to do it?” Great question! Talk about how pleasure is more than the physical side of sex; connect pleasure to feeling confident in decisions, valued in relationships and knowing what feels pleasurable for their own bodies with and/or without a partner. Also let youth know that if they don’t feel like sex could be emotionally and physically pleasurable, that’s cool too.
Nanaimo’s JrK-Grade 12 IB World School 12
Island Parent Teens 2017