Adolescent Sexuality by Dr. Karen Rayne

This post written by guest blogger Robert.

Dr. Rayne is graciously letting me hijack her blog for the day, for a chance to offer my thoughts and perspective.

As the father of daughters, I sometimes wonder what my role should be in helping them develop strong values and accurate knowledge about their bodies, their health, and their sexuality. Fathers are often shunted to the sidelines when it comes to talking about sex, many quite willingly. My partner and I sometime (half-) joke that the girls can come to me for questions about drugs, and to her about sex. But it’s a serious question. I want to be helpful, but what can I offer? It seems to me that fathers have three main responsibilities:

1) Get your own act together. To be able to be a role model and a resource, you need to have your own values worked out, and be up to speed on health and sexuality information. What do you think about teenagers being sexual? Is it different now then when you were a teenager? If your views and values have changed, why? And if your basic sex information is out of date or rusty, brush up. There are lots of good sites - like this one - that can help.

2) Respect your partner. How you treat their mother will be their first, strongest model about how relationships should be. Your actions will stick with them long after your words have been forgotten. Treat your partner with respect and you are teaching them to demand respect from their future boyfriends and partners. If you are abusive, or even condescending or dismissive to your partner, your daughters will see that as normal behavior, and expect that in the future.

3) Show up. You may not be your daughters’ first choice when it comes to questions about sex. You may end up as their choice of last resort - after their mom, their fiends, their cousin, racy novels and online tabloids. But at least they to should know that you are there. Your willingness and openness are supportive on their own. Be honest and open, even when it would be easier to pass the buck.

As fathers we have a responsibility to our daughters to be present and positive. Your daughters will benefit greatly if you do your part.

I occasionally adjunct for the Universities around town, and there is one particular summer course at the University of Texas that I find much delight in teaching.  It’s short and brutal (sixteen weeks of material squashed into 15 consecutive class days), but the students are highly motivated and focused.  I was so pleased to be asked back this summer to teach it again!

However, I am severely daunted by the idea of trying to keep up my blogging while teaching this class.  So I am looking for one, two three, maybe even four guest bloggers to keep you, my gentle readers, in the red with reading material.  I am even hoping that one or two or more of you, my gentle readers, are interested in trying on the blogging hat over here at Adolescent Sexuality Headquarters!  It’s easy, it’s fun, and it’ll give you something to brag about.

Here are the requirements:

1. You have to be willing to write post(s) which are related, in some way, to teenagers or sexuality or teenage sexuality.

Yep, that’s it.  Write about current political events, yourself as a teenager, yourself as a parent, your parents, your grandparents, your schools - whatever!  I would particularly love to talk with a few teenagers about guest blogging.

So send me an e-mail!   karen.rayne@gmail.com

Or leave a comment!

I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

May blog

This post is written by guest blogger JustAnotherTeen

The transition from high school to college can be a difficult one for both parents and teenagers. Although my transition will not be nearly the same since I have essentially lived in a supervised college setting for the last three years, I can understand the transition and the anxieties it may cause. Moving away from home to college is often the first chance that a teenager gets to live outside of their parents’ house and of course has many more freedoms than life at home. With these freedoms come freedom in sexuality, whether parents are ready for it or not.

Teenagers may suddenly discover that they can bring anyone back to their room, no questions asked. They can sleep with anyone they want whenever they want however they want. Their sexual outlook on life can change dramatically or only slightly, depending on how they were raised. I believe that if they are allowed the freedom to make their own sexual decisions while still in high school, they will be likely to remember to use a condom every time and less likely to make decisions they will regret. If they have not been allowed to make their own decisions when in high school, they will be less knowledgeable about the risks of unsafe sex and will be more likely to try it with the first person possible just because they can. I realize this is a vast over generalization and does not apply to lots of people. But I didn’t say this is how it would be, I just said it is more likely to be this way. And would you prefer that your teenager make mistakes at home or at college several hours away? Would you rather them be able to ask you about sexuality as they are experiencing it or just get their information from their peers in college. Obviously they are not always going to ask you even if you give them freedom in high school, but they are a lot more likely to then than later. That is my take on most people’s sexual transition from high school to college. Now for how mine will likely turn out.

Since I am already in a serious relationship, I doubt I will have the typical college sexual experience (as if there is such a thing). My relationship probably will not change much other than the fact that we will see each other all day long and we will be able to sleep together more often than we have been able to this past year. It will be nice because our relationship can be pretty rocky as a long distance situation. It is hard for us to both talk on the phone around busy schedules and homework, but when we can just be in the same room working together, we have no problems.

As always, feel free to email me at justanotherteen@gmail.com

How do you think relationships and a teens outlook on sex changes between high school and college?

(Written by Guest Blogger JustAnotherTeen.)

Let’s face it, my girlfriend and I are far from the poster children of safer sex practices. Sure, we are not that bad, and try to use two forms of birth control, but no one could argue that they are the safest ways to go. When we first had sex, she had already been on the pill for awhile to regulate her cycle after she lost an ovary. That was at least one line of defense, but I was adamant that we have two. So at first we used condoms. But, unfortunately, no matter how thin the condom, there is still a difference. Sure, not enough that it should have stopped us. So instead we switched to pulling out as the second line of contraception. And yes, I know, horrible is it not? Pre-cum has semen, it is hard to pull out in time, sometimes you lose the will to, etc etc. But it was just the second line of defense so I did not worry about it too much. Fortunately, we got lucky and never even had a scare. Now she is off the pill for a bit and we have started using condoms with spermicide. Not as much protection as I would like, but definitely better than just pulling out! And lets face it, condoms are some of the most accessible and most effective forms of birth control.

That said, I don’t think teens know enough about them. Can they become less effective if kept in your pocket or a warm car? Do the cheap ones in bathrooms work as well as any off the shelf in your local drug store? Honestly I do not know for certain the answers to these two questions (if I had to guess I would be pretty confident saying yes and no, respectively.) But some teenagers know far less than I do about them, and that is just sad. Furthermore, some teens probably don’t have access to condoms, and that is even more sad.

What forms of birth control do you/have you used in the past? Had any failures or scares? Comment back and let me know. Oh yeah, and feel free to berate my bad second line of defense!

(Written by Guest Blogger JustAnotherTeen.)

Let’s face it, my girlfriend and I are far from the poster children of safer sex practices. Sure, we are not that bad, and try to use two forms of birth control, but no one could argue that they are the safest ways to go. When we first had sex, she had already been on the pill for awhile to regulate her cycle after she lost an ovary. That was at least one line of defense, but I was adamant that we have two. So at first we used condoms. But, unfortunately, no matter how thin the condom, there is still a difference. Sure, not enough that it should have stopped us. So instead we switched to pulling out as the second line of contraception. And yes, I know, horrible is it not? Pre-cum has semen, it is hard to pull out in time, sometimes you lose the will to, etc etc. But it was just the second line of defense so I did not worry about it too much. Fortunately, we got lucky and never even had a scare. Now she is off the pill for a bit and we have started using condoms with spermicide. Not as much protection as I would like, but definitely better than just pulling out! And lets face it, condoms are some of the most accessible and most effective forms of birth control.

That said, I don’t think teens know enough about them. Can they become less effective if kept in your pocket or a warm car? Do the cheap ones in bathrooms work as well as any off the shelf in your local drug store? Honestly I do not know for certain the answers to these two questions (if I had to guess I would be pretty confident saying yes and no, respectively.) But some teenagers know far less than I do about them, and that is just sad. Furthermore, some teens probably don’t have access to condoms, and that is even more sad.

What forms of birth control do you/have you used in the past? Had any failures or scares? Comment back and let me know. Oh yeah, and feel free to berate my bad second line of defense!

(Written by Guest Blogger Mrs. Y.)

A commenter on yesterday’s post makes some very good comments about adolescence as a social construct.  I couldn’t agree more that people tend to mature when society prepares them to and that teens can indeed take on adult challenges successfully.  Unfortunately, we live in a society that doesn’t seem to give particular value to maturity.  Every age is built around a lowest common denominator of some kind, and ours gives short shrift to delayed gratification.  Teens who grow up in a society where they are expected to do adult work and take on adult responsibilities before they can enjoy adult perogatives mature faster.

But in the world we inhabit right this second, how should parents help adolescents make the leap into adulthood?

In general, I believe that the more clearly the boundaries are defined between childhood and adulthood, the more incentive a teen has to grow up.  Defining the boundaries includes establishing the distinction between child and adult privileges as well as an understanding of which processes a child must undergo to become an adult.  For example, in my parents’ home, it was made clear to me that within a reasonable period after high school graduation I would be expected to either physically move out or begin contributing financially to the household.  I also knew that none of the privileges of adulthood (such as the ability to have a boyfriend sleep over in my room) would be accessible to me in their home.  While many adult perquisites were available to me as I earned them - I earned the right to curse in front of my parents when I assumed responsibility for operating a lawn mower and then entered the part-time workforce, just as I earned the right to set my own hours for homework and sleep when I consistently earned good grades and got myself ready for school on time - I had a very clear sense of what I would have to do to be considered an adult in my parents’ eyes.  The fact that I was sexually active was not a factor in my parents’ thinking about my adolescent rights in their home.  While my mom made clear that they loved me and would help me if I needed it, she also made it clear that the mere fact of me boinking my boyfriend was not itself grounds for considering me an adult.  Adulthood would come when I assumed personal and financial responsibility for my own food, clothing, shelter, and transportation, and not before.

So what’s a parent do?  Well, you should have already given them the basics about puberty and human reproduction.  If you haven’t, do it or get someone you trust to do it.  Get a book.  Rent videos from your church lending library.  WhatEVER, just do it, no matter how much it makes you feel like a bozo.  And then:

• Articulate the distinctions between adolescence and adulthood to your kids.  Make it clear that responsible adult behavior, not aping adult vices, is the path to greater freedom and respect in your household.
• Recognize and reward adult behavior with adult privileges.  Give a later curfew or more access to the car to a teen who assumes greater responsibility for household duties and child or elder care.  Accept your academically self-motivated teen as the prime mover in decisions about selecting and funding his or her higher education.
• Recognize and teach your teen to respect the legal limits to his or her adult privileges.  Make sure the teen understands his or her responsibilities (and your legal responsibilities as the parent of a minor) as they pertain to driving, sexuality, drinking, smoking, drug use, and lottery tickets.
• Accept the fact that your teen has a life apart from you and that you cannot control his or her behavior 24 X 7.  At regular intervals, at least once a year as your teen ages, decide for yourself what you think is important enough to make an issue of and what you will just let go.
• Don’t be afraid to raise value-based questions about your teen’s sexual and social behavior.  If you have life lessons of your own to share, err on the side of giving too much information.  Even if your teen overtly rejects you, your example and your honesty will stay in his or her mind.
• Do not deny your teen food, shelter, clothing, transport, or expressions of love because of his or her sexual behavior.  Draw a clear distinction between your absolute love for your child and your feelings about his or her sexuality. 

Remember: your goal is to raise an adolescent who will make adult choices in your absence, not one who will be so helpless without (or resentful of) adult intervention that s/he does stupid and dangerous things in the wild.  Your goal is to raise an adult with a backbone who is capable of informed self-preservation.  Now go forth and do good.  And if you want more of this kind of advice - or ideas on how to broach sexuality topics with kids - come see me at Stork! Stork!.  Karen, thanks for letting me play with your blog!

(Written by Guest Blogger Mrs. Y.)

Tomorrow I’ll be talking about how parents can help their adolescent spawn establish themselves as adults, including in matters of the heart and, uh, other parts.  But today I want to talk about why I don’t think teenagers are adults.  Obviously I draw a distinction between teens living under the economic protection and supervision of a competent parent/guardian and, say, a 19-year-old soldier or a 16-year old emancipated minor or a 15-year old being raised by wolves - but that’s more in terms of their rights and needs than in terms of the havoc that nature wreaks upon them.

Psychologists don’t agree on all the factors that define adolescence, but three stand out: the increased significance of the peer group to the adolescent, the search for identity, and the development of advanced capacity for abstract thinking, which is frequently outpaced by rapid social and emotional development.  I posit (based on my medical degree from The Mommy Institute and my reading) that life events during this stage rewire more neural pathways than they do in adulthood because the brain is still developing so wildly in teens.

So no matter what happens to you or what you do when you’re an adolescent, these things don’t make you an adult; they simply shape the man or woman you will ultimately become.  Not all adults are good examples of adulthood by this definition - we all know plenty of 30 and 40-somethings in identity crisis, or people who can’t deal outside their own generational cohort, or people with no abstract thinking skills or social and emotional skills like a third grader.  We also know that those adults are lacking, and who wants their kids to be like those guys?

I could expand upon this topic endlessly, but since Karen’s blog is about adolescent sexuality I will confine myself to sexuality.  Adolescent bodies, social instincts, and emotions develop way faster than their ability to envision realistic consequences or incorporate abstractions (like value systems) into their decision-making processes.  Every physical response we take for granted in our adult selves (I will get an erection if I am in close proximity to someone I find attractive, I will want to reach out and touch the boy who looks at me with adoration and desire in his eyes) is a novel experience in adolescence.  Adults learn and can to some degree forecast the impact of these physical gestures and phenomena, but teens are just learning the power of a caress.

Parents of earth: if you confine sex ed to what the school offers or a quick discussion of adolescent effluvia, personal hygiene, and tab a meets slot b, you are just asking for your kids to develop their ideas of appropriate adult sexuality from porn, literature (heaven forfend!), your life mistakes, their friends, and/or (insert name of scary pop culture figure here).  See you tomorrow!

(Written by Guest Blogger Mrs. Y)
Not so long ago - or so it seems to me - I was an adolescent and chock full of sexuality.  Now I am a suburban mom with a full-time day job, and getting my middle-aged freak on seems a lot less important to me in the cosmic scheme of things than it did.  Oh, and I found Jesus.  So I’m probably not a natural fit to guest host Karen’s blog, except for one thing: my conservative parents did a good job of teaching me about the birds and the bees when I was a kid, so I see it as part of my spiritual calling to help other parents do the same for their kids.  Y’all can duke it out with some other blogger about condoms or abstinence ed in schools - all I want personally is that the schools should accurately teach kids anatomy and reproduction facts about humans the way they do (or would if we were getting adequate time for life sciences in schools, but that’s another story) about frogs and guinea pigs.  My point is that parents are just as responsible for their kids’ sex ed as they are for teaching them to brush their teeth and follow the Golden Rule.  Since many parents don’t have a good model for doing that, my goal is to supply one.  That’s my project over at Stork! Stork!, at least when I remember to update it.

My own offspring are very much still kids (ages 10, 8, and 5), but I remember how it felt to come of age.  I don’t mean adolescence - after all, sexual feelings don’t abruptly kick in at puberty out of nowhere. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I personally don’t remember a time when sexuality wasn’t part of my frame of reference.  I always knew it was out there, and I couldn’t wait to be old enough and try it, like the dregs of my mom’s coffee, or the magazines on my dad’s dresser, or their cigarettes and books.  As soon as I hit escape velocity (physical maturity factored with loosening of parental restrictions on where I went and with whom, about 15) I was raring to go.  But my parents still kept fairly tight tabs on my hours and deportment, and I had a demanding academic schedule.  After a couple of long-term relationships with lots of “everything but,” I lost my virginity at almost seventeen with a guy my age who I met at a summer camp.  We went steady for our whole senior year and agreed to split up when we went out separate ways to college.  I went on to a career of serial monogamy (with sexual adventures on the side as a hobby) until my mid-twenties, when I had some life-changing experiences that dramatically changed my perspective on the place of my sexual self-expression in my overall life.  But that’s another story …
 
(I told my mom I was having sex a couple of months into the relationship when I feared I might be pregnant.  She was understanding.  She took me to the doctor.  She paid for my birth control pills.  But the boy still wasn’t allowed into my room unchaperoned, my curfew didn’t change, and when I complained about our lack of privacy, she was like, “What, you want me to get you a hotel room?  Tough!  Adulthood has its privileges, honey.  You will earn them with age.”  Contrast this with my boyfriend’s parents, who never told him word one about sex except to ask him once if we were having sex and recommend that he use latex condoms instead of ones from sheepskin, or something - and that was it.  I kind of wonder what he’s planning to tell his kids about sex.)
 
Adolescent sexuality is the forging ground for adult sexuality.  In the mainstream, secular context most of us inhabit, this leads us to focus on issues like preventing STDs and unwanted pregnancies that can derail a teen’s future, or prevent the development of hang-ups that can keep adults from taking full pleasure in their sex lives.  But helping teens take the final developmental steps into adulthood is more than a matter of teaching them good hygiene - it’s a matter of modeling the virtues that you want them to carry forward into their lives as adults.  That means talking honestly at home about the impact of sexuality and sexual self-expression on others, even in terms of (gulp!) the parents’ own choices as teens and beyond.
 
Tomorrow: You Are So Totally Not Grown-Up Yet

This is a busy week for me.

Tonight, and then again on Saturday morning, I will be talking with the 2nd grade parents at the Austin Waldorf School (AWS). This group of parents approached me, and asked that I come and lead a discussion about sex education. AWS is a small school, and these parents foresee being together in a class for the next ten years - which will span the most dramatic of the hormonal, physical, and emotional changes that adolescence brings. The parents want to see if they can all get on the same page in terms of sex education, and if not they want to at least have a sense of where they all stand on the issue. I’m very excited to lead these very thoughtful parents onto this path!

On Wednesday afternoon, I will be talking with someone from the up-and-coming organization Don’t Tell My Parents. I don’t know much about this group or their philosophical perspective yet, but I’m looking forward to learning more. If anyone has experience or knowledge of the group, I would love to hear what your impressions are!

On Thursday afternoon, I will be presenting an overview of my parenting class at the Texas Council on Family Relations Annual Conference. Those attending will be primarily academics and parent educators. I’m interested in their feedback on my class, and to learn how they are educating parents and facilitating effective family relations.

It’s a busy week, and I’m enjoying preparing for it!

I am also looking forward to my next guest blogger, Mrs. Y. She will be joining us Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday with a new perspective on adolescent sexuality and sex education. I hope to bring many points of view to the table here on my blog, and I hope Mrs. Y will move that goal forward.

I will, as always, be reading the comments and will also be available by e-mail, so please do not hesitate to contact me while I am away from the front page of the blog.

 (Written by guest blogger Wendy Harlowe.)

I said I would write about substance abuse and adolescent sexuality, but I am amending that. I think there are plenty of people who use alcohol and drugs without abusing them (experimentation lies in this realm), but I think my opinions still stand.

Instances of rape (including date rape) are much, much higher if the girl/woman has had anything to drink, or any kind of recreational drug. And I think this isn’t talked about enough (although I know Dr. Rayne has referred to this correlation in the past). When you’ve had even one drink, your inhibitions lower and your natural caution goes by the wayside.

Please, consider, on a first date or any situation where you are around people you don’t know well, don’t trust well, please just don’t drink or drug! Its a good enough reason not to. The benefits of the recreation just don’t measure up to the serious safety issues.

I remember when I was young, my junior high actually showed “Reefer Madness” as an anti-drug message in our 7th grade science class. It was hilarious! And one of the things that’s important to include when talking to young people about the dangers of drugs and alcohol is that it feels good! That’s why people do it, and that’s why people can get addicted. Same thing with sex. When adults want to create “danger” messages, if they don’t include the fact that it all feels good, if they are only trying to scare youngsters into abstaining, kids can feel lied to. The message rings false. I don’t want to do that.

When experimenting as a child, teen, and/or young adult, just keep these safety factors in mind, and see if you can make the decision to only drink and/or drug if you are in very safe surroundings with very safe people. If you are ever having blackouts (periods of time when you are drinking where you can’t remember what you were doing), then realize that is a prime indicator of potential alcoholism. If you have blackouts, its really best that you not drink at all.

I don’t want to come across as a prohibitionist. Although I don’t drink at all any more, and I don’t take recreational drugs anymore, I have come to realize that some people can do these things in moderation. Even some binge drinking doesn’t mean certain alcoholism. (I’m in somewhat of a minority in the AA crowd these days.)

But I also know the pain of rape, and the pain of guilt. I absolutely don’t mean to blame a victim if she was impaired by alcohol, and was then raped. The rape doesn’t come as a result of the alcohol; the blame belongs with the rapist. But, especially in cases of date rape, the lines get so fuzzy and prosecution is practically impossible. I really want women to take care of themselves, and avoid sexual assault, and refraining from the use of drugs and alcohol is a very good preventative measure.

What do you think?