Raising Children in a World Saturated with Sex. A call for Action

                                                                        

The society is soaked in “sexualization” particularly targeted at the most vulnerable members of the community that is the children and teenagers. Many young children are showing more challenging and complex sexual behaviors than you can ever imagine.

Living in a sexually saturated society then calls for action by parents because, if we don’t tell our children about sex first, they will hear distorted, ungodly versions of it elsewhere, and it will become more difficult for them to hear and believe the truth when you present it.

Talking to our children about sex frightens many of us! But we don’t have much choice because as the most influential person in your child's life, it's your job to lead, guard, and protect them as they navigate this tortuous path of their live.

Furthermore, in this sex-saturated world, it’s more important than ever to instill sexual values and a healthy confidence in our children, particularly our daughters. Parents should therefore not sweep the headline news under the carpet hoping your children haven’t noticed how popular teenage pregnancy and premarital sex have become. The media has made it impossible not to notice. 

Healthy sexuality education should be an ongoing character education. And as parents we are endowed with the responsibility of instilling sexual values in our children at each stage of their developmental years, teaching them that their sexuality isn’t an embarrassing taboo but an enriching treasure that can – and should – be addressed openly. 

By so doing, you are instilling sexual confidence in your child. Perhaps you’re wondering: What would sexual confidence look like in a child? When they’re not yet sexually active! A young child doesn’t have to be sexually active to develop all of the characteristics of a sexually confident man or woman. 

A parent can instill a healthy sexual confidence in the children throughout their developmental years as follows: At ages 2+ you should guide your child to develop confidence in his/her sexual vocabulary. From the earliest stages of development, children need to have words with which they can communicate their sexual questions. Parents often use terms like “wee-wee” etc  this makes children only to have to unlearn those terms and struggling to learn the proper names later on. 

Similarly, the use of baby terms instills a sense that probably there’s something inappropriate in telling the children about their genitals, as if they are dirty or nasty, whereas they’re not. Giving your children the proper sexual vocabulary at this early age will give them the confidence to communicate with you when questions arise.

At age 4+ your child should develop confidence in his/her sexual boundaries. Your child must be aware of his or her right to say ‘no’ to anything another person may try to get him or her to do – not just with strangers, but with any person at all.  

Teach your child  that no one should be allowed to touch him or her anywhere that the clothes would cover, nor should he or she be required to touch anyone, and that if someone suggests anything like this, he or she  must let the parent know so that he/she can be helped to protect him or herself.

In conclusion, parents absolutely cannot afford to bypass talking about these issues. We must train our children to protect themselves from abuse. We must also teach our children what types of behaviors inadvertently make them an abuser. They won’t know it’s wrong unless we teach them it is wrong.