Episode 22: How To Not Pass Sexual Shame On To Your Kids

It's shocking how young kids are when they first get exposed to the topic of sex. You know, unless you want to raise your child in a complete protective bubble, like they're going to learn about it, you know, it's important for them to learn about it from you instead of the weird things that they're going to hear from their friends on the playground and stuff like that. Hello, and welcome to the Pillow Talks podcast. We're your hosts, Vanessa and Xander Marin. I'm a sex therapist with 20 years.

Of experience, and I'm just a regular dude. We share the ups and downs in our relationship while giving you step by step techniques for improving yours.

So make sure to subscribe for your weekly double date full of totally doable sex tips, practical relationship advice, hilarious and honest stories of what really goes on behind closed bedroom doors, and so much more. It's the sex education you wish you'd had. What did your parents teach you about sex? If you're like most people, the answer is probably shame. So we asked our Instagram audience, was sex a shameful topic for you growing up? 86% of people said, yes.

That's a lot.

That is a lot. So, you know, the thing about shame is that it's really generational. So I think most of us got shame from our parents. We were taught shame by our parents. They were taught shame by their parents, who were taught shame by their parents. This goes back generations and generations and generations, right?

And you might be thinking, wait, my parents didn't shame me about sex. But the reality is there's two different types of shame. What many of us receive is kind of a covert shame. Our parents don't even acknowledge sex. Like, it's something we just don't talk about. And we get this idea that sex and our sexuality should be a private, maybe even a secretive thing. And when you get that type of message, or like, a lack thereof, we still feel kind of shameful about it. We're doing stuff, we're experimenting with things, we're having thoughts about things. And at the same time, we're like, ooh, something must be wrong with this. It is not okay to talk about it. Then on the flip side, there's also overt shame, which is like, direct shameful messages. You might have grown up in purity culture. You might have grown up with certain religions where there's a premium put on saving yourself for marriage, being pure, being a virgin. Good girls don't do insert the blank here.

So good girls don't insert what?

That may be the message too good Girls don't insert anything.

So the thing about shame is that we carry it with us into our adulthood and then we can pass that shame onto our kids the way that our parents passed their shame onto us. We are just perpetuating that shame cycle. Right. So we asked people on Instagram, you know, are you worried about passing shame onto your kids? And 50% of people said that they were. Then we got a ton of DMs from people saying, I followed your account. And now I'm feeling so much better about this. I feel better prepared to talk about this with my kids. So I think we're having a really positive impact in that sense, which is great, but it's still something that people are really worried about, really afraid of passing all of that shame on.

Yeah. And if this podcast episode is striking a nerve with you, we would highly recommend that you listen to episode eight after this one. Because in that episode we talk about how to move forward if Purity Culture has harmed your sex life. So that can be a great episode to start to work through some of the stuff that you may have from Purity culture.

So in this episode, we're going to be talking about how to cut through the awkwardness, the embarrassment, and the shame that we've been taught to have around sex and end this generational shame cycle. So our hope is that by the end of this episode, you'll feel empowered to help your kids grow up with a healthier and more positive view of sex.

But before we get into all that good stuff, we're going to share the review of the week. Incredible. Two hands clapping. Thank you for those emojis. Absolute best. My husband and I have learned so much and have so many incredible conversations because of you guys. We first started listening on our 10 year anniversary road trip. Great idea.

Sounds fun.

We have learned so much about ourselves and about us as a couple. I look forward to the new episodes every week. Start from the beginning. You will not be disappointed.

Thank you so much for that great review. And just a quick reminder that we are doing a giveaway with our reviews. Reviews are so crucial to helping the podcast survive. We really rely on you guys. And so as our way of thanking you for taking the time to leave a review.

Thank you.

As soon as you leave a review every week going forward, you will be entered into our giveaway to be the review of the week. And if you get featured as the review of the week, you can DM us on Instagram at Vanessa Marin Therapy. Ask us a question, tell us about your situation, and we will give you a free mini coaching session. So this is just our way of saying thank you. The reviews really, truly mean a lot to us. And don't forget to leave your complicated emojis for Xander to figure out. I would have called that hands clapping emoji. Two hands clapping emojis instead of two hands clapping.

Why do you need to say emoji?

It's.

They're, you know, they just want to clap their hands. They can't clap their hands because it's not an audio.

Well, I thought you were saying the emoji is two hands clapping, but it's actually two emojis of the hand clapping.

How can you clap your hands without two hands?

I don't know. That's why I thought it was kind of weird that you were saying it.

Well, no, maybe it should be four hands clapping.

There are some people who can do that, like, one hand clapping thing. Haven't you seen that? They can, like, flap their hand really hard.

I am not that flexible.

Me neither. Anyways, let's get into it. As always, we recommend starting with yourself first.

Sorry, that's probably not what you wanted to hear. It never is. It never is, but it really always is. The first step.

Absolutely. So if you're trying to break this generational shame cycle with your children, the first thing that you need to get clear on is, like, what are the beliefs that you're holding? What are the things that you do and don't want to pass on to your kids? There are some really important questions that you can ask yourself. What are the messages that I received about sex? Directly and indirectly?

Yeah, I think that indirectly is important because a lot of people are like, oh, well, my parents didn't, like, tell me that I couldn't have sex or didn't shame me about it. But it's that covert shame where it's like, think about the conversations that you had, and if you are struggling to think of them, those conversations, it's likely you didn't have any conversations. You didn't feel like your parents were a safe place to talk about sex with. They felt awkward talking to you. And so what you got out of it was just like, oh, this is not okay to talk about. I talk to my friends about it, and then I feel like something is wrong with me, or I'm like, behind the curve. I can't talk to my parents. I guess I just don't talk.

And then I think, you know, asking yourself, like, what are the messages that I do want to pass down to my kids? I think it's important for us to acknowledge. You may have been taught some positive messages about sex, whether directly or indirectly. It's not that we have to take every single thing we've been taught or everything we've been learned and throw it all out. Like, there may be some aspects of your history that were beneficial to you. That's just an opportunity to explore that. Then I would think about, what are the messages that I don't want to pass down? So what are those direct or indirect messages that I learned that I want to make sure, like, that belief stops here. I am not passing this bullshit down more and more and more generations.

And then the most important part is to think about what new beliefs do I want to instill in my kids. So stuff that was not actively passed down to me. And I think a lot of us have these ideas. We've been around, we've been sexually active for a while, and we understand kind of like what the good messages around sex are. But it can be hard to actually deliver those because we haven't had a good example of anyone delivering it to us. So what do we do next?

Yeah, thank you for teeing me up there. So the second step is to actively work on having a healthier relationship with your sexuality. So this is kind of that, you know, like, put the oxygen mask on yourself first before helping others, kind of.

It's always such a cheesy metaphor, but it's so true. That's. That's the reason why we use it. It's like, you can't help anyone if you are dying, if you can't breathe. Sorry.

So you're obviously not going to be dying around your beliefs about sex, but this really is a great opportunity for you to work on your own relationship with your sexuality, dive deeper into that for yourself so that you can pass that healthier relationship onto your kids. You know, it's one thing for us to just have this philosophical view of like, oh, yeah, I want to teach my kids. That is not a shameful thing. But how are you gonna do that if you're still completely mired in your own shame? Like, kids know what's up, right?

Like, yeah, I was just about to say. I was like. I was like, I think it's so easy to be like, oh, well, my kids won't notice. Or, you know, I. I know the right things to say, even though I don't really do those. And, you know, the kids don't see what I'm doing behind closed doors. But kids pick up on your tone, your intonation. Kids basically know if you're kind of bullshitting them.

Absolutely. Yeah. So I think your kid's just gonna see right through you. If you're trying to, like, preach all this stuff at them, but you're not actively living that. You don't believe that, like, kids can tell when you don't actually have that. They're kind of little mind readers.

Oh, yeah. I think kids, especially teens, also love calling out hypocrisy when they see it, because, you know, it's like, you haven't really. You haven't seen a lot of, like, had to make tough, really tough moral decisions or see a lot of gray area. And I feel like I learned about hypocrisy. It was like, that's hypocritical. That's hypocritical. Oh, my God.

Everything's hypocritical.

Everything's hypocritical until you start living life a little longer. And it's kind of like, you know, there's a lot of gray area in the world. Yeah.

So obviously, like, it's not like you're going to put, like, one week of work into your sex life, and all of a sudden you're healed and perfect. Like, that's definitely not what we're saying. But we do want to encourage you to start actively working on your sexuality. So working on your sexuality is like an entire podcast. Multiple podcasts in and of itself. But some quick points that we wanted to mention is, first of all, like, just listening to this podcast is a great step. You're learning more about sex. You are actively thinking about these topics that we're talking about. If you're not following us on Instagram or on our YouTube channel, definitely recommend following us there as well. So you just get even more information, more exposure to these topics.

Could I sidetrack for a quick second? This just made me think about ourselves and kind of like the way that we used to show up on social media. Our own sort of roadblocks that we were hitting with this business.

Oh, you and me.

Yeah, you. You and me. Because about, I don't know, maybe a year and a half, two years ago, we had a small social media account. We had this assumption that people didn't want to follow a sex therapist. People didn't want to talk openly about sex in a public way, despite the fact that, you know, the message that we wanted to send is that it is okay to talk about sex in this open way. In fact, it's really beneficial to you. And so we were kind of trying to like skirt around this idea of, oh, well, no one's going to want to do this. So, like, you know, we won't talk about it totally openly on Instagram or we'll just do a bunch of like text posts or something like that. We won't ask people to leave comments or tell us what they think. And I think that really hamstrung us. Like, oh, yeah, you know, we were kind of stuck in that place for a long time. And then I don't know when it was. I don't know if there was an event where we were just like, screw this, like, we're going for it. But yeah, we just kind of said it and all of a sudden it was like the floodgates were open. It was like then we were practicing what we were preaching. We started really showing up in stories and being honest about what was going on with us and just putting it out there. Yeah, the response was huge. I think people see when your, your words line up with your actions.

Absolutely. Yeah. We were living some hypocrisy at that time too. So I think that's also a good reminder of like, you know, it's never that we're. You're going to get to this place where you have this perfect sexuality. Like, we struggled with it then. We still have different kinds of struggles now. Like, that's okay. Actually hit us up on Instagram. If you are like an og, if you've been following us for a while and you remember.

Yeah. Did you notice the shift?

Do you remember some of our weird posts and stories? Could you tell? We still had some stuff to work out ourselves. Okay, so getting back to it, you know, what are some ways to work on having a healthier relationship with your sexuality? So definitely exposing yourself to more, you know, healthy sexuality content, identifying your hang ups and your goals, and that's kind of your can loop back in with part one too is you're trying to think about what do I want to pass on to my kids that gives you this opportunity to think about. Yeah, what are the things that I struggle with with my sexuality that I don't want my kids to have to struggle with? Or what are the goals that I have for my sex life? How do I define a healthy sex life? And, you know, how do I want my kids to see it? Definitely want to give a little plug for exploring your sexuality. I mean, we're really big believers. You have to explore to discover things. You have to try things out to figure out what you like and what you don't like. And the really cool thing about sex is that there are an endless number of things that you can explore. So there's always something new for you to learn and try out. Another point that we want to make is to invest in your sex life. So we're really big on giving away a lot of free content. It's written into our company values that we give away 95% of our content for free. That being said, I really do think that there's a shift that happens when you actually invest in your sex life. And I'm not saying you have to make like a huge financial investment, but whether it's buying a book, whether it's buying one of our $19 masterclasses or $25 workbook, when you make that investment, you become more invested. The example I always think of is like, how many emails do you have sitting in your inbox of like, free newsletter stuff? Probably a lot of those are our emails that you're like, oh, yeah, yeah, one day I'll open this up and like click through those links and watch that YouTub or whatever. Like, when we get stuff for free, we don't really value it, but when we do actively invest in it, it changes our relationship with it. So whether that's something from us or some, you know, a book or something from somebody else, like, we just recommend that you make some sort of investment in your sex life so that you can become more invested.

Yeah, I mean, the reality these days with the Internet is that, like, you can basically learn anything for free if you put your mind to it. If you are open to the fact that it might take a while, you might have to sift through a lot of different stuff. There might be a lot of competing ideas, conflicting ideas, and you kind of have to synthesize it all. You can learn pretty much anything for free if you want to. Yeah, but do you. Do very many people actually do that? I don't think so. That's why people make online courses, because it's like, we're taking the time to like, put all the right information together in the right order. And when you buy a course, you're saying, like, I'm investing like time and money and making a commitment. And without that financial commitment, it becomes really hard to be motivated.

So the final point that we want to make here is that thinking about this in the context of your children can actually be a really beautiful opportunity for self discovery. If you approach wanting to work on your sex life and improve your relationship with your sexuality in the context of I want better for My kids. I don't want my kids to have to suffer the way that I did. I want my kids to feel happy and healthy and whole. Like, for a lot of people, it feels easier to open the door in that way versus, oh, I just want to have a smoking hot sex life. You know, and not that there's anything wrong with that. Like, I think we should all just have that belief that, like, I deserve to have so much fun and so much pleasure.

Yeah, I think a lot of people really do feel like they. They don't deserve that. But it's so much easier to convince yourself your kids deserve better.

Exactly. And.

But sorry, if you think your kids deserve better, you also need to make things better for you too.

Exactly. I think that this can be a nice way for a lot of people to open a door that they might otherwise have kept shut. Now let's talk about specific steps to take with your kids.

Yeah, you're probably like, okay, okay, I understand. I get it.

But, like, get to the stuff about my kids.

What do I actually do? Because my parents didn't do shit.

So we got you. Don't worry, we have tons of tips. Okay, so the first tip that we want to go over with your kids is using anatomically correct language. So let's start with the basics here. I think, you know, a lot of us grew up not hearing the words penis or vulva or vagina. We heard, like, some sort of cutesy word or some sort of slang instead. So we actually went over to Instagram again and we asked people, like, what names were you taught for your body part? So, like, like, what did you call a penis or a vulva in your family? Or, like, with your friends?

Or, like, what did you hear? Maybe not taught. Like, I doubt in many of these cases we'll get into the list. I doubt someone was like, this. Is that part of.

No, it really was. Yes. We got so many DMS from people saying, yeah, my mom said it was this. My dad called it this. No, people were directly taught this is what this body part is called.

I guess for me, maybe my parents didn't really like, like, give me any cutesy words. We just didn't have a lot of conversations in general. Like, I knew what the right words were, but I picked this stuff up from other people. It's just slaying.

Yeah. So first I'm going to talk about the words for, like, vulva and vagina that were used. My favorite example came from a podcast that I did where the host said that her family growing up Called it her shame. Shame.

I'm just real, real explicit and direct. Like, we are not hiding from the fact that sex is shameful. In fact, I'm gonn name your body part.

It's so shameful. We called it shame shame. We called it twice. Like, that blew my mind. Your shame Shame. Can you imagine teaching like a little girl that her body part is called the shame Shame. I could not believe it.

It's messed up.

Okay, so here were some of the hundreds, maybe thousands of responses that we got on Instagram. Cookie.

Wait, what?

Yeah, cookie.

I love cookies.

We have a lot more to go through, babe. Yes, you do love cookies. Cookies. All kinds of cookies. Birdie. I'd never heard that, but apparently this is a southern one because a lot of people said bird or birdie and they said they were from the South. Foo Foo. Special place. Dilly Queen.

Dilly. Like Dairy Queen. Not quite.

Jiggy front butt. That one slayed me. It's like, oh my God. No. Puff. Pippa. Peeper. Pocketbook. Poochie. Muscle. Your muscle.

I guess that maybe could be a somewhat positive thing. You really work on your kegels, your Kiki.

Smoosh. Biscuit. You know I love me a biscuit.

Yeah, Biscuit. Or I mean this. Is this the English biscuit or like the Southern biscuit? Because it could be a cookie too.

Toot toot. Susie. This was one of like the top three. Susie. I'm like, where the did this come from? You're Susie. Is there some sort of backstory that we don't know? Let us know. Frog. That one was kind of upsetting to me.

If you kiss it, it turns into a prince.

Oh my God.

Oh. What was wrong? Fairy tale.

I don't know if a lot of people would want that to happen. And finally, you're Virginia.

Great. That's a good one. That's a good one. This. That reminds me of. What is the story of the fur Gina?

Oh, the fur Gina. That was. I was babysitting when I was a teenager and I was babysitting this little six year old girl who I really love. She was super cute. And we were playing Hangman, where you have to like guess the word. Someone comes up with a word and then you're guessing letters.

She was advanced for six years.

Yeah, she was pretty smart. So we're playing this game. I'm dead. I'm so dead. Because I've guessed so many letters. It's not right.

I'm like, she's like adding on parts to the hangman.

She's like, now we're gonna do a shoe. And so her parents come home, like right as we're ending. And she insists, like, leave us alone, we're finishing the game. Vanessa hasn't guessed yet. And so they're just kind of like, you know, giggling in the background, getting settled. Their date night or whatever. And so finally I'm like, I, I give up. I do not know what this word is. And she goes, vagina. So she had spelled it F U R G I N A. It was just like her parents just laughed so hard and was like, yeah, for Giana. It kind of makes sense. Your vagina Virginia.

Yeah.

All right, walk us through the names for, for penises.

All right, so we had Pickle, Pee Pee Puddler, Franken Beans. Classic. Something about Mary. One of. When I was younger, I thought that was one of the funniest movies I've ever. I'd ever seen. I'm not sure if it totally stands up anymore. Probably a bit problematic. Turkey, Tally Whacker.

A lot of those.

This was like, like the male equivalent of the Susie.

Yeah. I was like, where did this come from?

I gotta love it. I bet it's. We have a lot of British followers on Instagram. I bet you this is a UK thing. Willikins. Willikins. I mean, I kind of have to say that with a British accent. I just don't know how to say it with an American. Willy Cans.

Willikins.

Willikins. And then One Eyed Willie Winker. Wanker. Wanka Dicker doo.

Dinkerdoo.

Dink. Oh, Dink. Thank you for correcting me. Dinker. Do do think or do hang Dangler. I like just Dangler. How could that sound like I put.

Those four together because I really like the way those flowed. One Eyed Willy Winker, Wanker, Dinker Do Hang Dangler. Tally Whacker.

That's a like, say it five times fast situation myth.

Yeah. Which is weird because you hear muff.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. I was like, that could be real confusing.

I meant for my muff. I don't know.

Bobo Noodle and Dinky. Little Dinky Noodle.

Those are funny to look back on.

As adults, but let's just leave them as funny. And that's it.

Yeah. So we think it's really important to help your children correctly label their genitalia. I mean, I think this is important. By saying the actual name, you're not creating the shame around the body part.

Or a mystery.

Yeah. Or that sense of mystery. I think kids pick up on like, oh, we're using this funny name because this part is so shameful that we're not even supposed to say what it is.

Like, he who cannot he.

What? I think I know where you're going, but I'm not gonna say it. I want you to figure it out.

It's like, he who cannot be named, he who shall not be named.

And who is that? Voldemort. There you go.

I'm kind of shocked that there's no, like, Harry Potter name names in that list above.

I know there should be something about like, your Ron. Your wand.

Oh, no, I was saying Ron, but you're Hermione.

Okay, so you know, it also, like, when kids know the correct names for their body parts, it gives them autonomy over their body. It helps them, you know, also protect themselves in situations when you aren't there. It helps around, like, learning to give consent. We'll get to that in a little bit. But there are just so many reasons why it's important and valuable to use. Use the correct terms. All right, next point that we want to talk about is the talk. You know, we hate that it's called the talk because it really gives you the impression that it's one talk, right?

Yeah, that's how it is stereotypically, I think, you know, like in movies or what I think of American Pie when, like, his dad sits gym down to have like, the talk. And it's like, oh, boy, here we go.

We asked people on Instagram, did you feel prepared? Did you feel like you had enough information the first time you had sex? We wanted to get a sense of like, did the Talk serve you? 80% of people said that they were not prepared, did not have enough information the first time they had sex. And oh my God, we got a lot of DMS from people saying, like, are you kidding? I literally knew nothing.

I would venture a guess that there might be some parents listening to this who go, wait, hold on a second. Like, I did give my kids the talk. I did give, like, all of this good information. But what I can say as a child of parents who received one, the talk, I think the reality is it feels so awkward in the moment. Even if you gave all the information and were super thorough, a kid who's like 13 or 14 or something is probably not very well positioned to be retaining all that information because all they're hearing in their mind is like, oh, my God, this is so awkward. This is so awkward. This is so awkward. So the unfortunate reality is that it's not about having one very Thorough talk. It's probably about having a lot, a lot of talks over and over where each one builds on the last, each one reinforces the last. Because I talk to my mom a lot about, like, memories from being a child. And like, very often my memories are like, like, very singular. It's like, oh, well, I just remember this one time where you said this and she's like, no, we talked about that, like all the time. And you come away with like a limited slice of things. Your brain is developing.

Yeah.

All these new experiences happening.

You need the repetition for sure. Yeah. So 80 of people not feeling prepared to have sex. Bottom line here is we just have to do better for our kids. We have to do better for these, you know, future generations.

We also might never be perfectly prepared for something that's brand new, that's different. It's very emotional. But I think better prepared is a good goal.

And I think that this could even be a good way to introduce the topic of sex to your kids, is kind of share with them what did you learn from your parents? And maybe it's telling your kids something like, you know, my parents didn't talk about sex with me, and that had a lot of negative impacts on me. It left me feeling like sex was shameful or it was something we couldn't talk about. When I wanted to talk to my parents, I felt like it wasn't safe to do so. You know, so you can kind of share your own experiences and tell your kids, I want it to be different between us.

Yeah. You could also share, like, what was it like the first time you did have sex without all that information? Like, what didn't go right? What do you wish you had known? Like, that's a kind of sneaky way to impart. All the right information is like, you know, I wish I had known this. I wish I had known that.

Yeah. So I'm sure right now a lot of you are thinking like, oh, my gosh, but like, what is age appropriate and what do I share when it's definitely a good idea to just start early and follow their lead. So kids are naturally curious. They will often blurt out questions. And if you make them asking questions, a safe and okay thing, they will continue to ask questions. We also do have a YouTube video where we specifically broke down what are the age appropriate conversations to initiate with your kids at different stages. So we'll put a link to that YouTube video in our show notes. Definitely go and check that out. You do want to follow your kids lead, but you also need to Initiate some conversations on your own, and that YouTube video will tell you exactly you know, what to say and when. It's also important for you to, like, be informative when you have these conversations. So try your best to answer your kids questions, like, as straightforwardly as you can can. And a great way that you can just show your kids that it's safe to talk about, that you guys can continue having these conversations is to end the talk with, like, does that answer your question? Or do you have any other questions that just helps the conversation keep going? And even when the talk is over, if they're like, yeah, I'm done, you know, you can say something like, I'm so glad that you asked me that. We can talk about this anytime you want to.

This is a really good example of why the oxygen mask thing is really so important. Like, why you need to be comfortable yourself. You need to really be practicing what you're preaching. If you are like, oh, well, I know what the right things to say to my kids are, even if I don't necessarily fully believe it for myself. And you might share all of that. Maybe you do a really, really good job. But then the moment your kid asks a question that you weren't prepared for and you're like, oh, God, I. I don't. Like, you know, once you kind of slip and go into, like, you know, you feel ashamed because you're like, oh, I don't know how to answer this. Like, your kid is gonna pick up on that. So it's much easier to just try to get comfortable yourself and just be really honest and straightforward. And if you don't know the answer to a question or you're not sure, you can share that.

Like, I feel like, let's look it up together. Yeah, I'm actually not sure about that. That's a great question. Let's go look it up together.

Yeah, I think that could be a huge way to build trust. Is like, this is not a topic where we have, you know, we know everything. I wish I knew everything. I don't. And let's see if we can learn together.

Yeah, absolutely. Another point that we want to bring up in having these conversations with your kid is that it's really important to teach them about consent. So this is a nuanced topic. It definitely warrants its own podcast episode. But we wanted to mention it here because it's. It's so important. So, you know, kids need to understand that they get to decide what to do with their bodies. They don't have to be, you know, Forced to do things with adults or with other people that they don't want to do. Talking about consent, being like only an enthusiastic yes means a yes. Talking about what to do if they receive some sort of unwanted touch or unwanted request. Again, this is all really complex stuff. We're not going to get into all the specifics, but we definitely recommend that you educate yourself about consent. We'll talk about more in the future. But consent has to be a big part of the conversation. Another big part of the conversation should be talking about sex in a positive way. So I think so many of us think about, like, talking about sex with our kids, and we think about, like, avoiding pregnancy and not getting STIs or not being immoral. Like, we think of all the things not to do versus being able to share with our kids. Sex is a joyful, beautiful, pleasurable experience. Like, it's such a gift that we get to have sex and we get to experience that kind of connection with ourselves and with other people. So, you know, that needs to be a part of the conversation as well.

If all you say is, don't do this, don't do that, don't do that, in a best case, your kid is going to be like, okay, great, I know what not to do. I still don't know what to do. That's like a best case scenario. The worst case scenario, which I think is probably the more common one, is your kid starts to do some things and some of those things that you said don't do, they start to do, and it actually goes okay for them. The world doesn't end, they don't get pregnant, whatever. And then all of a sudden your kids, like all my parents said was, don't do all this stuff. I just did some of it. It was totally fine. So, like, everything they told me must.

Be, or even worse. I think a lot of times we hear like, don't do this. And we especially as like, teenagers, you're like, oh, I'm gonna do it. Then, you know, like, there's a, there's an allure to when somebody says, don't do something. So I think, you know, the bottom line is your goal is to instill in your child the ability to make healthy decisions for themselves, to weigh the pros, the cons, to get in touch with their beliefs, their values, and to be able to make those decisions, decisions just like you would say, you know, you want your kids to make healthy decisions about anything else in life. Like, you don't just want to teach them, don't do this. Don't do this like, you want them to be equipped to make their own decisions. Right?

All right, so what if you're a parent and you're listening to this and you're like, oh, my God, my kid is 15, and I've, like, never had any of these conversations. Like, what is. You know, maybe I should just, like, cut my losses and say, well, maybe next generation will be better.

No, I mean, I think, you know, definitely our advice is to start as early as you can with your kids. But that being said, like, it is never too late to start. You can still have a huge impact on your child by just starting the conversation, whatever age they are. That can actually be a nice way to initiate the conversation, is take ownership and say, you know what? I wish that we had talked about this sooner, but I want us to start talking about it now and to continue talking about it. I think that can be a great way to just like, open that door up.

And if Your kid is 20 years old and you never have these conversations, call them up and be like, you know what? I want to have a remedial talk. No, I'm just kidding. I don't know what you do if that's the case.

I mean, I think one of the coolest things about me becoming a sex therapist is that as an adult, I've been able to have conversations about sex with my parents. We did an episode. I'm forgetting the number right now. I think it was 11. About, like, how I turned my orgasm struggles into this business. We talk about my version of the talk with my parents and how it was. Was not a good conversation. It was super awkward. It was one talk that didn't really go anywhere. Didn't have any information.

I don't think it was really a talk. It was just. It was a. Do you have any questions? Nope. Great. Okay.

But, you know, so as an adult, we've talked about sex so much. It's like a very regular, open part of conversation. I would say probably every time we see my parents, we talk about sex. And that's been a really healing thing for all of us. Like, it doesn't matter that I'm an adult, that I've had a lot of sex already. Like, it's still really healing and special for us to be able to talk about it together. So it truly is never too late. Okay, so the final point that we want to make around this is just to be a safe place for your kid. So, like, let your kid know, hey, sex is a complex thing. You're probably going to struggle at some point with, like, making the decision that feels healthy for you, right? For you. You're probably going to make decisions that you regret making. But I want you to know that I am always here for you.

For you.

I will always be here for you. I'll always help you take care of whatever consequences come up for you, whatever challenges you're running into. I think that's just such a beautiful gift to give to your child, is to let them know that you are always there for them no matter what.

All right, so we talked about what to do if you're like, shoot, it's been however many years. I haven't had any conversations. What if, like, just last week, you had a kind of negative. You had one of those like, like, don't do this, don't do this, don't do that conversations. And now you're, like, listening to this and you're like, oh, God, now I've gone and done it.

Well, I think it's. It's so important to cut yourself some slack. So talking about sex, it is hard, and you are not always going to get it right. You are definitely going to make mistakes, and you're going to say things that you wish you hadn't said or not say things that you wish you had said. You're going to get caught off guard by questions like, you know, stuff is going to happen. So I think, again, this is such a nice way to build trust with your kid is to let them know, like, hey, I'm a work in progress. I'm still working on this, too. I'm still working through my own shame and releasing that, you know, you're not always going to get it right, but just own up to your mistakes. You can always come back to your kid and say, you know what? You know, you asked me that question and I got really embarrassed and I didn't answer it, but I want to answer it because that was a great question, and I wish that I had responded to that more positively in the moment, you know, something like that. So you can always loop back around to your kid and say, hey, can we do that over again? I'm sorry for xyz. Or, you know, it's just such a great way for your child to see you as a human being, you know, not just as their parent. So I think as long as you keep making that consistent effort to communicate with your child, your child is going to get the message that sex is normal, it's healthy, and it's nothing that they should be ashamed of.

All right. I love all those tips. Let's get into some listener questions. Now, this is where the rubber meets the road.

I'm glad you like our tips.

I do. I genuinely do. Now we will see.

I want to do a podcast of tips that we don't like. Here's our terrible podcast filled with terrible tits. We just decided to create it.

Or how about we, like, intersperse good tips with terrible tips and we make the audience vote. What are the good tips and what are the bad tips? And if you. And if you put the bad tips into place. Sorry, you're screwed.

Really high stakes podcast.

All right. But what I was saying is this is where the rubber meets the road. This is where we see. Does Vanessa practice what she preaches?

Wow.

Can she answer these questions without getting flustered?

You're just thinking about that DM that we got, aren't you? Yesterday that was like, do you actually practice what you preach?

It was a confusing dm.

It wasn't like negative words.

It wasn't grammatically correct. And I'm not sure if they knew exactly what the words meant that they were saying or if they swapped some words, but it was confusing. It was like, so you experiment, but do you something.

Yeah. She was like, do you practice what you preach? I know that you experiment with all the things that you talk about, but do you practice them? Like, I don't. I don't know what this means. I'm so confused. Anyways, let's practice and experiment.

Far and away the most popular question this topic. I'm just gonna read one of the variants that we got. I want to talk about sex with my kids, but I don't want to give the impression that I approve of them having sex at a young age.

Yeah. A lot of people are very worried about this. This idea of, like, if I talk to my kids about sex, then they're gonna have sex.

Sex. Yeah.

And I think it's really important for us to acknowledge your kid knows that sex exists.

Yeah. Do they see movies?

I mean, they watch tv. Yeah. I mean, it's actually, it's. It's shocking how young kids are when they first get exposed to the topic of sex. You know, unless you want to raise your child in a complete protective bubble, like, they're going to learn about it. You know, it's important for them to learn about it from you, from, like a trusted resource, from somebody who can give them the correct information instead of, like, the weird things that they're going to hear from their friends on the playground and stuff like that. And also, I think it's so important for us to acknowledge that, like, talking about something doesn't mean that it's going to happen. So that's sort of like us saying, oh, I don't want my kids to learn about Mussolini in history class because then they're going to go on and become a dictator. Right? It's like, no, that's not how it works.

Yeah, that's not what education. Education is not like. Like you learn something and you just do it. Yeah, that would be nice. That'd be kind of like the Matrix style thing where you just like plug in the whatever program and then you're like super adapted doing it.

Yeah, exactly.

I'm ready to be a little dictator.

So your kid learning about sex is not going to instantly make them turn around and go have sex that instant.

It's also not gonna, like, sexually activate them. Like puberty happens.

When it happens, the sex, the sex switch gets flipped on.

The switch gets flipped.

The switch. That's a real tongue twister. Dinky, donkey, tally, whacker, switch, switcher, flipper, switcher, flipper. The switch does not get flipped where the second that your child hears the word sex, all of a sudden they are a sexual being. Anyways, getting back to the question, the point that we really want to make, when you're talking about sex with your kid, it should be really focused on healthy decision making, on helping them feel equipped to decide, like, what's gonna feel good and right for them when it comes to their sex life. So it's not that you're saying, hey, sex exists. Go out and have it whenever you want.

Yeah, it's this awesome thing. It feels really, really good and you can do it whenever you want. Like, that's not what we're teaching about it. This is something that people do when they're really close. And there's a lot of emotional things involved with it. Something that we typically wait until we're a bit older and in a more serious relationship or something like that.

Yeah, whatever your personal values are around that, you can teach that to your kids. But again, helping them become like a decision maker, helping them identify what's going to feel right for themselves. The other thing that I want to mention here is this reminds me of actually something that came up in my childhood. When I was about 6, 16, I had a serious boyfriend. I went to my mom and I told her, I want to be prepared if I do end up having sex. I'm not right now, but I want to be prepared. I want to go on birth control pills. And my mom flipped out. She said that, you know, how dare I think about that. She wasn't going to make it easy on me. She wasn't going to get me an appointment. You know, it was a very shameful conversation for me. And here I thought I was being really responsive, responsible and wanting to protect myself. I was saying, you know, I'm not ready to have sex yet. I just want to be prepared in case I do feel ready at some point. I brought it to her because I wanted to have this conversation with her. So that was a very shame inducing conversation for me.

And I bet that was the last time you brought something like that to her.

It was. And I had sex. I went ahead and had sex. My mom's saying, I'm not going to make it easy for you or, you know, how dare you be thinking about this? Like that didn't stop me from having, having sex. And I think that's one of the really harsh, challenging realities. And I really empathize with parents who might be struggling with this of like, oh my God, my kid is like a baby. Like I, I don't want my kid having sex. Like they're so young, they're so innocent. Like I want them to wait till later. I can completely empathize with the fear that must have come up for my mom, like thinking about her firstborn baby wanting to have sex. And at the same time, like one of the challenging realities is you cannot prevent your kid from having sex if you want to keep them locked in a bubble where they're never allowed to go outside.

Sure.

My mom made it really hard on me. Like I was not allowed to have alone time with my boyfriend. You know, she always called his parents when I went over. Like she made it hard, but I still did it. We still figured it out. You know, kids are, kids are crafty again. It's like I just feel so much compassion. I know that this is really, really fucking hard to deal with. But I do think it's important to acknowledge we can't completely control our kids. The best that we can do is again like equip them to make healthy decisions for themselves. Talk about those healthy decisions in an open, a positive, non shaming way. But also just coming from this place of recognizing, like, yeah, you might want your kid to wait until they're 45, you know, to start having sex.

Not even the 40 year old virgin. The 45 year old virgin.

You're not gonna have Hamilton. You will actually guarantee that your kid will have sex at a younger age and not be safe, not be smart about it. If you don't talk about sex or if you talk about it in this very shameful way, ironically, by talking about it openly, by giving them the information that they need, by helping them make healthy decisions, they will actually wait until healthier situations.

All right, so the next question is, we're religious, but I don't agree with all of my religion's views about sex and I don't want those views to harm my children. What do I do?

So I think this is a great opportunity to have really open and honest conversations with your kids about that, being able to share with them. Hey, you're probably going to hear X, Y, Z, or, you know, our religion teaches so and so. And I just want you to understand, like, this is not something that I believe in and here's why. What do you think about that? Open up a conversation with your kid. Religion can be challenging because you may not but agree with all of the religious beliefs that your religion or your church or your religious leader believes in. And like, that's okay. You know, we're allowed to kind of pick and choose what we want out of religion and our relationship with a higher power. We're allowed to have agency in that. And so I think having that kind of conversation with your kid can just be really beneficial. Yeah. Are they, you know, in some sort of program where they're, you know, regularly being exposed to this and like really negative stuff, it could get a little bit challenging. Maybe you want to rethink like their participation in certain religious groups or programs or whatever it is. But I think just having that conversation of, hey, I don't actually believe this, here's why. What do you think?

Yeah, I think that can be a really good opportunity to just start kind of showing the gray area in life to your kids. It's very easy to just have this black and white thinking from a young age. This stuff is right, that stuff is wrong, and it's really clear cut. And then as we get older, we all learn ourselves where that gray exists, how there's really not that much just straight up black, white, right, wrong in the world. And this can be a great opportunity to kind of show like, hey, you know, there's a lot of people that say, you really shouldn't do this, you can't do that. Here's what I think and like, here's how it's challenging to figure all this stuff out. All right, our last question is we have three seven year old girls. Our littlest touches. Okay, misread that. All right, we're gonna re record this.

No, no, let's keep going. I mean they could have triplets. Sure. It would be better if it was like seven three year old girls.

No. Okay, what is room here is. All right.

Three, two, seven.

It says we have three seven year old girls. We have 37 year old girls. No, we have girls who are between three and seven years old. I don't know how many there are because they didn't say. There must be more than one because they are between three to seven. And our littlest one touches herself. What to say to not make it shameful. First of all, don't shame me for misreading 3 to 7. 37 year old girls because they might have triplets.

They could.

And one of them is just a lot shorter than the other. The littlest one.

It's just the runt.

Yeah, there's one run to the litter. There's two really tall ones and one short one.

Nothing funnier than childhood masturbation. Oh my God. All right, so this is a complex topic, but we wanted to mention it because we got so many questions about it. So the bottom line that you to need, need to know is that masturbation is a completely normal and healthy experience at any age. Fetuses in the womb masturbate, so it is something that we do at every point in our lives. But of course, like, this is really uncomfortable to think about your 37 year old girls masturbating.

Thinking about our little run. Touching herself a little. Wow. I've. I've gone and done it.

I don't know if I could get through this. I want to get a shirt for myself. Mommy's little runt. I'm definitely the runt of the litter.

True, you are.

I am. I'm the littlest one. Okay, so masturbation. The thing with kids masturbating is that it's not a sexual experience in the way that we think of like adults. Adults masturbating. Children are just exploring their bodies and there's this sense of like, oh, cool, there's my Dilly Dally or my little, my Susie. No, they're not gonna do that because you're teaching them the correct names. Basically we have an entire YouTube video dedicated to how to address this, like exactly what to say to your kids. Other things that you need to know about it. So we will put the link to that video in the show notes as well. But we just wanted to mention here, it's totally normal, it's perfectly healthy. Nothing's wrong. There are just constructive ways that you can talk to your kids about, like, when and where they do this. So check out that YouTube video for more information about that. I made it.

Congrats. Congratulations, my little runt. What do we want to leave the good people with today?

We hope that you've enjoyed this episode. And you know what I want to say. I am so stinking proud of you for listening to this episode.

Me? Thanks.

Not you. I was purposely trying to not make eye contact with you so you didn't think I was talking to you. Now, dear listener, I am incredibly proud of you for listening to this episode because I know that sex is a hard topic. That is why we have jobs, because it's such a challenging topic for us. And I think it says volume about you as a parent that you are willing to tackle this topic and that you want to end that generational shame cycle for your kid or your kids.

Yes.

Like, you are fucking awesome. You are making change in the world. You are hopefully going to put us out of business. That is, that's actually our goal. Like, our goal is that we want to be put out of business.

Please retire us early. Put us out to the. Send us out to the farm.

Our business shouldn't have to exist. You know, we should have. We should all just feel empowered to have happy and healthy relationships with sex. Again, we just want to say thank you. You're fucking awesome. You're doing great work. It's going to be hard. You're not always going to get it right, but you're doing an amazing job. So thank you.

Thank you.

All right, so if you are wanting to learn more, we've got a bunch of links for you in the show notes. We've got that episode from the podcast about purity culture. We have the YouTube video about age appropriate conversations to have and the YouTube video about children masturbating. So make sure to check out all of those resources.

That's all for today's episode of Pillow Talks. Thank you so much for listening. Join us again next week when we talk about. Drumroll, please. Oh, I think Art was gonna do that.

Oh, okay. Will he do a better drum roll than me?

All right, let's see. Drum roll, please. Butt stuff.

Talking about kids to butt stuff. That's how we roll on this podcast of bad advice.

From little runs, masturbating to butt stuff. We got it all. Make sure. Follow us. Listen to Pillow Talks every. But definitely join us for bad stuff. Okay, bye.

Oh, God. That was ridiculous. A little runtime.