Personal Blogs

Can’t remember what it was, but something on telly led to a discussion with Ben about S. E. X. Now not that I’m squeamish or embarrassed in any way, and I have always been open and truthful with him about anything he might ask, but now that he’s 13 and the questions are getting a bit more complicated and a bit more direct I did find myself wondering if I’m really the person best qualified for the job!

In the course of our discussion I did find one particular thing coming up (no pun intended) that had me squirming a bit, which was the nature of the ‘female orgasm’, because he couldn’t quite work out why or how if there were no obvious consequences in terms of reproduction. I explained some of the Darwinian theories about the ‘relaxation’ effect of orgasm in the conception process and bonding and stuff, and some of the newer theories covering stuff like cervical spasms and ‘clearing the custard’ etc, but while doing this admitted I’m no expert (on evolutionary theory, I mean, not on the female orgasm. Oh no, don’t go making those kinds of assumptions, I’ve had very few complaints, there, thank you very much!) and asked if this had never been discussed in sex Ed at skool. I honestly laughed so hard that it hurt a little bit when he told me ‘Oh, that. It was completely useless, they never told us anything. And the girls were in there for about an hour and we only got five minutes max!’

Now it may be that the fact he goes to a specialist skool rather than mainstream makes a big difference, but I’ve never heard of this separate classes thing for sex Ed (?) When I was at school it was a series of lessons and photo slide shows presented by the blushing R.E. Teacher, who was also rumoured (falsely, I’m sure) to have been the male ‘model’ for the slide show pics – including the ones covering STD’s – performing valiantly for the sake of our education with his devoted (and somewhat scrawny, if memory serves correctly) wife. Ahhh, if only it could have been Miss Stephens, our French teacher, or possibly Mrs Hunt, the supply teacher who took us for history for a couple of years. *swoon*

Anyhoo, getting back on top(ic)... I don’t know whether RE teachers have been let off the hook as far as Sex Ed goes in our schools, or whether different rules apply in specialist schools, but it looks like it’s going to be down to me to make sure that he gets the info he needs as and when he asks it, so I think I’m going to have to start boning up (see previous brackets about no pun intended) on some of the finer points adults don’t generally have to think about but which may be reassuring and/or of major interest to a curious teenager . I don’t think the copy of Robie Harris’s ‘Let’s Talk About Sex’ I got him from Amazon is going to completely cover it, which is probably bad news for him (Ben, not Robie Harris) and me...