The day I asked my mother where babies came from was so traumatic it makes me shudder to recall it\u201d, said Justina, a renowned writer now a grandmother.\u00a0 \u201cIt was in 1966 and I "},"modified":"2019-07-28T05:02:12","modified_gmt":"2019-07-28T05:02:12","slug":"why-mothers-shouldnt-teach-their-children-the-facts-of-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2019\/07\/28\/why-mothers-shouldnt-teach-their-children-the-facts-of-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Why mothers shouldn\u2019t teach their children the facts of life!"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The day I asked my mother where babies came from was so traumatic it makes me shudder to recall it\u201d, said Justina, a renowned writer now a grandmother.\u00a0 \u201cIt was in 1966 and I was six; a gullible, good-natured soul, a lover of fairy stories who wanted to know if the story of the stock was true. If it was, then why had I never seen a stork when there were so many babies.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mother could have told me anything.\u00a0 She could have said simply that when two people want a\u00a0 baby, by some sort of curious magic, a tiny little spec is made in the woman\u2019s tummy. I liked magic and believed in it. But my mother was adamant her daughter would be far more liberated than she was. So, despite my tender age, she launched into a full anatomical description of sex, something that would colour my attitude to love and intimacy forever.\u00a0 I grew up thinking it was just a bit of fun, momentary meaningless.\u00a0 There is no doubt my mother\u2019s liberal attitude paved the way for me agreeing to my first ill-fated marriage being `open\u2019. This didn\u2019t in any way mean we had loads of lovers \u2013 in ten years of being together I took only one and my husband three or four \u2013 but rather there was a total disconnect between love and sex. Even today, in my second less conventional marriage, where love and fidelity absolutely go hand-in-hand, I can\u2019t help but feel great sex has more to do with my husband\u2019s beloved football team winning a match than a resurgence of affection for me. If my mother had been ore conservative when I came to sex education, would I feel differently?\u00a0 I believe I might.<\/p>\n
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\u201cAs a mother of five boys, ranging from 33 to 19, I have very determinedly taken the opposite approach \u2013 I pretended sex didn\u2019t ever exist, letting them find out about it in their own time, from their school and peers. And thankfully, not one of them posed the most awkward of questions. I still wonder what my mother was thinking.\u00a0 A little girl does not need to know about her father\u2019s manhood or the fact her mother has a `hidden passage\u2019 inside her.\u00a0 While she chatted away happily, I was horrified \u2013 not to mention a little traumatised. `Don\u2019t worry Justina, there\u2019s nothing to be afraid of!\u2019, she said. I became determined I would never experience sexual desire if it made you do such horrible things.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis feeling stuck with me throughout primary school. When I was 14, my mother went further still.\u00a0 She told me it was important to find out about my own body and not to fear it. I had to find out what gave me pleasure before I could ask someone else to do I for me. Surely, surely, it\u2019s not a mother\u2019s role to say such things to her daughter?\u00a0 But she firmly believed that the more you knew about sex, the better lover you would become, and the more fulfilled you would be.\u00a0 As a teenager, I wanted to be rebellious. I was longing to do things my mother would disapprove of, and make my own path in life. But when you\u2019re faced with enquiries like:\u00a0 `Have you honestly not had your first orgasm yet?\u00a0 Poor love!\u201d you become \u2013 what can I say?\u00a0 \u2013 anti-sex, a lover of purity, friendship, anything which isn\u2019t about body parts.<\/p>\n
READ ALSO: Muslim group, MURIC writes Buhari, calls for ban on #BBNaijia(Opens in a new browser tab)<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cDespite her enthusiasm for me to experiment, I was still (much to my mother\u2019s despair) a virgin at 18. Rather than feeling, I should wait for `the one\u2019, I began to feel I\u2019d like to shed off virginity. When a handsome young naval officer home on leave asked me out, I thought: `Oh well, it may as well be him\u2019. Poor man. I may as well have been in a dentist\u2019s chair and when the did was done, felt as empty as could be. I did have a couple of other lovers before I married my first husband, aged 22.\u00a0 He came from a bohemian background but his liberal views on sex and fidelity did not faze me.<\/p>\n \u201cPart of my mother\u2019s relationship advice was that all red-blooded men were unfaithful to their wives, so I didn\u2019t bat an eyelid at the idea of infidelity. After all, what did sex matter?\u00a0 Somewhat unsurprisingly, after a decade the marriage collapsed.\u00a0 My husband had fallen in love with one of his mistresses. Heartbroken, I went on to marry again but with a far more conventional outlook. I had two further sons and that\u2019s when I became determined to put matters right on the sex education front.\u00a0 I was certainly not going to be my sons\u2019 friend and adviser in bedroom matters. Neither parent nor child should know what the other gets up to in bed. Rather, they would find out all about sex from their schools and their peers.\u00a0 My role would be to pretend that sex didn\u2019t even exist.\u00a0 I would neither encourage nor discourage but let them find out about it in their own time.<\/p>\n I was always waiting for the question \u2018Where did I come from, mummy?\u2019 and tied myself in knots as to how I would answer it, but luckily, it never came. Perhaps, this sex-education business is easier with boys, I hoped.\u00a0 There was one wobble, though. Soon after my eldest son began university, he brought a girl home to stay the night.\u00a0 Her name was Amanda. She wore stilettos, revealing cropped leggings and a good deal of make-up.\u00a0 But she was also petite and seemed a lot younger than 19. She was friendly enough over supper and polite. I kept thinking: \u2018This is so wrong! Shouldn\u2019t I be ringing her parents?\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cBut my son would never forgive me for interfering. I was beside myself with worry. I had never even told my son to treat a girl with respect and tenderness, nor to get to know her first before sleeping with her.\u00a0 Then an even worse thought came into my head. I had never so much as mentioned the word `condom\u2019 and I knew my son wouldn\u2019t have given a thought to contraception.<\/p>\n If she wasn\u2019t on the Pill, I would be a grandmother to a child I might never know.\u00a0 By morning, I was already envisaging arguments between my husband and my son\u2019s father about who would be paying maintenance for the poor child.\u00a0 And all because of my negligence.<\/p>\n \u201cThankfully all was well. Amanda did not fall pregnant and life went on.\u00a0 Still I was flummoxed as to what line I should take.\u00a0 Should I start advising my other sons?\u00a0 I began to ask around \u2013 how did other mothers deal with the sexual education of their children?\u00a0 Some, to my horror, seemed almost as liberal as my mother and said they could `talk about anything\u2019 with their children. Worse was the friend who took the opposite view.\u00a0 `Remember the pleasure of sneaking down the corridor in the early hours and getting into bed with your boyfriend?\u2019 she asked me.\u00a0 `I want to crease the same titillation in my home, and will refuse to let my son share a bedroom with his girlfriend until he\u2019s married\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cAnother friend told me with pride about how she knocked on her 22-year-old son\u2019s door one Sunday morning and offered to cook him and his girlfriend breakfast, when a second child shouted out \u2013 me too please!\u00a0 God save me from such a moral quagmire.\u00a0 Can I imagine saying to my youngest now 20:\u00a0 `Remember one girl at a time!\u2019 I\u2019m afraid I\u2019m still going to take the cowardly way out and remain silent on the issue. The others have all grown up now \u2013 one is even expecting a baby soon.\u00a0 And as for you, my youngest, do whatever you like \u2013 just don\u2019t tell me about it!\u201d<\/p>\n Why you should sleep completely naked!<\/strong><\/p>\n 1.Skin: <\/strong>When the nights are hot (not now it\u2019s raining) going naked not only cools you down, it allows areas that are usually restricted by clothes to get some fresh air \u2013 lowering the risk of certain skin conditions.<\/p>\n 2.Hormones: <\/strong>Being overheated while you\u2019re in dreamland can cause your level of the hormone cortisol to rise, which can lead to increase feelings of anxiety and stress, and make you crave naughty foods!<\/p>\n 3.Fertility: <\/strong>A recent study found that men who slept completely nude had a far lower percentage of damaged DNA in their sperm compared with men who wore boxers or briefs.<\/p>\n 4.Sex: <\/strong>Sex has a host of health benefits \u2013 and you\u2019re more likely to have it if you\u2019ve shed those Pjs!<\/p>\n 5.Relationships: <\/strong>Sleeping naked with someone encourages skin-on-skin contact. This boosts the levels of oxytocin in your brain. This makes you feel happy and much closer to your partner. It\u2019s win-win!<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\nRelated<\/em><\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n