I'm a therapist who currently works with juvenile sex offenders. I've noticed that most were introduced to sex by being abused themselves, or they were never taught about sex, so their unbridled curiosity led to inappropriate sexual behavior. Most offenses were committed out of ignorance and not flat out deviancy.

In that article I posted about the physicians response to Mormon teachings about masturbation, he referenced examples of kids who committed suicide, turned to bestiality (because nobody told them it was bad, whereas masturbation was evil), and another child who turned to alcohol abuse because he felt that he might as well because he felt evil anyway due to not being able to quit masturbating.

My ex-wife, who was raised in a tbm family, was never taught about sex by her parents, and neither were her siblings. Most of her sisters ended up pregnant in highschool. I've had numerous TBM friends tell me that sex was a taboo subject in their homes.

How did your parents teach you about sex and masturbation?

How did it affect your view of sex and your sexuality?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/16/2011 10:40AM by lostmystic.

I was raised in a TBM family. Sex was never talked about. My parents didn't teach me anything about it. I remember hearing the word "masturbating" in a Prince song. I went and asked my parents what it meant and my dad gave me a quick answer, "It means playing with yourself." That was it. I believe that was the only time it was ever mentioned in my house. I had to learn everything on my own. I ended up messing around with an older TBM girl who taught me a bunch. She taught me so much sexually that I ended up in the bishop's office with my dad confessing my sins! I got in a whole mess of trouble as far as the church was concerned! Let's just say, it's hard to sit with your parents during sacrament meeting and not take the sacrament when you are supposed to be passing the sacrament with your buddies! That was embarrassing and public humiliation at it's best. Everyone knew I was in a lot of trouble!
'

It's one thing for TSCC to have a skewed view and punishment system about sex and masturbation, but it's even worse that they promote silence about the subject!

Why is it that so many TBM parents don't teach their children about sex??? And then hold them to an extra high standard? You would think that they would at least teach children about it before they enforce rules about it!

I suppose if I had any questions, they would have been answered, but I was too shy and introverted to ask.

I learned about sex through excellent sex ed courses available in my public schools (middle school and high school.) Later I took a very popular sex ed course at my university. My university clinic also had very good information sessions about birth control methods.

It is for this reason that I support sex ed in the public schools. For some of us, it's the only place that we get it. I was able to learn about the most effective methods of birth control, and thus completely avoided unwanted pregnancies throughout my lifetime. I also learned that masturbation is natural, normal, and healthy. I learned how to avoid venereal diseases. I learned that a certain percentage of the population is and has always been gay, and that this is true across cultures and time periods. I learned many other useful and interesting things as well. All supported by science and research!

I'm in support of sex-Ed too. My parents taught me about sex in 2nd grade. I also had sex-Ed in private school in 5th grade, and in public school my freshman year. We learned to put condoms on bananas, and were given plenty of free condoms whenever we wanted them.

My kids already know about homosexuality as far as some people prefering same-sex boyfriends or girlfriends because I have gay friends. They know it's less common but totally normal and acceptable...similar to difference in eye-color, and we taught them who you are attracted to is not a choice, but something that happens naturally.

They do teach you about it. They teach you not to talk about it, you don't think about it, and you don't do it. Then you get around all your little TBM buddies and that is all we talked about. I also remember going into a local bookstore and stealing the porno mags with all my TBM buddies. Some of those guys are probably bishops or stake presidents by now.

I was BIC into a multigenerational LDS family. My mom told me one Sunday afternoon to get into church clothes and we were going to drive to the temple. She was really hush hush about the reason why and it made me nervous (I was 10 or 11). We sat on a bench by the temple entrance and she asked me if I knew what sex was. I told her that I thought it involved kissing and she said yes, that is part of it and explained the rest. She told me that it was so special that she and my dad had saved themselves, etc and that sex was sacred and not to be talked about or joked about it friends and to ALWAYS keep myself pure. She also said that it was better to die than allow yourself to be assaulted, which made me feel really awful when I was raped after mutual one evening when I was 13.I was grossed out thinking about my parents doing that! Ick.

I started having sex summer after 9th grade and have always been pretty liberal about it. I did a lot of experimenting, but feel that I can from a good headspace about it and have always viewed sex and masturbation as activities worth being enthusiastic about ;)

In 'the miracle of forgiveness' it also teaches it's better to die than to 'allow' yourself to be assaulted. That sickens me. That's one step shy of what they do in some Muslim countries, where females who are raped are killed. They are either blamed for tempting the rapist somehow, or seen as damaged goods who are better off dead.

It pains me to hear you were raped. That is such a traumatic experience to deal with.

I'm glad to hear that you kept healthy view of sexuality despite what you were taught!

Thank you. I've dealt with it, and am now thankful that my painful experiences as a teen allow me to see people for who they are, not what they do/have done or their bad experiences in life. Honestly, the treatment that I got from church members after things blew up was more traumatic than the actual experience.

I have an LDS friend whose daughter was raped. He called me and talked with me about how angry he was and how he wanted to kill the perpetrator. I just listened and held the feelings with him. His ward members didn't want to hear his feelings and were telling him he had to forgive the rapist. I wasn't a member any longer and didn't carry that baggage of needing him not to feel what he felt.

The Miracle of Forgiveness is the only book I've ever burned. It is a hateful book.

I was lucky that my parents were fairly progressive (I still refer to them as secret hippies) and my mom was a health professional. She let me stay up to watch the "Miracle of Life" Nova footage on PBS when it aired the first time when I was six. She was very matter of fact about how things work and why. What she failed to do, was talk about the emotional parts of human sexuality. I had one sibling who was effected by the church's attitudes about sexuality in a very negative way, but the rest of us managed to have healthy attitudes about sexuality. Because of my one sibling, I spent a lot of grad school (clinical psych) trying to research marital sexuality and re-educating all those young gals at Institute about how to understand human sexuality and integrate the mechanics with the emotions in a healthy way. One close friend of mine asked me to give her fiance at the time a lesson on it after I had spent about three hours explaining things to her. I happily did, and as far as I know, things went much better for them after the wedding. I kind of made it my life's mission for about the last five years I was active in the Church. I desperately wanted these young gals to go into their marriages eyes wide open. I think I helped quite a few of them. Attitudes about human sexuality has been one of my biggest beefs with the church for at least 15 years.

My mom sat me down and explained the facts of life to me when I was a child. She as pretty open about it and I felt I could ask her anything. However, she was TBM so her views were conservative. She was not uptight about talking about it. As far as masturbation, she didn't really talk about it much although I do remember a couple of times that she told my small sister not to touch herself down there. It was done matter of factly without shame or punishment. Since my sister was wandering around naked at the time and doing it in public,I think it was handled approriately.I don't thnk my mother would approve of masturbating, but it just wasn't an issue as I remember. I think she thought that little kids are going to touch themselves, that it should be discouraged at least in public but that it wasn't a big deal. I guess I was lucky.

I remember the first time I had "the talk" I think I was 11 or 12 years old and I heard it from my mom, because my parents are divorced. I had no clue what masturbation even was until I was 14 years old. My friend told me it was "playing with yourself". My parents had never told me what it was, so I didn't even know how to do it, or what it was. I didn't even masturbate until I was 15 years old. Then I started hearing how bad it was from priesthood lessons and bishopric interviews. I remember crying myself to sleep and pleading with God to help me stop masturbating. I remember the incredible guilt and shame I would feel if I watched porn and masturbated. I felt like a perverted freak. I remember my bishop asking me if I masturbated or had a "problem" with pornography. I would say no, of course, because I couldn't stand to not be able to pass the sacrament and sit with my family having them know I did something bad. Sooooo glad that's over.

Yeah you did what most guys did, just lied about it. Me I thought I was the only one doing it, and was constantly meeting with the Bishop every couple weeks. After the mission I basically never had a temple recommend and was told I wasn't worthy to date the women of the ward until I could stop this evil sin. Now 10 years after the mission I learn that all my buddies and most of the guys in my singles ward were lying, most have admitted as much to me. I wish I had saved my self a LOT of pain and humiliation and just lied like everyone else. Try explaining to a woman in the Ward why you aren't temple worthy while keeping her interested in dating you. It doesn't happen in my experience.

I was taught that sex is a dirty, evil, disgusting, degrading, immoral, and deviant thing to do....and I should save it for the one I marry.

jebus Wrote:
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> I was taught that sex is a dirty, evil,
> disgusting, degrading, immoral, and deviant thing
> to do....and I should save it for the one I marry.

LOL!!

That's pretty funny.

Hilarious, yet searingly and soberingly dead-on.

There was no sex ed in our house. The only effort my parents put forth to teach me about the birds and the bees was to leave a copy of "What every girl wants to know but is too afraid to ask" (or something) on my desk while I was at school. Luckily I was a curious kid and had figured everything out by doing my own research far earlier, using the books my parents had and what was at the local public libraries.

The only attempt at a talk about sex my parents have ever attempted was when my sister was getting married (the only one of their kids to do that yet). Although she was exmo, 25 years old, and had been living with her future husband for a year, our mom found it necessary to tell her about babymaking and about the dangers of the female anatomy - yes, that's right, apparently what most people consider the source of pleasure for females was in my mothers eyes a great danger, and she specifically warned my sister not to touch it or play with it!

Fortunately, I feel I wasn't negatively affected by the lack of sex ed, since I was pretty curious and worked out those things for myself. Early on, I decided I was going to have as much fun with my sex life as I wanted to, and have been working toward that!

It was never discussed, except that I was never to be alone with boys. I wasn't even aloud to wear pajamas out of my room if males other than my father and brothers were in the house. My mom didn't even talk to me about menstruation. I saw the video at school and learned to take care of it on my own. Both of my parents are medical professionals, and I learned about "It" by sneaking their medical books into the basement and reading them at night.