It’s time for the talk. THE talk. At a Chinese restaurant yesterday, my 10-year-old son discreetly informed me that there was a bad word on the placemat. It was one of those standard Chinese restaurant placemats that tells your personality by the year of your birth. I have been called on for using bad words such as “stupid” and “crap” at our house, so I was intrigued to see the offending placemat term.
It turns out that the vile word was “sex,” as in “dealing with the opposite sex.” Sex. Sex is a bad word?
So now my lovely wife is convinced that it is time for me to have THE talk with him. This is the first time I have ever wished we had girls. Then this would be somebody else’s (my wife’s) problem to deal with. With a girl, my lovely wife would be responsible for the sex talk and I would be responsible for scaring the crap (there’s that bad word again) out of any potential suitors for my young girl’s hand. That I could live with. But no, we have boys and it’s the dad’s job to give the boys the talk about sex.
I remember well getting THE talk from my dad. I’m not sure how old I was, but I remember the discussion quite clearly. I can’t say it went well. I can’t say it was helpful. The best I can say about it is that it was over quickly.
So I think I can improve upon THE talk as I pass it on to the next generation. I don’t know if it’ll be great, but I’m shooting for less awkward and uncomfortable – for both father and son – than mine was.
Calling all readers – Do you have a success story? Anything helpful for me? How about a horror story of THE talk gone wrong? If I can’t learn from it at least we can all get a good laugh. Feel free to post your best/worst sex talk experiences in the comment section. Best story wins a $50 gift certificate to the Your Parenting Info online store.