Being a Mum

Bear brought home a consent form for sex education.

Bear squirmed as I signed the form.  What was worse, I insisted on telling him that he could always ask me or his dad anything because things that were said in the playground were often rubbish.  If he was confused he should check with us.  I told him that humans were strange creatures and when it came to sex there were all sorts of odd things around, not all of them healthy, and it was okay to ask us stuff.  I thought bear was going to pass out from embarrassment and I think I used up three years' ration of cringe in one short conversation.

As a ten year old, bear is absolutely mortified that his mother might know about sex.  I admit that I thought it was funny to see his horror at the conversation, but I tried to make it safe.  I would rather he could come to me or DH and ask us about the stuff that is out there, and while I might have to look stuff up, I'd rather he asked me than get lost and caught up in something he regretted.

Things have changed so much since I was his age.  I had my only, very sketchy sex ed lesson in the days before AIDS.  Now there is AIDS, drug resistant syphilis, drug resistant gonorrhoea and all sorts of other nasties that I've hardly heard of in my rather sheltered experience.  When I was ten I barely knew about the magazines that were on the top shelf of the newsagent.  Nowadays I would be very surprised if at least some of bear's classmates had not had an encounter with porn by the time they leave primary school.

I think the school is in a good place to give non judgemental and sensible information.  I'm happy for them to teach these lessons, no matter how appalled bear is that I actually read the form and I know that he will be hearing about sex.  Now I just need to navigate the best way to let bear know that it's okay to talk to me and DH if he needs to.  Also, I need to make sure bear doesn't realise how sweet he is when he's mortified.