Having "The Talk" With My Daughter

Everybody knows when this mommy is about to get her period. The PMS usually rings in a pretty good warning that I am about to dispose of my egg. I put it that way because when my daughter started to recognize that it was the time of the month due to the fact that she never leaves me for a millisecond, she wanted to know what the deal was. So I just told her we released our egg if it wasn’t fertilized. As we do.

She’s been asking a few questions about how do you make babies. All I’d answered was you usually need a man and a woman.

In third grade kids are given the opportunity to rear eggs in incubators to the point of hatching. They run experiments such as shining a light through the egg to monitor the embryo, so when it came to egg hatching at school my kid became very interested in how babies are made and started to ask basic questions like “How does the baby get inside your belly?” and “What fertilizes the egg?”

We do talk pretty openly about how babies are born, but we’ve never really touched on how they are made . I explained that you need a man to fertilize the egg. This minuscule explanation wasn’t going to be the end of it. I was sure of that, and it wasn’t.

“What you need to do is love each other so much that a baby is created, it’s called making love”.

“But Mom, I don’t get it. How is the man involved? Does he buy the baby from doctor?”.

“How does the baby get inside your belly”

“Ok! Ok there IS a penis involved!”

The word penis alone makes me embarrassed as we don’t generally use anatomically correct names for ‘privates’ where I come from (so one’s penis is a willy). That’s when even I have to admit I felt I’d gone a little too far. I needed to dumb that down to a PG rated explanation. It’s really difficult to answer such on the spot, direct questions from an 8 year old. Even harder when you don’t have the tendency to sugar coat life.

That answer did not really quench the thirst of her curiosity, no it just instigated more in-depth questions to which I had all the answers, much to my husband’s surprise.

So we spent the rest of our Sunday morning debating what family activity we could summon up enough energy for. The mere mention of a hike is enough to retreat all of my family members back to their electronic devices however it’s my favorite form of exercise. So, without even mentioning the word hike or the fact we will be requiring two bottles of water per person I was quite pleased with myself that no protests had been voiced when I began to load the family back pack.

Then in the car on the way to our local beauty spot my protege blurted out, “Mom does the penis rub on the vagina and then pee on it?”

“No dear the penis goes INSIDE the vagina”.

Now it’s at this point my other half just looked like his liberalness was going to drive itself to the nearest gun show and buy himself a shot gun.

After the walk the usual bartering for some sort of sugar started and all was forgotten until the next time...

Every day for about a week my kid came home and told me someone had mentioned penis’ and had guessed the role that it has during the baby making ‘event’ so I started to search high and low for the sex talk book I’d picked up at my local thrift store, hoping that next time I’d be armed and ready for the barrage of questions she was going to hurl my way.

Well as with most of my thrift finds I’d squirreled it away for the time I’d need it and obviously it wasn’t filed in the bookshelf under the ‘what to do when your child asks about sex’ section. I was kind of bummed as it was from the ‘70’s and it had classic illustrations.

At bedtime it is usual,once I’ve utilized my last mili-ounce of energy while reading for a series of random requests to be belted out,they are designed to prolong the final good night kiss. This night it wasn’t a need for a night light or a fresh band aid for her two week old scab or the gap in the curtains to be closed tighter. No it was, “So if it’s not pee what fertilizes the egg mom?”

“Errrrrrrrrrrrm”.

“You want to know how our egg is fertilized?”

“Err yeeeeeah”

“Sperm,yes that’s what it’s called it’s sperm”.

“Night then”

“Good night pet lamb”.

See it wasn’t that bad was it?

As I was climbing down the loft bed ladders I just couldn’t bite my tongue.

“Just remember if you see a penis one day just imagine how many vaginas it’s been inside.”

“Eeeeeeuuuuuuw!”.

Hence she was briefly educated on STD’s and the need for a glove for the penis.

“Night then”.

The next few days passed with no mention of penis’ or babies until we were all driving to dinner.

“Mom, what position do you need to be in to make sure you make a baby?”

This was enough to make both my hubby and my eyes pop out of their sockets.

“That’s the fun part figuring it out”.

No he didn’t crash the car.

I feverishly looked for the thrifted sex-ed book and found it under a pile of unopened packages of vintage Pyrex. It’s called ‘Where did I come from’ by Peter Mayle illustrated by Arthur Robins. I left it on the kitchen table in hopes that it would answer any further questions.

I waited for a few days and asked if my kid had read it to which she replied,

“Mom it’s a bit inappropriate isn’t it?”.

I’m waiting for the next inquisition and am no better prepared that I was before. I’m just winging it like most of us, and will just try to limit my answers to succinct ones in order not to put too many ideas into my little one’s head.

I wonder if the chastity belt will ever make a come back?

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About the Author
Jo Harper is a stay at home mom of one, home cook, baker and chief bottle washer. The eldest of a blended family with 9 kids. She cannot even throw away that tiny plastic tie you get on a bread bag. She is constantly thrifting vintage sewing patterns and fabric then starting a project but never completing it. A recent transplant from California to Oregon but is a Yorkshire lass at heart.