Yes, my father gave it to me, after I asked what “fuck” meant. Being a physician, he gave a very clinical description. I had not to that point felt the slightest glandular tingle, so I found the whole thing both fascinating and mystifying.
My mom was pretty thorough - she explained to me all the parts, their uses and consequences of said uses, then talked to me about the whole love and marriage thing. It was an extremely awkward conversation, but I’m glad that she gave me all the technical terms instead of the cutesy ones.
I’ve heard a few parents at my son’s preschool using cutesy terms (preschoolers sometimes go to the bathroom with the door open) and it drives me bonkers. I don’t care if they talk about their privates; hearing them do it using things like tee-tee makes me cringe, though.
I just got the book, around age 8. Later we had sex ed classes in school and kids had to have a parental permission slip for it–only a couple parents opted out. VD education, however, was mandatory, so I suppose it was possible a student could learn about VD and have no idea how it was spread.
My school district taught “sex ed” in 5th, 7th, and 11th grades. Fifth grade class focused entirely on puberty and not sex per se. Boys and girls were seperated. We watched a film on the changes out bodies were about to/going through, then got gift bags with pamphlets and samples of deoderant, and watched a sports film the rest of the afternoon. The girls had to take first lunch, skip recess, and spent the rest of day in their class.
Seventh grade covered sex and STDs, again boys and girls seperate. It replaced gym class one day. We were also told it was district policy to teach abstinence-only until marriage. Our teacher then told us that was complete rubbish, told us to always, always, always use a condom. He also warned us that “men have no rights” once a baby is involved, had to go along with whatever the mother decided, and these days paternity can be absolutely proven with DNA tests.
Eleventh grade was more of the same, but with added emphasis on abusive relationships, the age of consent, statuory rape, etc. Also it was coed. Homesexuality was never addressed in any way shape or form. Nor was masturbation (granted by then everyone, or at least all the boys, was very familiar with the concept). We also had the STD slideshow. That was segregated by sex and the boys all that to look at dozens of diseased penises, testicles, and male anuses. Some of the slides dating back to WWII. The girls had to watch the female version, but a “Childbirth gone wrong” presentation. Oddly they also shown the male slideshow as well.
I never learned a single thing in school Sex Ed classes that I didn’t already know, and nothing was all that usefull anyway.
Not in one fell swoop, but several times, on the level appropriate for that age. Fairly matter-of-fact, and not much embarrassment on either side, as I recall.
<anecdote> I was once riding in a car somewhere with my sister and her son, who was about eight at the time. Out of a clear blue sky, he asked me, “Uncle Shodan, what’s a blowjob?”
I considered letting his mother field it, but that felt too much like brushing off a genuine question from a child, which I swore I would never do, so I explained the process while giving my sister time to interrupt or take over the explanation should she wish to do so. She didn’t.
</anecdote>
Regards,
Shodan
My mom, being a rather uptight Catholic, explained periods to me, sort of, and showed me how to use the belt and pads (this was in the 60s, before adhesive pads) and told me babies were a gift from God to married couples. I was too scared to ask her about unmarried teenagers and how they fooled God.
Even in “health” class, there was no real discussion of the mechanics of sex - I guess so as not to give us ideas. I pretty much learned it all from dirty jokes, racier gothic romances, and listening. My own daughter was much better informed - I did my best to give her factual, age-appropriate answers whenever she asked.
No, I never got any kind of talk from my parents. I read about it in the World Book Encyclopedia. Under “S” for sex, of course, but also “P” for classical paintings. 
Nope, no talk.
I didn’t get the talk from my parents, but I got it at church. In Sunday school. I was maybe in 3rd grade.
The mechanics of sex didn’t freak me out, but I was pretty astounded at the sizes of things. The guy explaining it said that we were all once smaller than a period on a page. I found that to be an incredible claim. I asked if even he was once that small, and he said yes. This guy was like 8 feet tall. I didn’t believe him.
You know what? I still don’t!
Wow, Shodan, what did you say? I wouldn’t want to brush off a kid with a real question either, but I have no idea where I’d begin with that one.
I don’t recall ever getting A Talk, but there were lots of little talks starting very early. My parents were a little too old and scientific-minded to be real hippies, but they were pretty progressive. We didn’t use any cutesy names, though my mother did say sometimes say “body” with a particular inflection that clarified she was talking about the private parts or aspects of it rather than the whole thing. And Mom had a copy of *The Joy of Sex *in a dresser drawer, where I eventually found it, being, of course, a sneaky rotten kid.
Plus I got sex ed in school: non-segregated discussion of puberty in fifth grade; raising guppies and hatching chicken eggs and talk about conception and pregnancy in sixth; brief discussion of STDs in seventh (which for me was in 1981, before anyone was talking about AIDS); more detailed explanation of STDs, sex, and pregnancy in ninth.
I got a library book, although I think I had a hazy knowledge of things before then.
The only sex question I can remember asking my parents was about the sketch comedy TV show “Bizarre”. I was wondering what the “San Francisco 69ers” was supposed to mean.
I never got a TALK of any sort - my mother pretty much pretended that genitalia didn’t exist.
I learned about sex from reading Clan of the Cave Bear when I was around 6. I still have a sheet of paper I wrote to myself in pink highlighter reminding myself that this was an awful bad Satan book that had dirty things in it. :rolleyes: Needless to say, it left an impression, and I was actively disinterested in learning anything more about the whole deal.
When my little brothers came along, I learned more about their parts than I knew about my own.
I did run across a copy of the Joy of Sex while cleaning a neighbor’s home with my best friend - we sat there for maybe an hour or so being totally grossed out by the illustrations. The only one I distinctly remember involved some dude’s toe. :eek:
I didn’t have my period until I was 17, but that I expected. Oddly enough, mom was pretty open about *that *whole deal, I just never knew it had anything to do with sex. I also by that time was just glad that I started at all, because most everyone else seemed to start somewhere between 10-14. I was glad not to have to deal with it, but I felt a bit freakish to not have one, like I was missing out on this big important girl thing. By the time I started, to put in perspective, several of my classmates had already skipped a school year because they were pregnant, and come back and put their kid in the high school nursery.
Sometime in high school, I also realised that those shivers I got sometimes as a child were orgasms, and I was retroactively completely ashamed of my child self for having dirty impulses. Having a sex drive or hormones wasn’t something encouraged in my parent’s circles.
Everything else about sex I learned on the fly after I got to college, or from watching porn with my girlfriends/boyfriends.
If I ever have kids (debatable) I am SO having talks with the little suckers as soon as they can form complete thoughts. This repression and pretend it doesn’t happen shit ain’t cutting it.
Well, it did rather take me aback, but I had been married (pretty happily) for some years at that point, so at least I was able to answer, and to give some kind of context.
As I recall, I started off with “You know that sex is about feeling love for the other person, and making each other feel good. Well, there are lots of ways to to make each other feel good, not just regular sex with the penis in the vagina and so on. And hugging and kissing feel good, so this is sort of another kind of kissing, where the woman puts the penis in her mouth and moves it up and down so it sort of feels like a vagina. People do lots of things when they are in love with each other, and whatever you both want to do is part of sex and love.”
He seemed to accept that as a reasonable explanation.
Like I say, I swore early on that I would never brush off a genuine question from my children or anyone else’s. Heck, he was eight years old - he has to find out sometime. It was an honest question, and deserved a straight answer.
Thinking back on the experience later, I was actually sort of flattered that he asked me.
Regards,
Shodan
Nope. I got a book about getting my period, and it so embarrassed me that it went right into the bottom drawer of my dresser, where it remains today, 20 years later.
The book was outdated when I got it. It talked a lot about “belts”.
WTF?
Did your mom not think anything was unusual about this? IANAParent, but my understanding is that if your daughter isn’t menstruating by 16, a trip to the doctor is in order. 
Not really. She started at 16, my grandmother started at I think 15, and family legend is that my great grandmother didn’t get hers til she was 20. They thought she was broken for a long time, but then she had like 12 kids or something ridiculous.
I expected to start late, but after 16 came and went, it was more of a "ok, seriously, any time now… " waiting for the other shoe to drop thing.
Wow. Just… wow.
Are the women in your family exceptionally thin? I ask because my understanding is that very low body fat = no periods. Apparently is a bit of a concern for teenage athletes, or something.
I had ‘The Talk’ with my dad. Well, at least, we had an exchange that was supposed to be about the talk. He said let’s talk about this… “Do you have any questions?” me: “Nope.” Him: “Well, I’m glad we had this talk.”
We had sex ed in 5th grade that taught me about the reproductive aspect, but I didn’t under the mechanics of it until seeing some, um, explicit visual aids. I remember being completely shocked that the WHOLE THING went inside the woman. Up until them, I kind of thought you nestled them together…then something happened** and there was ejaculation. I don’t think I knew how the vagina was formed and that there was an actual tube…I kind of just thought the vulva was it.
I had the talk with my mom. In fourth grade. And everything she told me was news to me.
I believe she was vaguely unsettled and maybe even disappointed (?) that I hadn’t already put it together. She kind of had a gentle version of the “do I really have to tell you this?” inflection to her voice.
My five year old, incidentally, has already had the facts explained, very matter-of-factly, by his mom, together with an admonition not to go around talking about it since, like the truth about Santa Claus, this is something most parents don’t tell their kids until later.
Not really… I mean, we don’t tend towards overweight, but we’re all fairly lazy typical couch-potato Americans. We are all pretty tall however, and we have super–freakish-low blood pressure (normal for me is around 80/55), so that might have something to do with it. None of my doctors have ever shown any surprise or concern, so I never thought it was any big deal.