My parents said that they would let me drink under their supervision once I turned 16. I didn’t take them up on the offer because i wasn’t interested. Any time my Mom lit a cigarette I would start talking about how bad it was for her. So they never felt a need to talk to me about other drugs. Eventually when I waa 20 I let a girl talk me into drinking with her at her place when her parents were out of town, and she’s my wife now.
For sex, my parents were like “you talked about that stuff in school right? You know to use protection?” And I was like, “yeah I’m good”.
I was a responsible youth, the one in the friend group always thinking about the consequences and long-term effects of actions. My parents knew they didn’t have to worry about me.
Back when I was in elementary school, I had a classmate named “Noah Bates” and they called him Master Bates as a joke. I didn’t understand at the time so I want home and asked my mom why they kept calling him that, and why this was supposed to be funny. She couldn’t explain, was all flustered, and eventually said that it was a sexual innuendo, which I also didn’t understand the meaning of. We never had any other serious discussions about sex or drugs. Parents never drank alcohol even so I figured it was a non-starter with them.
We had sex ed in high school, but they spoke of it in terms my brain didn’t understand. “It’s better than any drug” yes but I haven’t done any drugs yet, so that is a meaningless comparison to me. A pretty dry and technical rundown of it. The DARE officer brought that suitcase full of drugs that shows you what each one is supposed to look like, and all I remember is wondering what they all did. I also had to write a paper on why drugs were bad, and I got hallucinogens as a topic. The only thing I could come up with that misconstruing a dangerous situation and injuring yourself.
There wasn’t any, they just signed the sex education and DARE forms schools sent home with me and left it up to government and pigs.
Sex education was decent, I recall two courses. One in elementary and another in high school. DARE was as useless as everyone already says, so no need to elaborate I think.
There never were any conversations about either.
Never had either of those conversations with my parents. They drank heavily, fought constantly, and for the last 5-6 years of their marriage we lived in an abandoned house so it probably wouldn’t have been a great talk. Instead I just swore I’d be different and in most ways I am.
How do you live in an abandoned house for 6 years? That is occupied?
I suppose it was. The method is drive down dirt roads until you think you see a roof poking through the brush. Take the address to the courthouse and look up who owns the land, then call. We lived there for free, granted it was an old drafty house and was missing window panes here and there. Those we filled with cardboard or plywood (cut to fit the hole), and tapped into place. Our bathroom didn’t have a door, sink (it had a sink, but it was never hooked up), or floor leading up to it (just step joist to joist and don’t rush or you could fall into the dirt/mud under that end of the house).
I’m in my 40s now and just in the past decade or so did I realize how bad it looked from the outside looking in, but to a kid, that was just life. I thought everyone had multiple refrigerators because when one quits working, you just go to the auction and get another to put beside it, as kids we thought it was funny to tell guests to open the other one because it got insanely gross after a while (maggots, black slime that food eventually turned into, etc.).
There’s a lot in this little story that is wild to me, but you had guests
All I know is plastic wrap is not the same as a condom. Also don’t forget it after getting the wendys.
Mom and dad never said much about drugs or alcohol, but they never did drugs or drank, Or at least I never saw evidence of them drinking and doing drugs.
Sex, on the other hand, they were and still are kinda weird about. They picked on me for being attracted to women/girls (I’m male) and the idea that I might find a man attractive was too horrible an idea for them to even entertain the thought of. (I’m not exactly on one side of the ol’ Kinsey scale) This caused issues with me as a teenager of course, and colored my interactions with people until I’d met a few nice women who weren’t weird about sex.
The weirdest thins is they still get weird and accusatory about sex. They at least keep it to themselves since the incident where I had to finally say “You guys know im in my 40’s, right? That tall cougar-looking woman over there? I’m married to her. I Have a kid with her. This is normal human life. We don’t require your advice or judgement.”
I was about 8 years old: “You wanna know what beer tastes like? Here, gross right? So you’re never going to drink one again right?”
He did the same with cigarettes immediately after.
In my teen years: “I’m not going to lie to you son, sex feels great. But if you do it with the wrong person it can ruin the rest of your life and you’ll never get to do it again so make sure she’s right for you before you do it or you’ll regret it for the rest of your life”
no drug talk; my mother sat me down at age ten and gave me such a dry, clinical description of intercourse that I had no idea what she was talking about. It wasn’t until a few years later when I was reading books with some mildly steamy sex scenes that it hit me: “–oh! This was what mom was talking about.”
Basically don’t use drugs or you’ll destroy your life.
Sex was avoided as a topic, but we were taught that premarital sex is a sin. I was also teased as a kid about having crushes on girls (I’m male), despite my adament (and truthful) denials, and othertimes they’d joke that I’d change my mind once I was older. I won that though - turns out I was gay and never did change my mind.
As for LGBT issues, it was so taboo / not talked about that I didn’t even connect my confusing feelings for male classmates with me being gay until I was 18. I thought everyone felt like that and was frustrated when they wouldn’t reciprocate those emotions back.
I genuinely can’t remember my parents ever talking to me about sex.
Catholic middle school “educated” me. I remember going to see a lady who yelled out a dozen or two names of various STIs as part of some abstinence bullshit.
Honestly not sure if it was a good or bad thing that I didn’t really know I was gay back then. but I sure as hell am glad I went to public high school instead of a catholic one.
I never really got a sex talk that I can remember, but my mom once told me “don’t do drugs but, if you do, do them with me so I can make sure you do them right.”
Given some books about girls puberty. Talked about sex should be consensual. Dad being dad said if it wasn’t tell him and he take care of it
Don’t do that!!! Cause most people don’t want other people to be killed!! Especially a young scared girl! Fuck man.
Also had several classes about it. One in regular school, one with a rabbi. Both were fine.
Mother also gave me a condom when I got my second boyfriend. It was ribbed. I did not want to know this.
From what I remember, pretty casual. I was real young when I first heard about boners on a ytp video, but I don’t think my mom explained what it was because I was too young. Otherwise, it was chill on the sex front. Got a talk from my dad for some reason on a 2 person paddle boat on a lake. Otherwise, that’s all I can remember of my parents talking sex ed to me, which is fine since I am a pretty safe sex positive person despite never doing it with anything but my hand.
As for drugs, also pretty relaxed. My parents wouldn’t wanna see us doing any hardcore drugs but are fine with drugs in most situations. Exception being things like when doctors wanted to give an adult dose of addictive pain killers to my older brother who was pre-teen at the time. They would also rather we do drugs at home in case something happens. Same thing with drinking. They’re also okay with weed, but I am the only person in the immediate family who doesn’t do it ar all ( health reasons ).
Same rules applied to alcohol, but I never really drank until legal age because I was more boring as a teen than I currently am.
Limited, although I knew just from some kind of diffusion that either makes you a worthless person bound for hell.
The funny thing is, I think they would have both been horrified to hear it put that way. But, that’s what had been drilled into them, and the attitudes stuck even if that’s not what they intellectually believed.
