the Empathy List #113: Dr. Dobson Gave Me the Sex Talk

In 4th grade, a Focus on the Family cassette tape introduced me to the birds and the bees.

Hello friend, Liz here.

My kids are reaching the age when they need to know how babies are made.

They used to know it abstractly—something about mom, dad, private parts, and mom’s tummy—but now they need to know. Like, the details.

Like many of my female evangelical friends, I grew up with very little knowledge of the details of sex, and I only learned certain details ON MY WEDDING NIGHT. (Not kidding.) …My husband knew more about my body than I did.

“Pink Tulip,” Georgia O’Keefe, 1926

In the ‘90s, the way evangelical parents told their kids about sex was to make it a BIG EVENT. The advice of child “experts” went like this: take your kid somewhere fun, and then hole up in a hotel room for the one and only conversation you’ll ever have about sex with your young teenager. Then you’ve done your duty and can ignore the topic for the rest of your lives.

My brother went on a weekend ski trip with my dad. My sister an…