What I Want My Daughters (and sons) to Know About Sex

Hopefully e-Mom will forgive me if I stray slightly from her designated topic for this Marriage Monday--Mothers and Daughters Talk About Love. As I considered what to write, all that came to me was "the talk" I had recently with my younger daughter. Forgive me for having sex on the brain (you IRL friends, stop laughing right now!), but finding the worldly view of it too shallow, I make sure my kids know a fundamental truth about sex.

It's not just physical.

Something much deeper happens when two people come together in sexual union, more significant than our society will admit. Sex creates an emotional and spiritual connection, forever linking a couple even after the physical act is complete. It is serious business, not to be taken lightly or flippantly, not to dismiss as "a good time," not merely an activity.

Sex is God's way of bonding a couple together for life.

When I explain it to my kids, I liken it to scotch tape. If you put two pieces of tape together, sticky sides in, they bond pretty tightly almost immediately. Try as you might, it is hard to rip apart, nearly impossible to do without damaging the tape. If you do get the pieces separated, they aren't as sticky anymore and adhering them to something else isn't quite as effective.

Uniting our body with another binds us together like that tape. We become one, physically, emotionally and spiritually. We establish a connection which makes it tough to part without pain. And if we are able to separate from that person, the ripping apart makes us distrustful and wary, affecting our ability to bond with another.

It explains a lot about men or women who remain with someone they know isn't good for them. If they've slept with them, they've formed an invisible tie that is hard to break. And what about wives who find their disheveled bed head husbands cute or men who remain attracted to their wives through stretch marks and wrinkles? Aren't they able to do so because their connection goes beyond the physical?

We need to tell our children to protect their tape, not only for their own purity, but also to ensure the best bond with their future mate. "Saving oneself for marriage" is about more than preserving virginity. It is about providing the best possible soil for a marriage to succeed.


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Photo Credit: jepoirrier