Ask Me Anything

Why don’t I have a willy?

“You are a girl and you have a special private place called a vulva. If you were a boy you would have a special private place called a penis. Some people call a penis a willy.”

Pre-schoolers start to become curious about the sexual differences between boys and girls and compare themselves with others. Use these opportunities to teach your child the correct words for parts of the body and also to clarify some of the words they may hear from other children.

Here is an example answer to this question from your 5 to 9-year-old:

“A period is something a woman gets four or five days every month. Every month a woman’s body gets ready to make a baby. Most of the time she doesn’t make a baby so she has her period and a trickle of blood comes from her vagina. She uses a pad or a tampon to soak up the blood.”

Take this opportunity to show your son or daughter what pads and tampons look like. To prepare your daughter for the time when she is 8 or 9 years old, buy her a supply of pads and tampons to experiment with. Suggest ways to cope with her period if it starts when she is at school or at a friends house. Periods typically begin a year after breast development starts so work out when that could be together.

Do these questions throw you? Don’t let them. They are asked out of curiosity. Your child is interested in the facts of pregnancy and birth, they are not asking about sexual feelings. Most 6 and 7-year-olds imagine babies are somehow manufactured by adults, like supermarket items. However they do seem to realise that both sexes are required.

My friend says a man puts his penis in a lady’s vagina……but it’s not true really.

-Darryn, 7 years

Darryn is not sure who or what to believe. Children hear about sexual intercourse and talk about it among themselves. They often use sex words they have heard from their friends but they may not know what the words mean. This is the beginning of sex talk and joking about sex with peers. They are old enough to understand sexual intercourse if you explain it to them when the opportunity arises.

If your child asks the question, “How are babies made?” a simple answer is to explain in your own words that when a man and a woman are loving each other in a special way the man puts his penis in the woman’s vagina. Some fluid comes out of the penis with sperm in it. The sperm look for an egg cell inside the woman. If they meet a new baby starts to grow.

Children may go on to ask questions about how they will be boys or girls, ask when they are getting a baby sister and are often fascinated by anything unusual, such as Siamese twins. Don’t be surprised if children think sexual activity sounds either ridiculous or disgusting. When a boy saw a couple kissing passionately on a park bench he asked what they were doing. He was told they were kissing and he said, “Yuk, I’m never going to do that!” He has plenty of time to change his mind.

 At age five to nine most children:

• Socialise with their own sex and tend to exclude the other
• Are aware that sexuality can be a tricky topic for some adults, and may ask less questions
• Begin to understand that intercourse occurs apart from making a baby
• Find information about sex from friends and the media
• May engage in sexual exploration with the same sex
• Develop a stronger identity in terms of gender and body image

A concern you may have is that giving your child the facts about sex at this age will take away their innocence, the qualities of wonder and naivety children have. Researchers argue against this however, pointing out that children’s understanding is limited regardless of how much information they are given.

There is a large gap between child and adult reasoning and comprehension. This gap protects young children’s innocence. Although you give them information on sex and sexual matters, they do not understand or act on it in the way adults do.

While our replies to children’s questions are important, they are only part of how we influence them. If you are embarrassed, ignore or delay answering a question your child will quickly conclude that this is a topic that makes Mum or Dad uneasy. Children may think that the topic is just taboo – unmentionable. They may decide to find less reliable sources of information about sexuality such as their friends.

Non-verbal cues – body language, facial expressions, tone of voice, will show children that parents are uncomfortable. If this is how you feel it is best to tell them you are uncomfortable but you are pleased they asked the question, it is important and you are happy to discuss it. You could say that you would rather they asked you than their friends, and if you don’t know the answer you will find out for them.

Tracey, 5, was being teased at school by boys chanting, “Tracey’s got a vagina, Tracey’s got a vagina.” She indignantly told them that she didn’t have a vagina. Later in front of the class she told her male teacher that the boys kept saying she had a vagina even when she told them she hadn’t. Although the teacher handled the situation very well Tracey was embarrassed that she hadn’t known what the boys had been talking about.
By the age of six or seven your child knows that they are either a girl or a boy and that this will not change. They are now very aware of the differences between the sexes and ask questions about them. If your child doesn’t have the opportunity to learn about the differences between male and female at this age they may become obsessively curious at a later time.

So you have work to do. By the time they go to school they need to know what the acceptable words are for the sexual parts of the body, and what the acceptable sexual words are within the family. They also need to know the language others could use. Your child is at risk of being teased by others if they use words they don’t understand or use them incorrectly or inappropriately.

Sexual behaviour between stepchildren can be an issue when stepfamilies are formed and both new partners have children. Stepfamilies bring together children who are biologically unrelated. However in the new stepfamily all the children are deemed to be related by marriage, whether their parent and stepparent are legally married or not. The children are in fact now brothers and sisters. There is a risk of inappropriate sexual experimentation or activity between stepsiblings. Reasons for this are because they are biologically unrelated, or because they are not familiar with each other, or for a number of emotional and other factors.

It is natural for young children to explore each other’s sexual differences in the playful, curious way. However a stepparent may feel more anxious if they weren’t aware of their child exploring in this way before the new family formed and may feel they are doing something unnatural or harmful. Alternatively they may be in a situation where their new partner accuses their children of aberrant behaviour, after observing sex play between the children. Both parents need to decide whether this is within the range of normal behaviours. Sex play is not usually a problem if all the children are happy and are not being secretive.

There may be a situation where one child may try to do something hurtful or embarrassing to a step-sibling. They may do this in order to punish the new parent or even their own parent, especially if they are feeling left out and confused about the new relationship.

What can you do to help?

At any age a child may try to talk to their own parent about the issues and be rejected for a number of reasons. Some parents don’t want to hear that there are conflicts between the children and may feel it is up to the children to sort out their new relationships within the family. The parent may think their child is making up stories, is misinterpreting the situation, or trying to get a sibling into trouble.

If your child is appearing sad, withdrawn, or has had a major change in their behaviour and tries to tell you about a sexual situation, take it seriously. Show them that you are listening and that they are doing the right thing in talking to you. Tell them you won’t blame them for whatever is happening and that you will do something about it. Don’t hesitate to seek professional advice.

With a new baby in the family older children can feel left out and jealous of the attention the baby is getting. This is most apparent while a mother breastfeeds her baby. Older children may ask to breastfeed too, either to have the same intimacy with their mother, or merely to see what it feels like. Many mothers do not feel comfortable allowing this to happen.

Your older child is well able to feed themselves and there is now an unstated rule that your breast is private. You could say this to your older child but give them lots of cuddling and attention, say why they are special, and point out all the skills they have that the baby hasn’t learned yet.

How should you deal with your 4-year-old son if he is constantly holding or rubbing his penis? The message you want to give him is that it is okay for him to play with his penis but it is something he should do in private. Tell him,

Rubbing your penis is something you do in private, so you can do that in your bedroom, which is a private place. You don’t do that in front of other people.

This will let him know that there’s nothing wrong with what he’s doing, but that it will embarrass other people if he does it when they’re around. If you are anxious about talking with your child about sensitive subjects, rehearse the words and the subject matter beforehand.

A group of women were sharing stories about their children and one mentioned that her four-year-old had charged into their bedroom while she and her husband were making love. “Thank God that’s never happened to us!” said her friend.

Many parents agree. Why are they anxious? Apart from the embarrassment they are often concerned that their child will lose their innocence about sex. But children at this age only have a limited understanding of sex in spite of what they have seen you doing. In their eyes you are playing games or having fun together. In some cases they may think you are fighting or even hurting each other.

Gemma could hear her parents making noises and when she went to investigate could see her mother was getting squashed underneath her father. She tried to push him off saying, “Get off Mummy, you are hurting her”.

Gemma’s mother can give her reassurance that she isn’t hurt and that they are having fun together. Respond to your child’s presence in a natural way and they will not be concerned by what they have seen. You can either put your own needs on hold for awhile or think of something more interesting for Gemma to do in another room.

A three-year-old cannot grasp the concept that babies are made or that time existed before they were born. They think that babies simply exist. They don’t usually understand or ask about sexual intercourse. However in the next few years they will develop some idea that babies are made by parents. They want to know where babies come from, how babies get into a mother’s body and how they get out. If they ask how babies are made they need a simple answer. It is usually enough to say that the baby is made when the father puts a special seed into the mother’s womb where it joins up with a tiny soft egg.

Your child will relate the terms you use to what they know. If you talk about a seed growing in Mummy’s tummy they may imagine a plant growing in soil in her stomach. If you talk about eggs they usually think of a hen’s egg, which has a brittle shell. If you notice your child is confused think about the words you have used. Asking them to tell you what they think will give you the chance to clear up any misunderstandings.

They may ask, “Did I grow in Mummy’s tummy?” and “How did I get out?”. Try to answer in simple language but use the correct words. “A special place in Mummy’s tummy called the womb” or “When you were ready to be born the womb helped to push you through a stretchy opening called the vagina between Mummy’s legs”.

Both boys and girls have questions about their bodies. It is important to teach both boys and girls about the anatomy of both sexes and to explain that there’s a special reason why their bodies are different.