Rachel Simon is a clinical psychotherapist & educator specializing in LGBTQ+ youth & young adults. She is the author of "The Every Body Book" & "The Every Body Book of Consent", out now!
542: Consent & Sexuality in an Accepting Home
Rachel Simon
In this conversation, Hunter Clarke-Fields and Rachel Simon discuss the importance of sexuality education, creating a shame-free environment for children, and the role of consent in parenting. Rachel shares insights on age-appropriate discussions about sex and the impact of media on children's understanding of sexuality. The conversation highlights the importance of fostering an accepting environment for children to explore sexuality safely.
Ep 542- Rachel Simon
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*This is an auto-generated transcript*
Rachel Simon: Raise your hands if you would like your children to have positive sexual relationships in their lives. Most of the parents like raise their hands pretty immediately, but I don't think that we think about our role in helping that be true.
Hunter: You are listening to the Mindful Mama Podcast, episode #542. Today we're talking about consent and sexuality in an accepting home with Rachel Simon. Welcome to the Mindful Mama Podcast. Here it's about becoming a less irritable, more joyful parent. At Mindful Mama, we know that you cannot give what you do not have, and when you have calm and peace within, then you can give it to your children. I'm your host, Hunter Clarke-Fields. I help smart, thoughtful parents stay calm so they can have strong, connected relationships with their children. I've been practicing mindfulness for over 25 years. I'm the creator of the Mindful Parenting Course and Teacher Training, and I'm the author of the International Bestseller, “Raising Good Humans Every Day”, and “The Raising Good Humans Guided Journal”.
Hello and welcome to The Mind Mama Podcast. In this episode, I'm gonna be talking to Rachel Simon, who is a clinical psychotherapist and educator specializing in LGBTQ+ youth and young adults, and she's the author of the “Every Body Book” and the “Every Body Book of Consent”, which is out now. We're gonna talk about the importance of sexuality, education, the importance of creating shame-free environments for kids, and the role of consent in parenting. So that means, boundaries, right? And talking, having open communication, etc. So we'll talk about age appropriate discussions you can have. Listen, don't escape this episode, because it's uncomfortable to think about- sex stuff is so helpful and we have a good time. I think you'll really enjoy it. So let's dive into my conversation with Rachel Simon.
Hey, I wanna let you know that I'm now offering lunch and learn talks for your workplace to bring practical, mindfulness and mindful parenting tools right where they're needed most. Whether you're a working parent trying to juggle it all, or you want to support the parents in your company. These talks are designed to nourish and empower. Here are just a few of the topics I've been sharing recently: calm in the chaos, how to talk so kids will listen. how to stop yelling at your kids. I offer mindfulness practices and parenting insights for working parents and caregivers. Simple ways to stay centered in the swirl of work and life. If you are in HR or a parent group, or you want to bring this kind of support to your workplace, reach out to me at support@mindfulmamamentor.com. Let's make the workplace a little more mindful in parenting, a lot more peaceful.
Rachel, thanks so much for coming on the podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm looking forward to talking to you. We have some like slightly uncomfortable things to talk about, as always happens when we talk to people. Who are sexuality education people here. But first I wanna start with a little about you, because I always think it takes a very special person to go into the work of teaching people about sexuality. So I'm just curious about you and your childhood. What was your childhood like and how were you raised?
Rachel Simon: Sure. I think of my childhood as quite a happy one. I always felt safe, loved. And nurtured. I grew up in the DC suburbs and both of my parents were present and encouraging of all of my interests and my curiosities and were involved in my life. And my younger brother is a key part of all of my memories that we bickered like crazy. It was also so protective of him and parental to him.
Hunter: Were you the oldest child?
Rachel Simon: Yes just the two of us. And we were close with my extended family. Got to spend a lot of time together doing fun things, going to meaningful places. And I think in terms of my own sexuality education, I was very lucky to have parents who answered my many questions and took me to the library to find resources to fill in so much information I wondered about. And I would say pretty close to completely shame-free environment where my parents would share their values and hopes for me, but then ask me about mine as those developed. And I'm very grateful for that as I know very much that experience is not universal.
Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. We hope that we would wanna create a shame-free environment, but I imagine that, I know that's definitely very far from the truth in what's happening in our country in a lot of different places. But maybe you can talk to that, like this idea of a shame-free environment. What is it that your parents created for you that, and what did that do for you? Or what does the idea of a shame-free environment do for kids as they're developing? I think, bodies, everybody has a body and bodies as this neutral and often positive thing that do plenty of things for us and.
Rachel Simon: So in terms of a shame-free body, like I didn't really grow up thinking that any of my body parts were shameful or wrong. They just were, and they deserved health. And we, it was okay to talk about them if there was, especially if there was anything going wrong, my parents would want to know. And also just to think about sex and sexuality and a sexual self as. This lifelong thing that had a lot of both responsibility and also pleasure and just exploring your own body and your own privacy and not really being told that was a terrible thing or that anything terrible would happen if you got to know your body in that type of way. I think it allowed me to be a healthier and more communicative adult as well. Just not having really deep and reinforced hangups about my body being bad or sexuality being bad, or like self touch being bad. Yeah, it's interesting. Like my, I think my parents strive for that.
They tried to be open hippies, but it was the early 80’s and they would walk around the house naked. And so would my brother who was two and a half years older and I was like, this is horrible. Don't do this. No. And I was like considered like the prude of the house and I guess in a weird way, like not really shame, but they kinda were like, what's wrong with the hunter's? Like ruining our nice open hippie thing because I was like, oh. I was like, no, I don't. Wow. That's such a fabulous example of consent though, right? Because there's a way in which, people's liberation is really wonderful, but everybody's comfort and everybody's consent is actually really valuable. So there are differing levels of Yeah. When people might crave something like privacy or when people might crave a little bit more yeah. Modesty, like those aren't bad words. And so to be able to say my most comfortable environment or my safest environment is one where I don't show off my body or I'm not seeing anybody else's body right now is also, there's nothing wrong with that.
Hunter: Yeah. It's interesting. I was listening to, I listen to, sometimes I listen to the Armchair Expert podcast and I thought that was really interesting 'cause. The host, Dax Sheppard was talking about how in their family they've done that kind of like people are naked. And then he was like, and and he was like, and I'm just kinda like looking out for clues that at some point this will be not like a cool thing for my kids. And I'm, I was wondering like, what would that be like, would it be like me being like, or would it be something else? If you, if somebody's in a household like that, what would, I dunno, maybe you could tell us.
Rachel Simon: I think that's an interesting question because, one of the things that I talk with families so much about is that family norms and family comfort as a unit they come together because everybody's curious about each individual perspective and that we don't often ask young children about their perspective. We normally say here are the rules. You could follow them and here are the consequences when you do not follow them. With something like shared family values or shared family norms, those usually come to be with conversation and hopefully with more communication, even if it comes up. In the sort of nonverbal, ah, like to me, that tells me that, young, you might have been feeling discomfort. And so maybe a parent can lean into that and say, oh, it seems like you're feeling uncomfortable. Do you feel okay telling me a little bit about that? Or what in this situation might make you feel more comfortable?
And those are the foundational tools of consent conversations with our kids to be able to say. I just heard I just witnessed a nonverbal display and I wanna know more about that. So everybody feels safe and comfortable here.
Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. And I'm wondering, like you have the language of, I just witnessed a nonverbal display, but not everybody that you would probably use that language. I might say something more yeah, it looked like from, your body and how you're reacting that you don't feel so good about something like this. You might say something more like that.
Rachel Simon: Yeah. Yeah. Shifting everything to developmentally appropriate language, like I don't think I would say nonverbal display to the three and a half year old sitting in my house. We do talk a lot about, your body is showing me, or I'm seeing that. Yeah. And I think that when we talk about consent at every age, teaching consent at every age I think how parents begin conversations at a developmentally appropriate level is a question I often get because obviously it evolves as kids grow older, but even with a preverbal child with a very young child, it can be as simple as beginning to narrate what you're doing as you're doing a diaper change, explaining anatomically correct names for body parts as they learn words, or reinforcing those very simple ideas about what they're allowed to say yes and no to, and really celebrating their yeses and their nos. I do or I don't like that saying to a preverbal child, oh. It looked like you didn't like that squeeze, so we're not gonna squeeze that way anymore. Or it looked like you did not like it when the doggy kissed your face. Let's keep your body safe and move them away. And then I think as it evolves with a toddler, with my toddler, we continue that respect for bodily autonomy by not making them hug or kiss anyone. They don't want to, not forcing them to share something really special and instead inviting them to see the natural benefit or consequence for of how they play and interact. And helping them begin to make independent choices about things like how much food their belly needs from their dinner plate. Things that help them get in touch with their body and their power. And again, narrating the safety pieces of the puzzle when you have to do things for their safety, I need to cut your nails to keep your body and my body safe. So which nail should we cut first? Or I had to grab your body because you were about to run into the street. And it's my job to keep your body safe and plenty of that repetition about, when they might be upset at not having full control. Oh yeah. Yeah. Because I obviously, I think like when we talk about teaching consent, we think about it in a young age. That's such a great place to start is like consent in all kinds of ways, right?
Like you totally consent in, yeah. It's okay for you to say no if. Somebody wants to touch your hair or if you don't wanna give someone a hug, or, even like non-touch things, right? Like there, there are a lot of great ways to teach consent. I don't know, I'm blanking right now. Maybe you can help me on some examples of non-sexual ways to teach consent.
Hunter: Oh, sure. I think the sharing example is a really good one. The food example is a really good one. The, comfort with space between you and an animal, or you and another person. Example there's so many ways that we talk about being empowered to say yes or say no, or say I'm comfortable or I'm not comfortable with that, and be able to set boundaries. Okay, so what if there are places where you. You are wanting to, like for food, for example, right? So there's like a, there's a lot, people have a lot of different. Opinions about food. We know that. We know that, we know that Todd, you know when kids get to be moving, that they start to really dislike bitter foods that often are vegetables and things like that because, maybe it's because we evolved and once they start moving, we don't want them just eating random plants.
Rachel Simon: If we are hunter gatherers, but we also know that nobody maybe loves broccoli the very first time they taste it. Just no one loves beer the first time they taste beer, right? Or coffee or, but then we end up like loving this thing that we stick with. So take food, like in our house, we had a rule that you don't have to eat it, but you must taste it. We explained this rule because it was very much because yeah, like you're not gonna like things that you are ultimately you're gonna really love at first, the first time, couple times you taste it 'cause you have to get used to it. Your mouth gets used to it. And we explained that, mom, mommy and daddy drink beer and wine. We love it. Like we hated it the first couple times we tasted it or took our coffee and we explained it to some things like that. But. If we are also wanting to teach consent, we want kids to be able to say no when they wanna say no or yes, when they want 'em to say yes. But then maybe in this case, like we're actually wanting them to be like, yeah, you wanna say no, but I want you to say yes right now. Just at least a little bit. Like what? How would you navigate. Like something, a situation like that. Yes. And we navigate it all the time. Our three and a half year old has the be just of beige plates.
There are a couple of things that align with our family values. We do. We love to try new things. We love to give something a chance before we say we don't like it. And so we will definitely encourage tasting new things or one, one thing to try, but we take, we take the approach of having a learning bowl. And he knows that if he smells it, if he feels it, if he boops it, with his mouth or with his tongue, or if he takes a bite that he never has to swallow anything that oh, yeah, tastes really yucky or anything that he doesn't, he's not a fan of.
And then he can say, no thank you. That's not my favorite. And he says that to mo to most new things. But the, it's not an expectation, it's an invitation. And again, this is a conversation about shared family values and aligning with family values. Of course there are going to be things that he has to do for his health, but I'm not gonna die on the hill that eating this broccoli is like really the thing I'm going to force him to do. If he is. Really not comfortable with doing it. Will I encourage him to feel it, to learn something about it, to boop it a little bit, to know something about its smell or its texture or its taste. Sure. But I think that it has helped to give him final say of what goes into his body. And the same thing like we're not clean plate club. Oh God. People either we're not going to make him sit and, finish a plate. We want him to be able to have a little bit more body trust where he can decide I feel hungry, or I feel full. And that doesn't mean we give him free reign, we'll, we decide what's on the menu and he decides what goes into his body. Yeah. Yeah. And we always try and make sure there are a couple of his safer foods on the menu, for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I think that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. Obviously, I should say, like along with. You must taste it came along with yeah, and you can spit it out if you don't like it.
Hunter: I think people are afraid that teaching kids. Might be afraid that teaching kids consent and bodily autonomy means that like you can say no to your parents, and we're parents are worried about disobedience, for kids' safety or different reasons. And for the feeling of respect and things like that. What do you say to, do you come across that as an issue and what do you say to a parent who might be worried about that?
Rachel Simon: I think so, I think it usually comes it usually comes because as parents or new parents, we're speaking from our own experiences and generationally there is a pretty big divide between the mutual respect between parent and child versus, the type of obeying. You'll do it because I said so. And I think that takes a lot of unpacking and relearning and, like we don't just roll over and take it when our kid is being mean or destructive in our house. There's consequences for behaviors. Like all we use the all emotions are welcome. All behaviors are not in our house, which I think has been really useful. But disobedience doesn't mean for me what I think it, it might mean in the minds of, more authoritarian style parents, because for me, if I'm witnessing disobedience again verbally or non-verbally, I'm thinking there's an unmet need here.
And that's my, that's my frame as a therapist, of course. So we're, sitting in the corner talking with a three and a half year old about feelings a lot more than the average household, I think. But. Yeah, when I think about disobedience, I'm thinking about if there's a behavior I need to stop. Sure. I can, keep a body safe or help with a consequence or even just watch a natural consequence occur. But I'm not super interested in obedience for the sake of obedience. In, in terms of a power. Struggle with me and my kid. I want to be able to respect my kid. And to say, yeah, I'm the parent and you're the kid, and that means I have to make way more decisions and I do have more power and control, but I'm not really interested in wielding that in a way just to show that I can, I don't necessarily think that makes a kid have an intrinsic wish to follow those rules.
Hunter: No. Quite the opposite actually. And so you're at the one end with a three and a half year old. My 17 and a half year old just biked by my window, going to do her chocolate wrapping job. And nice. And I have to say that now at the other end, at 17 it really does for those, maybe your listener, you're listening to Rachel and saying, oh, I don't know. It sounds. So that sounds a little scary, right? Too gentle. Too gentle. It actually does work to like when you get, show your kids respect and respect their opinions and listen to them and model that and have this gentler way of doing things that. My kids do respect me in a major way, and they do listen to me and they do care about what I think too. So when, giving what you want to receive in some way it may seem it's not for the listener, like it. And they seem oh, I'm trusting that this will work someday, like when your kids are really little. But I wanna just say that as somebody who is oh gosh, I hope this will ultimately be okay.
Rachel Simon: I'm so glad to hear that. Because I also think that there's a confusion between authoritative parenting and permissive, right? Like my house isn't some house where we just have no boundaries and no rules and no consequences, and we're just like. We are ceding power to the three and a half year old, because I don't think kids necessarily benefit from that either.
No, that doesn't feel safe. No, it's not safe. And again, it's a mutual respect, right? So I think we're in the process of helping teach him. I. You know what is a welcome behavior and you can always have your feelings and opinions about what's going on. You don't have to be happy about the boundary that I'm setting, and we can pause and really talk through your feeling about it. But the decision I made, the boundary doesn't actually change. And that can be disappointing and frustrating at times, but he also knows how to work through that disappointment and that frustration.
Hunter: I love that. Okay, what is an appropriate age to discuss the details of sex with kids? And now, and we know that now we're like coming we're a more evolved human beings and we know that not only do LGBTQ+ people exist, but that sex can mean many things and it means maybe more than just like the heteronormative, like you're, a penis or a penis goes in a vagina and makes a baby. Because that's how it's been discussed for many years. So from that inclusive lens then, like when, what is the age appropriate ways to talk about the details of sex and what would you Yeah, I'll let you take it from there.
Rachel Simon: Yeah. It is a fantastic question. I think when a child is old enough to ask a question, they're usually old enough to get a developmentally accurate answer. Although there might be different ways of answering maybe a specific, how is a baby made question If your kid is three versus six versus nine? There are many honest answers at each of these ages that don't break their brains. And as you said sexual orientation and gender identity are actually great topics to further that point, because there's a clear and unfortunate discourse that is present politically now where there's this insistence that kids are just too young to even know what gay or trans means, and that those of us who are offering inclusive education or being explicit about specific sex acts, or we're grooming children with information that they don't need, and, i'm not really sure what they're imagining those conversations looking but just to pull back the curtain, what is actually happening is that, a child's. Like mine, for example, might have books or dolls or exposure to certain media where there are families just like his and families that are different than his, where there are representations of different families, different bodies and diverse sets of people where that diversity might show up in race or religion or ability or sexual orientation and gender. So again, my three-year-old is aware that some people with his body parts are boys and some are not. He's aware that people who love each other can be partners or live together and be married one day if they want to. He's aware that some families like ours have LGBTQ plus people in them, and that is great. And that's cool for three year olds that's nearly it. The nuances might come a bit later. And about the age of six to seven is when I've had folks let me know that my first book, “The Every Body Book” has been a helpful tool. For answering some of the questions that their kids have about sex. Reproduction scientifically accurate and inclusive language and piece by piece based on the specific questions that the kid is asking at that time. Yeah.
Hunter: So you sent me your new book, the everybody book with consent, which I'm loving. And so we had our podcast our podcast integrator, get your other book. Which you just mentioned, and she has younger kids and she's oh my goodness. Like I, I can see my son like really cringing and like really being very uncomfortable about reading this book. And I thought, then maybe that's like good that he could just have it to check out when nobody else is around. Do you find that your books are used that way?
Rachel Simon: I do because of the interesting age range especially for “The Every Body Book”, which is marketed to 7-12 year olds. Yeah. I find that those 6, 7, 8 year olds are maybe they'll go to their parents or ask a specific question that parents will open the book to a specific page and answer the question With this resource together the 11, 12 year olds, I would say, are the ones who take the book, make no eye contact, sneak away to a corner and say, don't look at me. Don't talk to me. I've got this. But it depends. It depends on the developmental sort of space that the kid is in, what specific questions they might have. We don't need to overwhelm a kid with answers to questions that they're not even asking for yet. That is a wonderfully some parents with amazing intentions are like, let's have this amazing, huge talk about sex and sexuality. But it's not always necessary. And kids use the books as resources. I would say the everybody book of consent is bigger words, maybe for 10 to 14 year olds, the middle school age. And usually they're gonna probably use that resource maybe a little bit more on their own. Yeah, that's what I was thinking, that it would be ta talking about it on their own.
Hunter: Yeah. If we're having these conversations if a parent's having a conversation about, they've worked up the courage to read the book or to have a conversation and they see like their kid is getting visibly uncomfortable, what should they do? Because maybe you might know you're, my kid's 10, like they're probably seeing whatever on their friend's phones, on the bus. I don't want them to be uninformed. I want them to get information from me, but they're they're giving me signs that they're visibly uncomfortable. So how should parents navigate that kind of thing? The awkwardness is definitely to be expected and. I think we can all remember our own conversations with parents or wherever we got the sources of sexuality information these days versus when we were growing up are really vast and sometimes really beyond what we would consider safer, appropriate for our own kids.
So I like how you highlighted that. As parents, we also wanna be a good and safe source of sexuality information because at the very least, hopefully we'll have better information than what is just randomly out there for kids. But. I always encourage parents to push through especially their own emerging discomfort, their own and their child's discomfort in the name of safety, because this is our job, our most important job to keep our kids safe and being a safe person for them to have ongoing dialogue about all the topics under the massive umbrella of sex and sexuality.
Rachel Simon: It's a great goal, but it often does include some eye rolls, some awkward moments, some like deep breaths. And I think like we were talking about before, it's also okay to notice visible discomfort and name that and ask if the kid needs a break or name. If you need a break. But I would say that I think an important reframing of sexuality in 2024 in our conversations with our kids is to move away from so many of our references or assumptions about the big talk.
I. The birds and the bees talk and towards that ongoing dialogue with kids that never really ends and isn't this one marathon conversation that the kids aren't even asking for. And my colleague Al Rnao in this area actually teaches parents that sex talks don't boil down to one 1000 minute conversation and instead having 1,001 minute conversations while your kid is running out the door.
That broach an array of topics and often span years and years. Because like you were saying before, consent is non-sexual most of the time, and wanting kids to build healthy sexual selves involves all of the non-sexual things like confidence, communication, self-reflection, self-advocacy, boundary setting, and these things can be really helped along by supportive and curious parents who encourage kids to think about these things early and often inside and outside of sexuality conversation.
Hunter: Yeah, so you're a psychotherapist or an educator? You help young adults, right? Who? Maybe LGBT kids, teens, young adults, parents, families, all of the above. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm wondering, if, have you learned from, kids who are like, God, I wish my parents had been this, what are the, what do you see as some of the mistakes that we parents make that may end up like driving a wedge between us and our kids or making things uncomfortable for them or making them feel unaccepted?
Rachel Simon: I think there are a couple of answers to that question. One is obviously silence. One is not talking about things at all. Two is coming from a place of shame. Sometimes that gets paired with religiosity, sometimes it doesn't at all, but having this idea that there are behaviors and there are identities that are bad and that, if you do this thing or if you are this thing, then you are bad. I think is a massive mistake and one with really impactful and lasting consequences to people's overall wellbeing, indefinitely their sexual wellbeing. And their health. Yeah. That's interesting because that can, the idea of that can be mean. Us reflecting on also how we speak about things and issues and people around us.
Hunter: Exactly. Exactly. In a, with, in a how we're talking about that. Are we being judgemental of our neighbors or the people in the news or the different things like, and how are we speaking about that and how is that, how is, what is. What are our kids picking up on? What those messages?
Rachel Simon: Yeah. The kids are picking up on everything. They're listening to everything, and I think that's one of the reasons why it can be so slippery and not intended, but the sort of heterosexist and cisssexist way that we assume our kids' genders and sexualities from a very young age. I think I've moved away from this idea that a lot of parents have offered, which is if my kid is queer or trans, then of course I'll love them no matter what. And I take the position like, I don't know what my kid's gender sexuality is yet. They'll figure it out along the way and I'll hopefully help them figure it out along the way. And. I just don't assume going in cis or straightness in most people I meet, I just let them come to me and let me know what's going on, and I think.
There's an openness there where we anticipate a day when maybe people don't need to come out in the same way or it doesn't need to be this whole big thing, and we can only really have that day when SNU and straightness is not really this expected default of everybody around us. And as a partner to that, I would say another mistake I see parents make is to overload these conversations with their values. And to say here's what I believe about sex before marriage, or, here's what I believe about pregnancy and abortion and all, all of the things that might come across in these conversations. And I do think that those values are welcome. But if the conversation stops there and there real isn't an invitation for your kid to offer their own values or maybe differ in their values or maybe still be working on some of their values. I do think that those can be really under what am I trying to say? Underutilized conversations. They're conversations that we don't have enough, I would say.
Hunter: Yeah. But it's interesting 'cause the, I'm thinking about the person listening and you may have some really strong values that you know, that you want to impart to your kids, yet you. You don't know, like what your kid may end up be, as far as like their sexuality, et cetera. And you wanna be accepting of them too, right? So there may be battling forces within parents, around this. And I think it's interesting, if we think about this in terms of so for instance, like maybe if you're a listener and your religion is. Is promotes like heterosexual norms and things like that, and that feels right to you. But you're also but you're also a parent who has a kid, you listen to the podcast and you're like, oh, I want to love, love and accept my kid for whoever they are. At some point it's interesting, there may be a place of saying what is the most important thing to me? You know what I mean? Is it maintaining that relationship with my kid where I have. I have I have, I'm accepting them. I am showing them love. I am, I'm there as a positive influence in their life. Even as they become young adults and et cetera. Or is it this value that may, make it so that, that may drive my kids away from me if they become other than.
The norm that I'm expecting. It's interesting. So there, and I'm wondering, it's almost like you'd have to make that choice like pretty early so that you don't inadvertently, you're saying, you may think in your head like, I can have both, but. Kids are really wanting to be accepted for, as a parent of teenagers, like wanting to be accepted for who they are, they want that openness. It's a very open world and they wanna explore lots of different things and. For you to be there as a loving support and influence and positive person in their life. Like you, you may have to make a decision early on to be a little bit more o, practice some more openness and acceptance.
Rachel Simon: There are ways in which we never know what our kid is going to come to us within 20 years to say how we mess up. The difference generationally that I think a lot of folks are experiencing now on so many different ends, either this idea of boomer parents who aren't willing to take any feedback and all these, millennials who are having to go no contact with their parents and these millennial parents who are attempting to do, some healing work on themselves and, nothing too broad brush. There are plenty of people in all these generations that have bucked all of these norms. But I do think that there's. A bit of a culture of I did the best I could, and so why are you telling me, why are you telling me about these mistakes? And I think part of it is we're making meaning of our own mistakes as we join, this culture of parenthood.
And we say I do think there's a reprioritization that has to happen because when my kids come to me, I don't wanna learn it. I don't wanna learn some of these things too late. I don't wanna learn some of these things at the expense of my relationship with my child. And instead I'd like to be looking ahead and prioritizing the things that I feel like maybe I didn't get or maybe were extra important to me right now.
Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. What are the sort, it's as we talk about this it makes me think like. Having an environment that's like open, accepting. For me, when my daughters were little, I was like really annoyed with the pink and blue thing, like the just like super gendered stuff that was really, that was happening and maybe it's 'cause I was a little bit of a tomboy, which was like a normal acceptable thing back in the day for girls to be tomboys. I was a tomboy- I hated pink. And anyway, so I would put my kids in. I have two girls. I would put them in green dinosaur pajamas and whatever, like they had other things, but it was, I did make a conscious effort to stem the flow of pink into the house a little bit and have a variety of different things around the house that were, of all the, we had all kinds of things, so it just was like an open and accepting environment, I think, as far as what are the outer markers of gender? And then I guess for me, it felt, I'm explaining this because it felt like I, I felt oh my God, that was the right decision, because at 14 or something, my oldest daughter came out to me. And I was, and she was like, I thought you already knew. And I was like, no, I didn't. Of course I didn't. But, and it, there was some processing of course I had to do and, but not a lot. And it was fine. And she always felt safe and fine.
She has friends who are also LGBTQI+ and they don't feel safe telling their parents and I know. Kids and I know the parents and anyway, I just wanna say that like making that choice at a young age, I felt like, I mean I'm, it sounds like I'm like being like really egotistical and pat myself on the back, but like I'm just saying like I feel like that was one of the better choices I ever made as a parent was to make things open.
And you get the gift right, the gift of your kid feeling comfortable coming to you with that. And to say, I thought you already knew. There's a connection there that I think is really special to, to have your kid feel so comfortable letting you in on something so important about them. Yeah. So one of the things you recommend is first thinking about teaching about gender identity and different types of families having resources around the house that are just open and inclusive. Is that just a simple way to check that box? Or what else, what might we be doing? It's one simple way, right?
Rachel Simon: That, that it is important to teach kids about the existence of queer and trans people and families in their resources, in their communities. In their media and also just like in conversation about, who we care about in our lives. Because like we mentioned, everybody has a gender identity and a sexuality and giving kids of all identities. The opportunity to think about and explore their own is such a gift. Cis kids are not really encouraged to explore their own genders. Straight kids are not always en encouraged to explore their own sexualities. And for queer and trans children, it can be absolutely lifesaving as we know. And for CI some straight kids, it absolutely makes them better allies and accomplices to their friends and to their loved ones. And. What we know from various studies of children and adults is that people who have access to this type of information and representation become more empathetic with others, have improved social awareness. Confidence. We know from decades of research that as these kids grow to young adulthood, that comprehensive sexuality and consent education reduces. STI rates teen pregnancy at abortion rates, high risk sexual behavior rates, and even delays sexual activity to begin with. So it goes against that idea that if you teach them, they're just gonna wanna do it. That's, it's the opposite of what we found and. We know affirmative consent education makes kids safer and more communicative when they enter sexual relationships hopefully by choice. And it's crucial if we as parents want our children to have healthy, safe, and pleasurable relationships with sex- whether it's with ourselves or whether it's with themselves or other people, to open the lines of communication and make yourself as a parent, a safe person to come to first.
Hunter: Yeah, it's interesting. I think that's I think that's so true and I've been pushed by podcast guests in the past to like actually have my own conversations with my kids, which. I'm like, okay, I'll do it. I just talked to Amy Lang, I'll make sure I have this. Go talk to my kids now. I'm like, okay guys, I just talked to a guest. I gotta tell you some things. Anyway, it's like a way for me to do it, and dear listener, you should use these episodes as a way to, to push yourself to do it too. But yeah, it's interesting. One thing I think about now, now that my girls are 14 and 17 I've taught, we've talked about so many different things that really get into adult territory. And but one of the things that I think is a difference in the way we think about sex now, right?
We think, we. Always in the past, like I had the what was it? Where do I come from? Book? Did you have that book? Uhhuh? I loved that book. Oh my God, it was such a great book. It's like kind of tubby, like mit hu midwife that they're so cute. And it describes like an a, an orgasm as it feels like a tickle that just and then anyway, or like a sneeze. And I've always thought. A sneeze is a great analogy. Oh, I love the ones that say sneeze. That's so crazy, Annette. It makes me like so excited. Every time I have a sneeze I'm like, woo, I just sneezed. What kind of sneezes are you having? But yeah, just this idea, this is beyond the podcast now. I'm like, Rachel, help me with my own kiss. But the idea of sex as something that's beyond reproduction, but is something about pleasure. Yes. That conversation to me, that feels so beyond awkward. It like, I, it just feels to, I think I can, we can talk about it like obliquely and like maybe joke about it via movies and stuff like that, but is. Anyway. Are there things that we should just wait until-
Rachel Simon: It depends, like what would you want your daughters to wait until 25 to have pleasurable sex? No. No. If they want to, but yeah. This is so revolutionary and I fully credit these wonderful two sex educators, Dr. Charles and Amy Myron, who are this couple, that team teaches human sexuality in matching sweatsuits. And they led a retreat when I was 14 years old and they were my mentors. They're the reason that I got into this stuff. And I remember my mom going to their parents session of this retreat that they were going to lead, and the Myrons asked all of the parents in the room, raise your hands if you would like your children to have positive sexual relationships in their lives. And like my parents, Mo, most of the parents like raise their hands pretty immediately. But I don't think that we think about our role in helping that be true because we don't wanna, we don't want to think about it. And we also like, just as much as our kids don't wanna think about us having sex, like we definitely don't wanna think about their sex lives either.
There's a way to bracket a bit of, I'm not visualizing any of that, but practically logically and emotionally, I want that for them. Of course, you do. You want them to be fulfilled. You want them to be happy. And I think most people would agree that a pleasurable, having pleasure in their sex would be something that we would want for them. We don't want them to be having traumatic sex. We don't want them to be having painful sex. We don't want them to be having terrible sex. And our role in that is to offer conversation and offer education and offer freedom and exploration and leave it to them, but encourage that.
That's just something we wish for them, and that if there's any way that we can guide them to the right resource or help them find. What they need to help them achieve whatever they want safely and in a healthy way. That is actually our role. And when we go silent and when we lean into the awkwardness or when we're, what do you mean? My teenager has a sex toy. La. I don't look the, I would never buy my tea. You know what I mean? What do you want your role to be in, in helping them help themselves and helping them? They're going to get this information somewhere, and if the information that they're getting from society is that, as women, their pleasure doesn't matter, or that as women, their pleasure comes second Ew, we don't want.That for our kids. We don't want our kids to enter sexual relationships thinking, terrible values or that they should devalue themselves or their own pleasure.
Hunter: Okay. So with my 17-year-old, I could say something to the effect of Hey honey, I just want you to know, I want you to have pleasurable sexual experiences in your life, and if I can be a resource for that, let me know. I, I have some. Maybe, I could help you find some resources.
Rachel Simon: Yeah, I think that's a great start. Yeah, I think you can name that. You could also just ask some questions like if you watch media together, I find this is such a beautiful way in, right? We always wanna be critiquing the media for what they're doing wrong and then giving thumbs up for when they do it right. And if you're watching a movie with. Your teens or your tweens and you see a perfect example, which we often do of like consent being ignored or wow. Yeah. In sex scenes, if you're like, shielding your eyes, 'cause you don't wanna be watching a certain thing next to your teen, but you are instead of shielding your eyes and waiting for that scene to be over, to be able to, again, like you said, keep it light, keep it jokey and say where was the foreplay? Hi. That was a little quick. I don't think and maybe that involves a conversation about yeah. Most people with vulvas and vaginas don't go straight for penetration. What just happened there that didn't look like it was fun? Or it should have been as fun as it looked, and sure there's awkward conversations when you're just sitting down doing I don't know what to say to each other. Okay. But media can be a great way to have a, a very light conversation about
Hunter: okay.
Rachel Simon: That really didn't look like it looks in real life. Have you ever, heard of somebody like having an orgasm, a simultaneous orgasm with their partner every single time? Like the people with that anatomy that's not how it really works, and 17 year olds aren't often told that they enter sexual relationships thinking, yeah, that's how it should be. That's what we've seen, that no foreplay is needed, that we're going right. To penetration and that within, 40 seconds that both people are having orgasms and that's not. That's not what's happening in real life. And that's definitely not what the guy, the 17-year-old boys or other folks with other anatomy are seeing in porn. Yeah. Yeah
Hunter: Okay. All right. So I think that's a good idea 'cause we're on a movie kick, so maybe we'll use that. My 14-year-old and I actually watch Bridgerton together, so that was like really fascinating for conversations.
Rachel Simon: What an amazing example. If you're caught up on this last season, there's foreplay, you know there's a lot of yeah. There was a losing of virginity that actually looked like pretty, pretty realistic. Okay. To me. Yeah. Yeah. Pretty realistic to me. And to point that out when they do it well, to be able to say, This person is taking their time. This person is focusing on only their partner's pleasure. Whoa, that's so refreshing to see. Or that's that, I hope that, when you enter into sexual relationship that you feel like somebody can look at you the way that yeah. Yeah. They look at each other there. There's something to be celebrated when there's something to be celebrated and there's something to be cod like. So much more of the time.
Hunter: Yeah. All right. All right. All right. I think I'm gonna go for option B. Rachel, this has been so much fun talking to you. I really appreciate it. Rachel's books are “The Every Body Book” and “The Every Body Book of Consent”. You can get both of them now.
Rachel, any final things that we missed or, and also where can people find you if they wanna reach out?
Rachel Simon: Definitely. I think if I were to distill some of the most important things to help keep in mind, to teach kids about consent and about keeping their body safe I think there are a couple of pieces early early on. Using correct names for body parts is an evidence-based way to keep kids safe and talking, identifying safe adults and encouraging, asking for help is another. Talking early and often and directly about consent in a non-sexual context and then in its sexual context as your kids age. Like we were just talking about, critiquing all of the ways that people and systems around us and our media get things wrong and what they get things right I think is super important. And I really love to highlight my kids' responsibility to keep. Other people's bodies safe from himself, because, especially with daughters, I'm sure you know so much of the narrative around keeping our own bodies safe and especially girls, people socialized as girls and women. So much of it can miss the mark because it's only half of the conversation. And if we're entering into relationship with another person, we have a mutual responsibility of safety. So being able to be a safe person, in addition to keeping yourself safe is a piece of consent education that I also really love. To highlight. And I hope that listeners will walk away with a lot of thoughts and feelings about how they would like to nurture these conversations in their own families.
And thank you so much for offering “The Every Body” book and “The Everybody Book of Consent to your listeners in case those resources can be helpful for them. And depending on the age of the listener's children. I also love to shout out Megan Madison and Cory Silverberg, and Jayneed Sanders, Tyler Feder, and Rachel, Brian for doing great work in this field depending on the age of the kids and the resources you're looking for.
Hunter: Okay. Awesome. Rewind, that section you just heard played a few times so you can write down those names.
Rachel Simon: I talk fast! And people can find me on my website, RachelSimonTherapy.com. I do love my psychotherapy job with my clients every day. I also do some sex ed teaching and then consulting for organizations and PTAs and parent groups all the time, and I love it.
Hunter: Awesome. Thank you so much. It's been really a pleasure to talk to you. I really appreciate you coming on.
Rachel Simon: Thanks again for having me.
Hunter: I hope you enjoyed this episode. Yeah. It's so important to get that shame out of our parenting and to help kids really understand this idea of consent and healthy sexuality. It's so important. I hope you liked this episode. I hope you had enjoyed it. I bet you are gonna know someone in your life that maybe could use this episode, so text it to them, let them know it's here. Tell 'em to subscribe so we can grow the podcast and continue to bring the Mindful Mama Podcast to you.
If you want more about talking to kids about sex, I recommend my episodes with Amy Lang. Check out episode #389 “Talking to Tweens about Sex”-really good one. And I really love my episode from way, way back in 2019, episode #164, “Let's talk about Sex” with Mike Domitrz and really good. So that's #164. Just go to MindfulMamaMentor.com- under “Podcasts”, there's a place where you can just search, and just search for 1 64 and you'll find it. So yeah, dive in, make your kid the most informed and therefore the safest in the neighborhood.
And that's all I got for you today. I'm wishing you a great week. I hope you enjoyed. My episode with Maggie last week, that was such a joy for me. And next week we have a really great teacher on Kristine Carlson talking about “Don't Sweat the Small Stuff.
So lots of great stuff coming up and I wish you ease and peace and stability. And hugs- lots of hugs. Yes, all the hugs. And I will be back to talk to you again next week. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening. I understand you've got a choice and I feel really honored that you're here still listening to me and my guests, and so I really appreciate it. I wish you a great week. Namaste.
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