How to Talk to a Five-Year-Old About Sex
- 1). Initiate a conversation with the child to open up communication between you. Choose a comfortable and familiar location such as a sitting room or their bedroom. At bath time, teach your child about body parts by pointing out "this is your nose, this is your arm, this is your penis." Give them real facts to build upon.
- 2). Relax and be calm. Acting nervously may signal to the child that something is wrong. Treat talking about sex casual and natural, otherwise the child will have negative connotations with the subject.
- 3). Respond to your child with a question, when they ask you about sex. Confirm exactly the information they want to know. For example, if they ask, "How does the baby grow inside you?" respond with, "Do you mean where did the baby come from, or how does it eat?"
- 4). Use simple explanations for complicated information. Five-year-olds are inquisitive but unable to grasp complex ideas so formulate basic answers, such as "Mommy has special eggs inside her belly, which met with Daddy's special eggs and created a little baby."
- 5). Be honest with your information. Don't skirt around the subject. For example, if a sexual image pops up on television unexpectedly and the child asks, "What are they doing?" tell the child, "They are having sex, which is a way that a man and woman show their love for each other."
- 6). Praise your child for feeling confident in asking you questions. Say "Good questions! Ask me more any time." This removes boundaries that you face about sex so it becomes a comfortable subject to talk about as the child grows up.
- 7). Talk about sex in everyday situations. For example, if you are in the park and two dogs are copulating and you notice the child looking, then tell the child, "Those dogs are mating, which means that they are trying to make a new puppy by having sex."
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