I always had a sneaking suspicion that I'd go crazy - I just didn't know that it would hit me quite this young. I am 46 years old and my mind has already begun the descent into madness. Not only that - I'm watching it board the CRAZY TRAIN, don Groucho Marx glasses (with nose) and wave at me mockingly from the window.
It's because of sex. I'm thinking about sex almost all the time. Because why? Because Rissa has had a boyfriend for almost three years, who now lives in the same town and walks her home everyday after school. We love him, he's a great boy, and he obviously adores her (hence the walking her home everyday), but he's still a boy who wants to touch my daughter's boobs. This notion of someone wanting to grope my daughter, has made me fucking mental.
Rissa and I were doing bedtime, chatting and laughing, with the added delight of a small tickle fight, and I accidentally copped a feel.
"Sorry! Sorry! Not cool for your Mom to cop a feel."
"It's okay Mummy. It's not like you were squeezing them."
And then the thought hit me. "Has...
the boyfriend done any...?"
And then... she shrugged. That's all it took. A shrug. Letting me know that the boyfriend had already copped a feel.
"Oh God!
OH GOD! Above the waist!! He can touch you anywhere
ABOVE THE WAIST!! PLEASE, KEEP IT ALL ABOVE THE WAIST!!!"
This is when David yelled from downstairs "Everything okay up there?"
"Mummy's gone crazy."
You know how
Inception is all about creating an idea in someone else's mind? That planted idea takes hold
so strongly that it cannot be unrooted. The idea of the boyfriend having sex with my daughter has undone me. No longer am I the cool, collected, unflappable, unembarrassable mother. Now conversations with her about sex have me imagining the boyfriend
having sex with her -
ALL THE TIME.
David's attempt at pragmatism: "Well there are worse things than having her first time be with someone who so obviously adores her."
"
SHE IS FOURTEEN!!!!"
When they study after school, I see his hand on her knee and in my twisted mind, it's one short step from that relatively innocent affection to her entering the Sex Olympics.
(face palm) And when your daughter's made it to the Olympics you want to be all supportive and thrilled with her performance,
"Great job honey!! Great job!! That double-twisting somersault mount was
AMAZING!!"
but it's
THE SEX OLYMPICS!!!! (head banging on table)
I have layered scarring on my tongue from biting it so hard. She knows. I
know she knows. She's
not dumb. But I also remember what it's like to get caught up in a moment and get all tingly and squishy inside. And the next thing you know -
BAM! - hymen-less.
So here's what I've come up with: I try not to harrangue her every single minute of the day, and she has a prescription for the pill. I have told her that this prescription is not tacit permission. I have told her that I still believe she should wait until she's older - much,
MUCH, older... but I'm not an idiot - she's in a long-standing relationship with a boy and I remember what I was doing at her age with boys who weren't my long-standing boyfriend. I frequently share the fact that, at 16, I was not emotionally ready for sex. I share the fact that I had a terrifying
almost pregnancy at 16, and did not practice safe sex when I was young. I tell her it was by the grace of divine intervention that I didn't end up pregnant, with and STD and HIV. During my Tourette's moments I might yell out the words
VAGINAL WARTS now and again.
I didn't think this would be me. I thought I'd be even-tempered and intellectual about it all. I thought my usually brash nature would take over and allow me a measure of laid-backness to my daughter's maturity.
"I'll take Illogical Suppositions for $1000 Alex..."
I didn't account for the Mom Factor. The very thought of my baby having sex makes me hyperventillate. My massage therapist came up with a great idea. We start a parents' group. It would be a rotation system - we would all talk to
other people's teenagers about sex. Teenagers, with whom we
don't share DNA. Teenagers with whom we
don't have a huge emotional connection. Without the
Wonder Years' esque remembrances of the day they were born, how their teddy bear got its name, or their first day of school, it will be so much easier to talk freely about chlamydia and the fact that oral sex should be an equal opportunity sexual act.
I'm starting a sign up sheet for
NOT YOUR MOM'S SEX TALK - who's in? Until we really get going, I'm handing out these pins.