My mum and dad never told me that I was found in a cabbage patch, or delivered by a stork. They took a straightforward approach to talking about sex, and always seemed far less embarrassed about it than I did.
Once I started at my all-girls secondary school, PSHE lessons re-enforced the emphasis my parents placed on sex as an important part of healthy and committed relationships. The aim was to enable us to make informed decisions, and to feel confident saying no if need be, not to preach abstinence.
Sex-ed sessions were good on the practical stuff, too. I’m grateful that, aged 16, my schoolmates and I bid farewell to PSHE with an encyclopaedic knowledge of sexually transmitted infections, and the ability to label genitalia diagrams and put on a condom.
The fallacies of Victorian literature were tackled – we were reassured that your first time shouldn’t be horrendously painful and there probably wouldn’t be any blood.
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