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Scarleteen Confidential: Teens and Body Image

SCsquareOur societies are chock full of norms and ideals of beauty, and we all run up against them eventually. These norms and expectations often have a hand in shaping how we feel about our own bodies. When you're a teen and trying to sort out how to feel comfortable in your changing body, these messages can be very potent indeed.

So, what can you do - and what shouldn't you do - to help teens feel at home in their own skin?

Scarleteen Confidential: When You Don't Like Their Partner

SCsquareIt's a perennial cliché in nearly every coming of age movie, book, and sitcom. An adolescent or emerging adult character brings home a new boyfriend or girlfriend, who is met with dismay or disapproval by parents.

In real life, it's not unusual for parents to not immediately like the partner of their teen, or to feel wary or cautious when it comes to supporting their romantic or sexual relationship.

So how do you go about working out whether or not your concerns are valid, and what to do about them if they are?

Scarleteen Confidential: Teens and Mental Health

SCsquareMental illness is often a hard thing to talk about even at the best of times. There's still so much stigma attached to it and mental healthcare, and a lot of misconceptions about what someone with a mental illness looks or acts like. It can be doubly scary and intimidating if the person dealing with that illness is your child.

What can you do to create a more supportive environment for a child who may be coping with mental illness?

Consent (and other social conundrums) When Clubbing

Dylan19
asks:
I am a 19 year old guy and I have a question both about club etiquette and general advice. I have gone to nightclubs/pubs a few times with my friends and on the dance floor sometimes girls seem to stand very close to me and seem to be "inviting me" or waiting for me to make some kind of move (everyone tells me, and I suspect its true)....

This Way, Not That Way: Avoiding One of the Most Common Condom Oops

hatOne of the most common condom whoopsies we hear about from our users involves themselves or a partner going to put a condom on, then discovering they've put it on the wrong way.

Often, after doing that, they'll also report following that up with a second common oops, which is just flipping that same condom over and then putting it on the right way.

Lube 101: A Slick Little Primer

Meet our good friend, Lube. It can't create world peace, but it can make some kinds of sex more comfortable, masturbation or other sex you already enjoy even better, help prevent condoms from breaking and more.

Breaking a No Condom Habit

CuriosityCat
asks:
I am 20 and sexually active. I don't have a long term partner but have had and do have various partners. I have an IUD so I'm protected against pregnancy, however I know condoms are still hugely important. My problem is that I am completely stuck for what to say to make a man put one on. At the moment, it's just getting carried away then really kicking myself later....

Rescripting Sex

Life has scripts. Little socially-agreed plays that we enact rather than trying to figure out all our interactions from scratch every time. Many of them are very simple. There's also scripts for sex. Unfortunately, the most common script out there is terrible.