Parenting

We encourage parents and guardians to have honest, supportive conversations with young people about sex and relationships. Because we know that can sometimes be intimidating, we're always on the lookout for resources to help with the trickier parts of those interactions, which is why we were excited to read the recently released Sex Education for Boys: A Parent's Guide: Practical Advice on Puberty, Sex, and Relationships by Scott Todnem. Scott chatted with us about how the book came to be, how to model positive masculinity, and the different challenges that come with raising boys.

You sound like such a thoughtful parent AND educator. I’m so glad you wrote in! I’ve got lots of practical advice for you, but before I get to it, I hope you’ll have patience while I talk a bit about a couple of crucial ideas embedded in your question. First, thank you for knowing that EVERYONE...

When a young person comes out, the adults in their lives can have all sorts of reactions. If you're trying to be a supportive parent, here are just a few of the ways you can help them navigate those moments.

If you're a young mom, it’s easy to feel overwhelmed during this time. But I promise, you are not alone. Here are some strategies, resources, and affirmations to help you get through the challenges that come with parenting during a pandemic.

Bonnie Rough echoes many comprehensive sex educators in her assertion that it is often adult discomfort with the idea of children being sexual beings, or an inability to see things like nudity in a non-sexual light, that drives the way they interact with children’s sexuality. She’s honest about the ways in which she, and many other well-meaning parents, can be so focused on how they can prevent negative outcomes of sex that they inadvertently reinforce harmful, sex-negative messages. She poses an alternate question for parents to ponder in place of merely thinking about how to prevent negative outcomes: what are my hopes and dreams for my children in their sexual lives?

Young people don’t arrive at their conclusions about appropriate romantic behavior in a vacuum; they’re influenced by a myriad of messages, including input from the adults in their lives. Sometimes that input includes ideas that end up exacerbating issues around rejection and dating. One of the ways we can work towards a world in which acts like this no longer happen, a world in which people, and women in particular, aren’t afraid their “no” will make them a target of violence, is to make a concerted effort to help the young people in our lives learn to deal with rejection in healthy ways. With that in mind, we’ve put together recommendations to assist adults in doing exactly that.

This is part of our series for parents or guardians. To find out more about the series, click here. For our top five guiding principles for parents or guardians click here; for a list of resources, click here. To see all posts in the series, click the Scarleteen Confidential tag below, or follow the...

We remain deeply saddened, angry, scared and horrified about the horrible events that unfolded last Saturday night on Latin night at Pulse, an LGBTQ club in Orlando which took 49 lives, injured over 50 others and have left millions of us hurting. So do many young people. Here are some ways you can support the LGBTQ young people in your family who are or may be struggling right now.

Unless you live under a very large rock, odds are good you've heard some statistics and research about adolescent minds and neurochemistry and how they are still doing a lot of developing through the early to mid-twenties. Yes, the adolescent brain makes impulsive behavior more likely. But that doesn't mean that teens and emerging adults don't know what they want, who they are now, or what they're talking about.

If you're caring for a young person, then the question of when and how to have "the talk" with them has likely crossed your mind. It's generally understood to be one of the more dreaded moments of raising a young person, because it's awkward for everyone involved and seems like an awful lot to have to do all at once. But it doesn't have to be an awkward, embarrassing, weird metaphors about birds and bees filled discussion. And it not only doesn't have to be all at once, it shouldn't be.