Is it okay to lie to your children about your sexual history?

[Lorelei12]

I do have a quick question for the ones who say “this is a private matter and none of your business.” If your child asks during the course of your discussion on sex “did you have premarital sex?” and you did in fact wait for marriage, do you still not answer and tell them it is a private matter or do you go ahead and answer the question?

I did wait, and I don’t plan on sharing that with our children. Though I don’t think it’s the greatest idea for parents to share their sexual history (however vague) with their children, it’s anyone’s right as a parent to share whatever they want. I personally am a private person, and even though I did wait, my privacy is my privacy. My own family doesn’t even know that I waited. I presume they hope I did, but no one has ever asked me nor would they. It’s not their business.

I also have no idea whether my parents waited, nor do I care. I never asked them, and if I had they would have told me it wasn’t an appropriate question. I was taught that I should wait, and had they told me they hadn’t, I probably would have thought “Well they didn’t and they’re alright, so what’s the big deal?” In my case it was better for them to keep such details private, and teach me what God expected of me and what was best for me. I’m not saying this will work for every family, but in my case it sure did and there isn’t anything wrong with a parent being open to discussing sex without giving personal information that their child has no right to know.

 

[Bookcat]

Is it okay to lie to your children about your sexual history?

No.

But one does not need to tell them either…and can use discrete language etc

 

[Gary_Sheldrake]

I am ashamed of my sexual past, and I regret much of it. Funny enough, I remained chaste until the age of 18 when I found out my mother had lied to me about having saved her virginity until marriage. I was deeply upset about it, and temptations I had had previously became something I took lightly henceforth, perhaps out of anger, perhaps out of loss of faith, or a combination of the two. I don’t want this to happen to my children, especially if I have a daughter, as I would be concerned she would do the same thing. After all, we find more acceptable what our parents deem acceptable, as generations become more and more relaxed. It is hard to find someone who is more chaste than their parents had been. If it were never to be known, would it be a lie, or even a white one, to falsify your sexual history to your children if they asked, in order to protect them from acting out on their temptations?

I think you are having an interesting dialog with yourself on this subject. On the one hand you are saying that your sexual history is at least in part because your mom lied to you about her sexual history. Now, you find yourself considering the idea of lying to your children about yours. Hmmmmm…

Maybe you could raise your children keeping the dialog focused on what the smart options are for them, while acknowledging at a broad non specific level that you gained some of your wisdom on the matter experientially. That’s an honest approach. In fhe meantime, i see nothing to be gained in your feeling ashamed of anything. The first thing i would love to see happen is for you to be more accepting and kind to yourself.

 

[Frank_Drebin]

If you do not want to answer these sort of privacy questions when they are of age to ask them, then the work begins well before you get to that point. I was raised from birth simply knowing the boundaries of what was approrpriate for me to ask and what was not. I simply would never have asked my mother, someone who I did not view as my equal by a loving superior, because I was groomed that way. My sisters were tghe same way. Sure, some children can be more impoetinent than others even with the same upbringing, but avoiding nosiness from children does not begin when they are old enough to generally want to ask about a subject, The boundaries begin long before that.

 

[thewanderer]

If you do not want to answer these sort of privacy questions when they are of age to ask them, then the work begins well before you get to that point. I was raised from birth simply knowing the boundaries of what was approrpriate for me to ask and what was not. I simply would never have asked my mother, someone who I did not view as my equal by a loving superior, because I was groomed that way. My sisters were tghe same way. Sure, some children can be more impoetinent than others even with the same upbringing, but avoiding nosiness from children does not begin when they are old enough to generally want to ask about a subject, The boundaries begin long before that.

One of the best and most sensible posts on this thread. If you never expect or train your children to respect such boundaries when they are young, but you all of a sudden put up boundaries when they start talking with you about sexuality it will very likely seem fishy and inconsistant to your children and probably lead them to believe that you are hiding something from them about this, in other words, that its not about privacy, but about you not wanting to embarass yourself, probably because you did something wrong. I mean, whether or not you did anything wrong, if the kids aren’t used to seeing personal boundaries it is very very likely they will interpret this as being a way of you avoiding admitting that you did something wrong. If you don’t want them to ask about such things, set boundaries from a young age. If you fail to set boundaries and they come asking, however, a refusal to talk about it can cause them scandal and so it might end up being necessary to tell them, even if you don’t want to.

 

[silentfactor80]

I wonder even if one told their kids they waited whether or not the kids would believe it in today’s world. My friend told her family her and her fiancee are waiting and no one believes them. I don’t know why because they don’t live together and they are not the wild type. Of coarse everyone that doesn’t believe them has already had sex themselves. I believe them though. They have nothing to gain by lying.

I think if I had kids I’d say you can have the answer but both mom and dad are going to sit down and talk to you about it together. That is the deal and if you can’t talk to us together about it then you are not ready to know.

 

[Margarete_Faust]

I’m 25 and I still don’t know my parents’ sexual history, and I have asked them before out of sheer frustration concerning my own dating life. They were very good about maintaining the importance of purity and telling me that their history was none of my business. Granted, I have my guesses since I have also heard strange allusions from them, but their refusal to answer anything upright was ultimately beneficial. It does not help me cope with my unsuccessful dating life now, but it did allow me to be idealistic and hopeful until my early twenties.

Of course, some things are unavoidable. My friend was conceived out of wedlock, but born after her parents got married. She saw her parents’ marriage certificate at age 12 and was observant enough to point out that the certificate coincided too closely to her date of birth. Obviously the game was up and her mother had to gently explain what had happened. I would say that situation is the only exception.

 

[mtigue2]

lying is with holding the truth from someone who has a right to know it.
If they don’t have a right to know, it isn’t lying.

Classic example is if you were hiding Jewish people in your apartment and a nazi soldier came asking if you were hiding jewish people in your apartment. The soldier doe not have a right to that information so it is not lying.

But, you tell your parents you are going to library but you are really going somewhere else…lying because parents have a right to know where their kids are.