Despite having a solidly christian family, and despite the strict limitations on what kinds of modern culture her parents would allow her to see, by the time she was 13 she was partying and drinking. The "older boys" - age 16 with a car I suppose - would be very intimidating for these new recruits to their party scene.

   How did they apply pressure? - sometimes there was violence, but mostly it was just the social heirarchy and threats of humiliation and ostrasization. Too often, teenage girls "live and die" by their social status.,,,

  And so what she told me that stunned me was that "SHE WAS NEARLY 16 YEARS OLD BEFORE SHE FINALLY SAID NO".

   as in, "no, I won't have sex with you tonight"!!

    Before that, she had always said "yes".

    Not until age 16 did she finally feel strong enough to make the choice for herself, as in strong enough to define her own boundaries. She had not taken ownership of her body until that night when she finally said "No".

Ponder that for a minute...

   I was shocked, I was speechless while trying to imagine being a girl of 13, 14, or 15 years old and feeling pressured into having sex when she really did not want to, and almost certainly terrified of it the first few times...

   Are we raising our girls right when they don't have to "f*** the football team" in order to be accepted socially? Or even that they don't know that they do not have to be at the top of the social structure in junior high school in order to "be someone"?  I thought sex-ed classes would have improved a bit since the 1970s...

  At the risk of getting off track, I will say that the "strict christian household" where the parents pretend that sex isn't real, or where the parents think it is sufficient to tell their daughters to "just say no", might have been a factor in this case.

   Admittedly, I found it difficult to talk to my sons about sex. In fact, I am guilty of "believing them when they said they covered it in sex-ed classes".  My sons could see I was uncomfortable, and they let me off the hook and I jumped at the escape hatch.

   If I could do it again... so Listen Up you parents of pre-teens - there are HOURS of discussion to be done about sex whether you have daughters or sons. The concept of "our right to define our boundaries", and the social status issues, as well as the mechanics of safe sex, and of birth control, and how to enjoy it if you are going to do it, are all on the table.

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