You sit there tense, your pulse is racing, your eyes are fixed on the little white machine, and you feel like the suspense is killing you. These are the longest two minutes of your life. Suddenly you see a “+” sign pop up. You’re 15 and pregnant. What are you going to do now? Miller is 13 and HIV positive. Who can she talk to about sexuality and AIDS? “I never thought it could happen to me” are the thoughts of a 16 year old with herpes.
The teenage years are troublesome. They’re filled with important decisions, hard work, school, peer pressure, and what some teens perceive as love. Almost everyone knows what its like to be a teenager. Some decisions are harder than others for teens to make. One decision that is probably the hardest is abstinence. The decision to have sex should not be made while you’re a teenager. Sadly the story of two teens knowing each other, having sex and life working out wonderfully can be found in plenty of fairytales, television shows, and movies. In real life, these people are getting pregnant, contracting and spreading sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and ruining many lives including their own. This happens because children are not mature enough to make the decision to become sexually active or to deal with the consequences that go along with such a risky behavior.
Sex is a subject that has been debated for years. We’ve debated birth control, pregnancy, STDs, and the AIDS epidemic. With all this history behind us, you’d think we’d be a little bit wiser. Instead sex is becoming more of an issue. With new outbreaks of sexually transmitted diseases and the fact that sexually active people are becoming younger, it’s a daily topic in high schools, middle schools, and in a lot of cases elementary schools, too. Did you find the elementary school part a bit shocking? Well, what did you expect to happen? Sex scandals in the media and talking about who slept with who are making it seem like it is an accepted practice in America. Someone came up with the brilliant idea to distribute mass quantities of condoms and consider the problem solved. Telling kids to use a condom or some other form of birth control is not the answer. You can’t expect teachers and schools to do all the educating, nor can you simply close your eyes and hope for the best. With all the emphasis focused on the importance of using condoms and birth control to promote safe sex, aren’t we overlooking the most obvious choice? It may seem “old-fashioned” to some, but if “no sex or abstinence” was promoted as much as “safe sex” is the next generation of teenagers could see things very differently. I’m not saying that people shouldn’t be educated about condoms and other forms of birth control. Teaching them to be responsible enough to take these precautions when they do become sexually active is important, but so is teaching abstinence. And no, I don’t mean that you can simply tell them to “just say no.”
Tell them that approximately 1 million adolescent girls become pregnant each year, and that 86% of all STDs occur among persons aged 15-29 years old. Tell them that sex is not love and love does not have to lead to sex. If your girlfriend or boyfriend breaks up with you simply because you won’t have sex with them, they’ve done you a favor. If both of you are truly in love with each other, you can wait until you’re married and more mature to have sex. Sex is not casual fun like dancing or video games. It is much more than that, and it has emotional and physical consequences. Teach your children early how to avoid peer pressure, and what to say when they find themselves in a sexual situation. They should know that you only get one first time, and that they shouldn’t share this gift with someone they won’t even remember in a few years. There’s no greater joy than to share that first time with your husband or wife. Saving yourself for them means that you are giving them something that no one else in the world can have. It shows that the love you have for your husband or wife is unique and special. The gift of yourself in marriage sets the standard high for what is expected of you and your spouse throughout the marriage. If both of you are virgins at marriage there are no memories to compete with, no guilt, no remorse, and nothing to confess. Tell them that for the sexually experienced, a honeymoon is simply another nice vacation. They’ll want more out of life, love, and marriage than that.
Finally, ask them if a few minutes of pleasure are worth a lifetime of physical and emotional scars? Making the decision not to have sex now doesn’t mean that they can’t share that experience with someone later. It simply means that they are willing to wait until they have achieved their goals and become a more mature individual. And if it doesn’t seem like enough to consider their future, then help them see how their choices could affect the lives of others. They aren’t the only ones affected by the consequences of premarital sex. Remember to tell them that from their DNA to their fingerprints, there never was, is, or will be anyone else like them. They are a unique person who has been given a very special gift, and that’s how you know that they are worth waiting for. When you tell them all this, mean what you’re saying and say it from the heart. They’ll believe you.
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