Modern Sex Education: or, How Exactly Does the Sperm Reach the Egg?

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boy crouching down against wall Providence Moms Blog“How Exactly Does the Sperm Reach the Egg?”
My five-year-old asked that question over and over.

I was a modern mother, but not that modern.

Still, he was persistent. Every time we went the library, he headed to the section on the human body. I would dutifully read it to him but leave out the crucial parts. After all, however ‘modern’ I was, I did not want to be the mother of that kindergartener who explained the facts of life to an eager pre-school audience.

I did acknowledge my own fault in this.

As a modern mother with a 5-year-old, a 9-year-old and an 11-year-old, I was determined to NOT  make …shhh…sex…a secret, scary subject. So I discussed…that stuff…openly and whenever questions were asked.

We were lucky enough to be able to do family dinners, and…those topics…were frequently discussed around the dinner table with some modifications due to the presence of the 5-year-old. But, the whole ‘sperm meets the egg; becomes a baby that is grown inside the mother’ always seemed tame enough.

After all, my own mother had been a “modern mother.” I remember her trying to have “the talk” with me.

“Umm.” she started. “Have your friends told you any jokes that you didn’t understand?”

“Huh? No. What?”

She finally gave up, and just outright told me that whole shebang. I think she included a couple of those “jokes.” None of which I had heard. But I was 11, and she needed to warn me about menstruation. And boys. And accidental pregnancies.

I remember being pretty horrified as well as puzzled.

“It sounds like it would be awfully hard to do…THAT… by accident.”

I thought I was doing better with my own kids. I was even more modern than MY modern mother.  

I thought that until that morning when I was driving my kindergartener to daycare.

“Mom,” he asked. “To get the sperm to the egg, does the daddy put his penis inside the mother? And do kind of a pushup? And pant? And go up and down?”

I gasped, slammed on the brake, skidded to a halt, and put my hand on his shoulder. I shook him, shouting  “WHAT? WHAT?!”

Well, actually, no.

I didn’t do that. I kept trying to be a modern mom. After taking a deep breath, I tried to ask questions. Calmly. And. I was taking him to daycare. I had to catch a train. I had to get to work. (Every modern working mom, has to be bit psychopathic to keep her job. Right?)

So I replied. Calmly. “Umm. Yes. Ummm. How? How do you know this?” (Had he seen his father and me? Had he seen someone else?!)

My precocious 5-year-old was happy to explain.

He had watched a film. In it, the teacher had drawn a diagram on a blackboard with pictures of the sperm and the egg.

“Oh.”

Then the teacher showed a film demonstrating exactly how the sperm got to the egg. In this film, he explained, the teacher put his penis inside the woman, got up on his arms – as though he was doing a pushup – and panted. 

“But?” I asked, still driving. And still trying desperately trying to be calm…”Where!? How!? Who showed you this?!!”

“Josh (his older brother) and Bill (his brothers’ friend.) They were watching a movie.”

Oh. OK.

“Oh. OK.” I replied. Breathing.

“Please,” I added. “Whatever you do, don’t tell any of your friends about this. Please. Don’t tell them how the sperm reaches the egg.”

That evening, after I got home from work, Josh, my oldest, was in trouble.

We discussed it at the supper table. Or perhaps not. Perhaps we discussed it privately.

“WHAT?! What did Greg see? What were you watching? What were you thinking?!” I demanded, somewhat less than calmly.  

“The Meaning of Life. It’s a Monty Python film,” he explained. “It had this really awesome throw-up scene!” He started to describe the scene in great detail.  

“Stop! Wait? Just how was your younger brother able to accurately describe the sex act?!” I demanded, somewhat less than calmly.  

“Umm. Oh. Well. There was a scene where a professor drew a diagram of the sperm and the egg on the blackboard. Then he switched to a home video of him and his wife…doing it…it was kinda boring…”

“What?!! You were supposed to be babysitting?! How could you let your younger brother watch that?!!”

“Umm. Well, we tried to get him to go away, but he just wouldn’t leave…”

“You could have turned it off!” I exclaimed.

I breathed. I remembered that my first rule for babysitting was to NOT fight. And that 11-year-olds watching movies didn’t ever turn them off. I don’t remember who had picked up “The Meaning of Life.” And to this day, I have not seen the offending film.

Blessedly, I never got a complaint from the daycare. Either my son did not share his revelation, or his fellow kindergarteners did not have “modern parents” and did really care exactly how the sperm got to the egg. Maybe the daycare owners were modern and intrigued.

Whatever. There is no moral to this story. My kindergartener is now married with two children of his own. So, all’s well that ends well. Apparently, he did figure out exactly how the sperm reaches the egg.

 

boy crouching down against wall Providence Moms Blog

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Carol-Ane Woodard
Carol-Ane Woodard was born in Rehoboth, which is in Massachusetts, but really should be a part of Rhode Island. She grew up taking the Trailways bus into Providence and shopping at the Warwick Mall. She currently lives in Foxboro, Massachusetts with her husband of of 38 years, Paul Woodard, but she misses coffee cabinets, red clam chowder, and hot wieners, and she still considers Providence to be her home city. Carol-Ane graduated from the University of Massachusetts in 1973 with a degree in sociology. She minored in business at U Mass Dartmouth and took a job for the FDIC as a bank examiner. She worked there for 30 years and retired 10 years ago. Other than her 3 children and 5 grandchildren, her hobbies include reading, reading, and more reading, interrupted only by hikes in the woods, Freecell, and knitting. Although her Linkedin profile lists her as a stay-at-home grandmother, Carol-Ane actually has a rather nervous disposition and is frightened by small children. Nevertheless, she persists.

1 COMMENT

  1. I can just imagine what went thought your head. After 63 years of being your sibling, I think I know you pretty well. Anyway, I know what would have gone through MY head.

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