I have shared many times since my parents' good advice. When I was about fifteen they sat down with me when I asked them to, and they said: "Don't sleep with anyone you're not 100 percent sure you really like and trust. If you feel reservations, listen to those instincts and don't do it, because there's no going back."
So I didn't sleep with the person I was seeing then, or another person I dated after that. And I was glad, during and after. Those guys both broke up with me after that, which was fine with me. A while later I fell in love with someone I had known for several years. Suddenly he just looked so interesting and he had stuff going on in his mind that was funny and sharp and smart and he liked music maybe even as much as I did. We were in the same friend group and had started pairing off with other people when we looked up, looked at each other, and said, "Wait, you're the one that I want."
Throughout my childhood, truly as early as I can remember, I knew about bodies and sex because they were all around me. I spent a few of my formative years in the middle of seas of people who were exploring their bodies, minds, senses -- you name it and they were exploring it. I spent hours in Golden Gate Park, and in the flow and swirl of a hundred parties and concerts and love-ins when people ingested substances, dropped their inhibitions, and did things they never would have done back home, wherever that was.
But my personality is now as it was then both flamboyant and joyful as well as shy at the core. Back then I felt some dissonance. There was tension between what I wanted and what everyone around me wanted. One of my mother and father's friends, a tall, bearish fellow with frizzy honey-colored hair whom I loved and trusted like a dear uncle, once told me, "You don't have to be modest," when I covered my chest after realizing I had worn overalls with no shirt underneath. His well intentioned advice had the exact opposite effect on me, however; I felt exposed and embarrassed about wanting to be modest.
Because my mother had become pregnant with me back in 1962 without knowing much about how babies and anything else worked, she didn't want me to be a victim of that kind of ignorance. She gave birth to my sister at home, and she became a midwife when I was about 10 to help other families have their babies at home. The facts of life were all around us. My mother spent many hours telling me things at various times I was ready and not ready to hear. I am still grateful for her help diagnosing and solving a potentially dangerous problem I had once.
One of the best tools my mother ever gave me was Planned Parenthood. From being a midwife, and her own experience, she knew plenty about people who had babies before they were ready. She was always grateful for the existence of Planned Parenthood and she made sure I knew it was there if and when I needed it.
These days, clinics tend to mark out the names of the people who checked in before you at their reception desks, but back when I was fifteen and went to learn about my contraception options, seeing my classmates' names on the sheet made me feel good about checking in at the Planned Parenthood clinic. My mother asked whether I wanted her to come along and I had my first clinic visit with her present. I felt comfortable going on my own after that. When I was sixteen, I had a stressful moment that ended a week later when my Aunt Flo finally arrived . Not that we called my period that back then -- no euphemisms at our house! And everything worked flawlessly after that -- I was scrupulous in my use of contraception, and got to know the loving man who would nine years later become my husband (and to whom I am still married). Planned Parenthood was there for me -- for us.
I know some of our relatives might find my personal history shocking, but I am still so thankful for that time and space in my life. I had so many stresses at that time with trying to do well in school in preparation for college, and a custody battle in which I was finally standing up to my father and asking to live with my mother for a year before I graduated high school. I still feel that the intimacy my sweetheart and I shared during those difficult years made all the difference in how bearable my life was.
I saw more and more of my friends' names on my Planned Parenthood clinic's sign-in sheets over the next few years. I appreciated the support I felt for my teenage self's need to explore and be protected, and I appreciated having that support into my adulthood. Even though I now have insurance coverage and can see a network specialist for my gynecological needs, I continue to support Planned Parenthood because I appreciate their support fo my and other women's reproductive health and our autonomy and self-determination.
So I didn't sleep with the person I was seeing then, or another person I dated after that. And I was glad, during and after. Those guys both broke up with me after that, which was fine with me. A while later I fell in love with someone I had known for several years. Suddenly he just looked so interesting and he had stuff going on in his mind that was funny and sharp and smart and he liked music maybe even as much as I did. We were in the same friend group and had started pairing off with other people when we looked up, looked at each other, and said, "Wait, you're the one that I want."
Throughout my childhood, truly as early as I can remember, I knew about bodies and sex because they were all around me. I spent a few of my formative years in the middle of seas of people who were exploring their bodies, minds, senses -- you name it and they were exploring it. I spent hours in Golden Gate Park, and in the flow and swirl of a hundred parties and concerts and love-ins when people ingested substances, dropped their inhibitions, and did things they never would have done back home, wherever that was.
But my personality is now as it was then both flamboyant and joyful as well as shy at the core. Back then I felt some dissonance. There was tension between what I wanted and what everyone around me wanted. One of my mother and father's friends, a tall, bearish fellow with frizzy honey-colored hair whom I loved and trusted like a dear uncle, once told me, "You don't have to be modest," when I covered my chest after realizing I had worn overalls with no shirt underneath. His well intentioned advice had the exact opposite effect on me, however; I felt exposed and embarrassed about wanting to be modest.
Because my mother had become pregnant with me back in 1962 without knowing much about how babies and anything else worked, she didn't want me to be a victim of that kind of ignorance. She gave birth to my sister at home, and she became a midwife when I was about 10 to help other families have their babies at home. The facts of life were all around us. My mother spent many hours telling me things at various times I was ready and not ready to hear. I am still grateful for her help diagnosing and solving a potentially dangerous problem I had once.
One of the best tools my mother ever gave me was Planned Parenthood. From being a midwife, and her own experience, she knew plenty about people who had babies before they were ready. She was always grateful for the existence of Planned Parenthood and she made sure I knew it was there if and when I needed it.
These days, clinics tend to mark out the names of the people who checked in before you at their reception desks, but back when I was fifteen and went to learn about my contraception options, seeing my classmates' names on the sheet made me feel good about checking in at the Planned Parenthood clinic. My mother asked whether I wanted her to come along and I had my first clinic visit with her present. I felt comfortable going on my own after that. When I was sixteen, I had a stressful moment that ended a week later when my Aunt Flo finally arrived . Not that we called my period that back then -- no euphemisms at our house! And everything worked flawlessly after that -- I was scrupulous in my use of contraception, and got to know the loving man who would nine years later become my husband (and to whom I am still married). Planned Parenthood was there for me -- for us.
I know some of our relatives might find my personal history shocking, but I am still so thankful for that time and space in my life. I had so many stresses at that time with trying to do well in school in preparation for college, and a custody battle in which I was finally standing up to my father and asking to live with my mother for a year before I graduated high school. I still feel that the intimacy my sweetheart and I shared during those difficult years made all the difference in how bearable my life was.
I saw more and more of my friends' names on my Planned Parenthood clinic's sign-in sheets over the next few years. I appreciated the support I felt for my teenage self's need to explore and be protected, and I appreciated having that support into my adulthood. Even though I now have insurance coverage and can see a network specialist for my gynecological needs, I continue to support Planned Parenthood because I appreciate their support fo my and other women's reproductive health and our autonomy and self-determination.
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