There is no quick fix trick to motivating your teenager. The motivation has to come from within him.

However, what you can do is inspire that motivation either through the strength of your relationship or by creating a more mature and responsible teenager.

These are things that are not hard to do.

Go to: http://ccparenting.com/parenting/12/

This will give you some insights.

Warmly,

Anthony Kane, MD

Thanks.

So from my personal opinion, schools may try helping, but I have to agree that if parents choose not to teach their children, and they \"believe\" schools giving out \"condoms\" leaves these children, safe,yes, I do mean
children, the kids are left with t.v.,peer pressure,curiousity,hormones, etc., as the outlet to learn about \"sexual activity.\"
I was very very lucky. It tears my heart out that I lost a baby. But God gave me two more beautiful children.
So again, the only agenda I have to share these stories is because I do agree and I believe that Learning about \"human sexuality\" should be taught by parents before the child is even old enough to get pregnant. It is a very difficult subject for, from my experiences, some parents to share and teach this \"subject\" that truly seems to get more attention than the actual children.
I agree the stress and responsibility many teenagers feel should a \"unplanned pregnancy\" occur is something that they shouldn\’t even have to think about.
Once it occurrs, going from being a \"child\" to a \"parent-child\" is very hard for everyone involved. So again, in my opinion, parents should be \"very\" involved.
I hope this may help. I have found every post helpful. I believe if parents felt open enough to talk with other parents and their children, we would have less
\"unwanted\" pregnancies because I truly believe and have experienced that communication will always remain the \"door to learning and accepting.\"
Linda

Are the schools who hand these drugs out willing to pay for any medical care that is needed due to undesireable side effects? Who is responsible if one of these teens dies from the contraceptive or procedure? Are these schools willing to take that gamble? Are they insured for the lawsuit that would occur if a child died due to their administering these drugs? Would they foot the bill for the funeral? Do they even consider the possibility of these contraceptives interacting negatively with any other medications the child is taking which they may not be aware of?

How can they justify going behind a parent\’s back and making these options available when these very same children cannot even get routine vaccinations or medical care without parental consent? It\’s ridiculous!

I conceived twins at age 17 and again at age 20. My father left when I was a baby. My mother is a drug addict. I did not have healthy role models. Yet I was a very smart girl. I knew full well that sex could result in pregnancy and/or STD\’s. I wasn\’t too concerned about either of those consequences. In a sense, I HOPED to get pregnant so people would pay attention to me. I was so lonely. I mistakenly believed that if I became pregnant that the father would love me and stay with me forever. I was VERY illogical but I truly believed this lie. I was SO irrational, even at 17-18 years old! And no matter how many times the guys left after he got his \"fil\"l I still believed this lie and moved on to the next guy. I\’m embarassed to admit that I had over 50 partners before my 21st birthday.

What may have prevented my teen pregnancies would have been someone teaching me the value of me, teaching me that sharing my body, my most intimate parts of myself was sacred and not to give it away to just anyone. Teaching me to value myself enough to wait, be selective, and yes, save myself for marriage. Nothing is more sacred that sharing your body with the one who will be with you for life. Sex should occur when there is mutual love and dedication and commitment between the man and woman.

Instead of asking myself, \"Is this guy good enough to share myself with? Does he meet my standards? Can I see myself growing old with him, sharing a room in a nursing home with him?\" I set out to find value in me as a person and I based my value on whether or not a guy would have sex with me.

No one told me those things. Promiscuity was what was modeled in my home. My mother looked for love by offering her body before she even knew the men she brought home. She was looking to fill the void in herself and I followed in her footsteps.

My twins are 12 and 9. Each set was a boy and a girl. I am not too concerned about them becoming sexually active. I am very open and honest with my children about my past mistakes. I explain the reasons why I regret the behavior I engaged in, how the consequences affected me, but more importantly, how my actions back then affect them now. The fathers are absent parents and my children suffer because of that. We discuss these things often.

Will that keep them abstinent until marriage? I really don\’t know. But what I do know is that if someone had invested time in me when I was their age, perhaps I would have valued myself enough to not share my body so ignorantly and so freely. All I can do is invest as much time as I can in my kids and teach them the values and morals I hold so dear and pray they don\’t make my mistakes.

If for some reason one or more of my children engage in premarital sex and conceive a child, I know my children will come to me…not to some stranger who doesn\’t have their best interests in mind, who will give them drugs to prevent pregnancy or perform some risky surgical procedures on them that kill their babies and can even kill them.

Is sex education the answer? Yes and no. It is part of the answer but not something that should be managed by the government or the schools. This kind of education needs to take place within the privacy and safety of home. What we SHOULD be doing is strengthening the parent-child bond by encouraging parents to discuss these things with their children and encouraging the children to trust their parents, go to their parents.

Educating the kids about STD\’s could be part of their health class but it has to be real. We can tell teenagers anything until their eyes glaze over and they zone us out. Put a class of kids in front of a projector and SHOW them what herpes looks like. Show them what genital warts look like. Have them watch a vaginal birth and a cesarean birth. Have them watch an abortion being performed. Show them what REALLY happens instead of telling them that they can have so called \"safe sex\". No sex is ever safe.

Right now with sex education in school and some schools handing out birth control, what is happening is that the parents are kept in the dark, their authority is upsurped and the schools enable the teens to continue engaging in risky promiscuous behavior. Birth control is widely available, but, as clearly demonstrated with this particular school, these girls wouldn\’t have used it. Their intent WAS to get pregnant. Availability of birth control wouldn\’t have prevented these girls from attaining their goal.

Are freely available birth control pills the answer? Absolutely not. My mother started me on birth control pills at the tender age of 11. I now have multiple reproductive problems…endometriosis, fibroids, severe adhesions, ovarian cysts, and I live in near constant pain. I am convinced that the reason for my health issues was the birth control. And I\’m certain, even if I can\’t prove it, that the reason why I had two sets of twins so young is because my body\’s abilty to ovulate was suppressed so long, before I even began menstrating.

Is abortion the answer or even an option? Never. All abortion does is enable reckless behavior and activity. People think abortion is a cure-all but really, it\’s part of the problem. Women don\’t have to worry about becoming pregnant since they can always \"get rid of it\" if necessary. Women do have a choice. They can choose to NOT have sex and thus not take the chance of conceiving. It\’s that simple. Adoption is a viable option for the sexually assaulted. And I say this as a survivor of multiple sexual assaults as a child.

Abstinence is truly the only guaranteed way to avoid unintentional pregnancy. It\’s not a religious theory…it\’s scientific FACT. Don\’t give them a false sense of security by teaching them \"safe sex\". Give them the truth about the real consequences of sex.