When it comes to protecting our children from abusive dating habits, by way of teaching them about healthy relationships, sex or even interpersonal boundaries, this is what’s happening all around the country: we are failing our youth.

And if parents don’t stop with the “not my kid” mentality, what should come as a strong warning will end up paving the way to what some experts are calling “a new wave of disturbing abuse” in the future.

The alarming results of a new survey show that not only are tweens (age 11-14) and teens (age 15-19) pairing off into couples, they are having sex (including oral sex) and getting beaten and battered in the process. And if that isn’t bad enough, their parents are clueless about what’s really going on.

Consider these actual findings—and these are not opinions; the survey asked about tweens and teens' own or their friends’ dating practices, as well as the parents' beliefs about what’s going on:

When it comes to tweens:

• 72-percent say dating begins by age 14.
  What’s worse: Nine-percent say dating even begins at age 10 or younger.
• 28-percent say having sex (going all the way) is part of the relationship.
  What’s worse: More than one in four kids say some type of sex is part of dating.
• 24-percent say physical dating violence is a serious problem for tweens their age.
  What’s worse: Only 51-percent know the warning signs of a bad relationship.
• 69-percent who had sex by age 14 experienced one or more forms of dating abuse.
  What’s worse: 36-percent of them were pressured into have oral sex they didn’t want.

When it comes to teens:

• 34-percent say an angry partner has hit, kicked or choked them.
  What’s worse: The earlier teens begin having sex, the higher their level of abuse.
• 42-percent say physical dating violence is a serious problem for teens their age.
  What’s worse: This finding is almost double that of tweens and shows these serious problems increase with age.
• 42-percent reported having had sex.
  What’s worse: 44-percent of teens were pressured into having oral sex or intercourse when they did not want to.
• 58-percent who had sex by age 14 report tracking behavior.
  What’s worse: Tracking behavior consists of demands to know where a partner is at all times, or whom he/she is with, and cell phones are being used for such purposes.

When it comes to parents:

• 70-percent aren’t talking about dating relationships because their kids are “too young.”
  What’s worse: That’s a weak excuse for parents who are too embarrassed or intimidated to do what they know they should.
• Parents overestimate what they think they know about their tweens’ dating habits.
  What’s worse: While 20-percent of tweens say their parents know “little or nothing” about their dating—only 6-percent of parents admitted this was the case.
• Only 8-percent reported their child has “hooked up.”
  What’s worse: Twice as many tweens (17-percent) report having hooked up, showing that parents are woefully ignorant when it comes to their own children’s behavior.
• 39-percent of parents think teens in general “make out,” while only 17-percent of parents think their teen has or will.
  What’s worse: Parents who refuse to face facts may pay dearly, and jeopardize their child’s health, safety and even his/her life.

That’s what I took away from a press conference held July 8 at the
National Press Club in Washington, DC. While I didn’t find the result surprising, having experienced many of the same things discussed therein myself, it is nonetheless sad and scary that 32 years later, parents are still not doing their jobs.

In my next post, you’ll meet Sami, a teen whose ex-boyfriend sexually abused her in the woods behind her school and in her own home. You’ll also meet the Burkes, whose daughter Lindsay was viciously killed when she tried to end an abusive relationship.

Their stories will inspire you to do what you can to help yourself and others—especially your own children.

The national survey was commissioned by Liz Claiborne Inc. and LoveisRespect.org. More than 2,000 online interviews were conducted, and demographic quotas were used to achieve a gender, age and ethnic mix that would align with U.S. Census data.


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Posted by Daleen at 05:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Already enough has been said about the “Gloucester 17” so I won’t contribute too much to that particular avenue of thought. Instead, I will say there are many problems facing teens these days, and most adults aren’t even aware of what they are, or how to deal with them. In turn those problems lead to adult, family and even societal problems.

Yes, Americans do have sexual hang-ups, and no, they don’t do a very good job at teaching their children about sex and sexuality. But both topics are a necessity if we want to help teens reach their emotional, psychological and financial potential. Because a teen mother burdened with the chore of caring for a baby over an 18-year (usually more like 20 years, plus) period, definitely misses out on her potential. In most cases.

In some cases, though, what happens can be far worse than that. I spoke about one of these scenarios in my Aug. 3, 2007, column at the Cumberland Times-News last year: it discusses mothers who kill their children. Evidently, I wasn’t the only person who thought it was an important issue—the column took second place in the critical thinking category in the 2007 Maryland-Delaware-DC Press Association contest. (See: Many factors involved when mothers kill.)

Reading about experiences like mine, a teen mother of four children who nearly took that route myself, is one way to become educated about the real dangers facing our young people. Another is to look on the Web, where any number of great sites are available to help parents figure out how what the problems are, and then how to help their children.

For instance, Liz Claiborne, Inc., has been working to prevent domestic violence (a very large problem for our families) since 1991. Check out their site at Love is not Abuse. The other site it operates, the National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline (Love is Respect), offers teens great advice about how to remain healthy during dating relationships. The company has even come up with a curriculum for use in schools, to help teens stay free of such violence.

Sites like these are good because teen sex isn’t the only thing too many parents fail to talk to their children about—so is teen violence. In fact, it’s something that few parents are even aware exists. But it does and guess what? If you take a teen, add some dating violence that includes sex, you have sexual abuse. And sexual abuse can and does result in teen pregnancy.

Just ask Joe Klein, the Time reporter who in 1996 wrote a “Public Lives” column, “The Predator Problem,” for Newsweek.

Referencing a 1995 Alan Guttmacher Institute study, Klein correctly informed us that the majority of teen mothers become pregnant by adult men. His column also pointed to a 1990 California survey, which reported that those teen girls were 10 years younger than the men who fathered their babies.

If you’re still not convinced, that survey was looking at girls who were only 11 or 12. And this was 18 years ago, when we weren’t ready to accept that children that young were willingly having sex. As it turns out, most of them weren’t. A 1992 Washington state study Klein also highlighted found that 62-percent of 535 teen moms were victims of rape or molestation. The men guilty of these crimes were, on average, age 27.

I wonder how many of those very young teen moms ended up like me? I referenced my August 2007 column for a reason—because it’s timely. Teen dating, teen pregnancy, sexual abuse and filicide-suicide are sadly, all too often interwoven themes we refuse to see. But the pattern’s there. We just have to look for it.

And it’s time parents and society understands this. If the Gloucester 17 doesn’t serve as a wake-up call for parents to stop being afraid of talking to their children about sex, if Klein’s article doesn’t help society see fingers are being pointed in the wrong direction and if my experience, as one such pregnant teen, once upon a time, doesn’t do the trick, then it’s quite possible nothing will.

If so, then we may just go the way of Rome.

Posted by Daleen at 02:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)