Yes, Your Kid

What Parents Need to Know About Today's Teens and Sex

By: Debby Herbenick PhD, Kristina W. Supler Esq., Susan C. Stone Esq.

Narrated by: Coleen Marlo

Too often, parents wear blinders when it comes to the sex lives of their children. They hear the statistics—how 80% of college students have engaged in rough sex or how one in four teens have sent or received a sext—and think, "Not my kid."

Yes, Your Kid is the reality check parents need about what sex is like today—so they can better educate and support their tweens, teens, and college students. Combining insights from cutting-edge research, conversations with real students, and on-the-ground legal experience, Yes, Your Kid provides:

● An overview of key topics in sexuality, from communication and consent to pornography and rough sex, describing how things have changed

● Real-world legal stories illustrating today's consensual sex pitfalls and clear tips for how to help your child avoid them

● Age-appropriate tools to talk with tweens and teens about bodies, puberty, technology, birth control, and consent

● Concrete advice parents can share directly with their children so that—if and when their children become sexually active with partners—they are more likely to have safer, consensual sex

● Inclusive sexuality education tips for parents of young people on the autism spectrum

©2023 Debby Herbenick (P)2024 Tantor Media

Excellent overview and specifics

If I had children over the age of 10 I’d put this book on a living room shelf and let my kids know why it’s there. I’d invite them to talk about any and all of it. There are so many challenges to offering informative sex education now from when I got it in school at age 11. Not just more complicated issues around birth control and STIs. But why consent is only a baseline criteria for emotionally and physically safe sex. The authors make it very clear why consent alone is insufficient to support healthy, pleasurable, non-abusive sexual behavior. This book covers underage sexting and children sending naked pics of their bodies, how to talk about pornography, the ubiquity among teens of “rough sex” and strangulation (called “choking”) that are as normal now as oral sex was a few decades ago. This book also does a good job discussing diverse sexuality and gender issues, autism, and disability. It’s as compassionate as is comprehensive. I highly recommend it to anyone who wants children and young adults to be prepared for what sex is like in the 21st century.