Becoming Sexually Active
Becoming sexually active is not a door you need to go through to become an adult. It’s not a “right of passage” to make you mature or a “real woman.” And it’s not something you just do “because everyone else is doing it,” like getting your driver’s license. It’s a significant step that has many responsibilities connected to it. Sexual activity choices are choices that each person needs to make purposefully and with much forethought.
Sex YES / NO
Which of these girls do you want to be right now – at this point in your life?
Rebecca, YES
- Is worried and tense all the time and often feels depressed.
- Is scared every time her period is late that she might be pregnant.
- Wonders if her boyfriend really cares about her or is just there for the sex.
- Worries about getting an STD and wonders how many partners her boyfriend had before her.
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- Feels terrible about the lies she tells her parents and the sneaking around she does.
- Worries that a pregnancy might force her into a marriage or even an abortion one day.
- Feels like she’s on shaky ground and worries about how she can continue handling everything and still make it in college.
Tammy, NO
- Is happy, healthy, and feels good about herself.
- Has no fear. Her period comes on time every month.
- Knows that her boyfriend respects her and won’t pressure her to have sex.
- Is healthy and confident about her body and her own sexuality.
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- Has a close and honest relationship with her parents and family.
- Anticipates being married and she’s not ready for having children.
- Looks forward to going to college and achieving her career goals.
The Best Lines To Get A Girl To Have Sex:
When it comes to sex, there are standard “lines” that have been used successfully for years. If you don’t want to fall for them, know what they are, recognize them for what they’re meant to do, and learn some good comebacks.
- Don’t you love me?
- Come on, everybody’s doing it.
- I do it with all my girlfriends.
- You mean you’re still a virgin? Are you just a kid?
- If you get pregnant, I’ll marry you.
- I’m not like other guys.
- I love you.
- I love you so much I want you to have my baby.
- What are you waiting for?
- Sex isn’t a big deal.
Although girls can, and sometimes do, lead guys on, guys are more likely to use these lines to get sex. And, sadly, many girls have fallen for them. A girl may find it hard to believe that a boy is lying when he says, seemingly with great sincerity, “I love you!”
If you’re a girl, you need to know two things:
- If a boy puts any kind of pressure on you to go farther than you want to go, it shows he’ll sacrifice your self-respect and physical safety for himself. He’s interested only in getting what he wants.
- Many guys will lie through their teeth, say anything, and do whatever else they have to do to get sex.Remember, if you’re dating someone who is pressuring you to have sex, you’re dating the wrong person.
Why Do Guys Break Up After Sex?
Girls wonder why a guy often breaks up with them after they start having sex. Here’s what some guys said:
Reggie: You get bored. It’s like a kid with a new toy. After you’ve had it awhile, it gets old.
Jed: After I have sex with a girl I don’t want to see her anymore.
Ivan: After we had sex she thought she owned me, so I dropped her.
Rick: Everything got too serious after sex. No more fun.
Terry: She wanted commitment, and I didn’t.
Mat: She got pregnant, so I split.
How About Sexting? No Big Deal, Right?
Now consider this:
Wisconsin – A 17-year-old was charged with possessing child pornography after he posted naked pictures of his 16-year-old ex-girlfriend online.
Alabama – Authorities arrested four middle-school students for exchanging nude photos of themselves.
New York – A 16-year-old boy is now facing up to seven years in prison for forwarding a nude photo of a 15-year-old girlfriend to his friends.
Pennsylvania – Three teenage girls who allegedly sent nude or semi-nude cell phone pictures of themselves and three male classmates in a Pennsylvania high school who received them are charged with child pornography.
Texas – A Texas eighth grader spent the night in a juvenile detention center after his football coach found a nude picture on his cell phone that a fellow student sent him.
Florida – One notable incident in Florida left 18-year-old Philip Alpert listed as a registered sex offender for the next 25 years after he was convicted of sending nude images of his 16-year-old girlfriend to family and friends after an argument.
CBS News legal analyst Lisa Bloom said of the six teens in Pennsylvania, “This is a serious felony. They could be facing many years in prison.” News reports are constantly identifying legal repercussions after these indecent photos appear online, and attorneys say there are many unanswered questions about whether young people who send their photos could face prosecution for obscenity or child pornography. Depending upon the individual state, both parties can be subject to all kinds of laws and prosecution.
Sexting photos seldom stay in only the phone they were sent to. Their distribution is often extensive as they circulate among friends, on social media, online, etc. And once the photos are out there, there’s no taking them back.
Here’s Syndey’s story:
You hear all the stories in today’s world… rape, abuse, sexting. I never thought I would be one of those girls. He was my first real boyfriend. I didn’t know at the time what sexting was, that it is illegal, and it means you have no self-respect. We had been dating for two weeks, and he asked for a picture.
Not knowing what he meant, I sent a picture of my face. He texted me back saying me naked or of something under my shirt. Surprisingly I actually sent ten pictures to him. Then he dumped me! Girls, if your boyfriend asks you to send a picture of you naked, dump him. All he wants you for is sex. You can do better than that. I have learned, but every day I live with the guilt of the pictures. I never knew, but you can do better.
Love vs. Lust
The Physical Facts
Since the beginning, every living thing has been genetically programmed to procreate to continue the species. In the animal kingdom, having sex is the method by which offspring are created and born, thus maintaining each species. This genetic programming includes the highest of the species, man.
You may have heard people refer to the “raging hormones of teens.” That’s because the hormones that genetically kick in during preteen and early teen years are the ones that create the sex drive for both girls and guys, and this causes very new, different, and intense feelings and emotions that you have never felt before.
The result of all this is that the male of any animal species is programmed to go out and impregnate a female, and that applies to humans as well. At the same time, girls are programmed to be receptive to a mate to get pregnant and continue the species. However, the continuation of the human race is also affected by the intellectual responsibilities of humanity, community morals, religious beliefs, and other factors.
Consequently, instead of following their animal instincts, humans are separated from the animal kingdom by their high intellect, and they must use this intellect to restrain themselves and take responsibility for their actions rather than just going out and procreating all over the place.
Now, this is especially tough on the guys, as the male sex drive is strongest between the ages of 17 and 21. Look Out, Girls!
Girls, on the other hand, have the strongest sex drive during monthly ovulation, that time of the month when you WILL get pregnant if you have sex. This makes logical sense when viewed from the context of evolution. Ovulation is the most fertile phase for women, and increased interest in and responsiveness to sex during this time ensures a more significant probability of conception and procreation than at other times of your monthly cycle.
This increase in sex drive has been attributed to increases in estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone and generally kicks in anywhere from a few days before ovulation until ovulation is over. So, if you don’t want to get pregnant, beware of this heightened desire.
Despite all this genetic programming, it is not an excuse to allow your animal instincts to overpower your intellect to the detriment of your life and plans.
How Girls Feel
You feel incredible, giddy, happy, cheerful, ecstatic, romantic, on cloud nine! He’s so cute, adorable, you’re obsessed, you think about him all the time, you melt at his feet, he’s perfect! It must be love, right?
If you read The Physical Facts above, you know by now that all those hormones kicking in are meant to make you have these feelings when an appealing potential mate turns up. It’s all part of that genetic drive to propagate the species. This is not real love; it’s pure physical attraction propelled by increased hormonal activity.
And if you are near this wonderful guy in a very private place at that dangerous time of the month when you are ovulating (when those hormones cause your sex drive to be at its peak), you are most likely to give in to those feelings, because you think this is real love. It’s also the very time when many girls lose their virginity. This is when your brain must kick in and evaluate the whole situation.
Girls are very, very vulnerable to these physical attractions in their early teens, as they are also thinking about romance and how good that all feels. That’s why they get pulled in by guys who will tell them anything, like “I love you,” to get them to have sex, and that’s why so many girls get pregnant under these circumstances, only to have the guy up and leave. Like, for example:
I was 13 years old and I thought I was in love with the guy. I was still a virgin at the time, and he knew that. So one day he said if I really loved him I would give it up to him. At the time I thought it was right because I thought I was in love with him. Three days after we did it, he told me he had another girlfriend and he just wanted to have sex with me.
I was 14 when I lost my virginity. I thought I was in love with the guy I lost my virginity to. He told me he was in love with me and wouldn’t leave me for any reason. So I let him talk me into having sex. We broke up a month after it happened.
I lost my virginity when I was 13. It was to a boy I loved, and I thought he loved me. As soon as “it happened” it was a total flip. He was a total jerk. Two weeks later we broke up.
Now Consider This
Guys are inclined to have one-night stands, and girls tend to connect love and sex. Girls connect sex with romance and intimacy, and guys focus on body parts and functioning. Did you know that eight out of ten first-time teen sexual relationships last only a few weeks or months, and one-quarter of them are one-time experiences? Did you know that 85 teenage girls get pregnant each hour?
Now, here’s one more thing to think about. Do you know what statutory rape is? Statutory rape is sex with a person who has not reached the age of consent, even if both people participate willingly. All 50 states have very different laws concerning the age of consent. In most states, it is 16 years old, but in some states, it is 17 or 18. Consequently, if you are under the age of consent, the “love of your life” could be charged with statutory rape.
Now think of this: do you know anyone who met their future husband when they were 13 and ended up marrying them and spending the rest of their life with them? Do you know any happily married couple who fell in love at 13? No, and that’s because those feelings are only the beginning of understanding love vs. lust and all those physical and emotional aspects.
Having several different boyfriends over the years gives you the experience of learning what you want in a husband. All boyfriends start “perfect” initially, but after getting to know them better, you often find things you don’t like about them. That’s why boyfriends come and go before you pick your husband.
So, consider this time a training ground, and don’t let your hormones rule your actions. They are programmed for only one thing: procreate. You, however, are programmed for many, many other things and need to understand that your physical needs must be controlled so you can also pursue your emotional and intellectual wants.
The key to success during this time is to learn self-control (both girls and guys). Girls, however, learn faster, as they’re the ones who get pregnant and must deal with the consequences. Once you have experienced several boyfriends, know that self-control, and look at the world with more mature eyes, you can find real love. Real love is not just a huge physical attraction. It’s wanting the same things as adults, home, family, etc., and making plans to have them in the future.
How Guys Feel
OK, guys, you know all about your sex drive. It’s with you every minute of the day. And if you checked out the page on The Physical Facts, you know WHY that sex drive is so strong. However, just because you’re genetically programmed to carry on the human race, it doesn’t give you an excuse to go out and populate the world.
Most teenage guys are in lust, not love. There are exceptions to this, but here’s a way to test out your feelings:
If you’re totally focused on her looks and body and already fantasizing about what she looks like naked and what it would be like to have sex with her, that’s lust.
If you pressure her by saying, “If you love me, you’ll do it,” that’s lust.
If you don’t really listen to her when she talks about her life, interests, friends, etc., and are only thinking about having sex with her, that’s lust.
If you want to have sex or have sex and then brag about it to your friends, that’s lust.
If you don’t want her involved in your life, except when you want sex, that’s lust.
For guys, lust is a very heady experience. The brain goes on vacation, and the red-hot surges of testosterone run the show. Guys are perfectly capable of engaging in sex without forging any emotional bonds with a woman and often do.
So, you’re not responsible for all this; it’s just those hormones that take over, so you can’t help it? Wrong!!! You also have a brain, and it’s your responsibility to keep it engaged, no matter how hard that is. Did you know that 50% of guys have never considered what their lives would be like if they got a girl pregnant? Well, you need to think about that.
The Effect of Pregnancy
If you want to be irresponsible and go out and get two or three girls pregnant, you can kiss your financial future goodbye. Have you heard of child support? Depending upon the state, you are financially responsible for your children until they reach 18 or 21!
The average child support payment is $400 to $500 monthly, depending on your income. So, with anywhere from $400/$500 to $1,200/$1,500 per month, it will be challenging to afford child support, a college education, a new car, a house, etc. And every hour, 85 more teenage girls get pregnant!
You mustn’t figure you can count on abortion as a backup, either. Abortion is her choice, not yours. You have authority in the decision.
Now, here’s another thing to think about. Some girls, especially the youngest ones, WANT to get pregnant because they want a baby, and they’ll do anything to get one. She will tell you she’s on the pill or other birth control, but you never really KNOW that’s true.
So, it’s easy to be tricked into fatherhood, and it doesn’t make any difference how it happened. You’re still responsible for child support. And don’t think you’ll get away with saying, “It’s not mine.” A simple DNA test will prove that.
Finally, are you familiar with statutory rape? Statutory rape is sex with a person who has not reached the age of consent, even if both people participate willingly. All 50 states have very different laws concerning the age of consent. In most states, it is 16 years old, but in some states, it is 17 or 18. Consequently, having sex with a girl under the age of consent could get you charged with statutory rape by her angry parents and ruin your life.
This doesn’t mean that guys can’t fall in love, but it takes a lot of maturity to reach that point, which usually doesn’t happen in your teen years. Real love is the most ennobling of human emotions and makes the guy want to “be a better man” and to make a home and family with this person.
Love Or Lust
How do you tell the difference? When you’re strongly attracted to someone and feel desire and longing for them, it’s very easy to confuse this with love, but it’s not. Lust is purely physical, with a need for gratification, and hormones drive it. Lust is short-term, and love is for the long haul.
If you find a person’s face and body gorgeous, and the things they do push your buttons, then you have lust, and it feels fantastic, but it’s not love. When the chemicals start to fade from your body, the lust will disappear, and you’ll be wondering what you ever saw in them.
Now, let’s examine love because it’s not just physical attraction. It’s far more than that.
- You have excellent compatibility. You are sincerely interested in your partner’s words and can spend hours talking.
- You want to spend all of your time together without the involvement of sex.
- You see a future together and talk about it seriously. You begin to plan your lives together, including marriage, home, and family.
- You introduce them to your family and friends with great pride, and it is essential to you that they like them.
- You include your partner in all your plans and consult them for advice.
- You become more romantic. This is especially true of guys, as girls start that way anyway. Guys will send flowers and notes, plan romantic evenings, and call to say they missed you.
- You jump to their defense if someone says something unkind about your partner.
- “We” become more important than “me”.
- You want to know everything about them, and you can accept excellent and not-so-good qualities.
- You support each other’s interests and encourage them toward their goals.
- You have an intense feeling of caring for your partner and only want the best for them.
- You want to spend your whole life together.