This post was originally published on here
Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here.
Dear Care and Feeding,
I recently found one of my favorite novels under my 13-year-old daughter’s pillow. Great, right? I’m not so sure!
The books she picked is from my shelf of beloved romance novels. I love reading romance novels whole-heartedly. Knowing the general beats of what is going to happen, and that there will definitely be a happily ever after, is comforting to me. I love reading about yearning and love and sex, too. The books I read are not “closed-door romances”—they’re pretty smutty with racy sex scenes. The particular book she was reading does start out very “casual” and before it turns more serious, though all with consenting adults.
My mom was more into literary fiction when I was growing up, but I definitely read some books with sex scenes when I was young—younger than my daughter, probably. I don’t think it messed me up, and in a way it was probably good for me. Should I just turn my head and let my daughter read these books? Should I put them away? Or should I try to talk to her about them?
—Romance Reader
Dear Reader,
I was probably around your daughter’s age when I started borrowing my grandma’s bodice-rippers. My mom definitely noticed, let me know she’d noticed and laughed at me, but then she shrugged and never mentioned it again.
Pretending you never saw the book is one way to go, and might spare your daughter some embarrassment. (If she wanted you to know she was reading your book, after all, it wouldn’t be under her pillow!) If you do want to say something to her about the book—not to embarrass her or take it away—you could just to let her know that it is totally normal for her to want to read and think about romance and sex, that many romance novels don’t necessarily contain the most realistic depictions of intimacy (but they’re fun!), and that you’re always here if she ever has questions about anything she reads, no matter the topic.
I don’t actually think it’s super important to say anything to your daughter about romance novels, one way or the other. What’s important is that you talk with her about sex and desire and consent, in an open and non-shaming way, throughout her teen years. This might be one more opportunity to do that, but it doesn’t have to be if you’d rather not.
—Nicole
More Parenting Advice From Slate
My good friend has found her mate after several failed relationships and is desperate to be married and start her family (tick tock). I am thrilled that she is engaged, and she has asked me to be in the wedding. I would normally be pleased to do so, except for one issue. She has debt of approximately $250,000 in credit cards and student loans, and she has not told her fiancé about this. I feel strongly that she is morally and ethically required to tell him before they are married, but she refuses. I can’t help but feel like an accomplice to her dishonesty by standing up in the wedding.
